Every adult on the [school] campus should understand the signs and symptoms of trauma and mental-health issues.

Schools and districts looking to implement initiatives like Professional Learning Communities  (PLC+) must realize there isn’t one recipe for success.  Successful implementation must be viewed as a journey and not a destination.

Our students’ academic progress, we have come to understand, hinges on their ability to utilize their emotional skills. Chief among these is gaining a sense of belonging.

We are not focused on remediation, which is deficit-oriented thinking that focuses on gaps and loss and might result in lowered expectations.

A memorable professional learning event we attended challenged our thinking about the ways in which students with disabilities should be educated.

It comes as no surprise that students whose teachers have lower expectations of them learn less than peers in high-expectation classrooms. These beliefs are telegraphed by our behaviors. 

Equity requires that schools pose questions to themselves—starting from the assumption that inequities, like water, surround us—and identify barriers that restrict students' aspirations. An equity audit helps us do so.

Engagement isn't simply about low-level compliance. Indeed, existing and new research can help us understand engagement, and how to identify it, in a new light.

The damaging message inferred from the learning-loss narrative is that educators' "extraordinary commitments" and dedicated "talents, energy, and resources" last year2 were all for naught.

Through this value of Activation, the PLC+ framework places a premium on the role human behavior plays in PLC settings and helps teams navigate challenges and maximize their collaborative expertise.