PYLUSD hosts K-12 AVID professional learning workshop

On Wednesday, September 27, the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District (PYLUSD) hosted more than 80 AVID principals, coordinators, and leader teachers, and teachers for the first of six county-wide K-12 professional learning workshops.  This group represented 17 PYLUSD schools including three high schools, six middle schools, and eight elementary schools, as well as guests from Capistrano and Santa Ana unified school districts.

The one-day session provided more than six hours of training in writing, inquiry, collaborative, organizational, and reading (WICOR) strategies, as well as collaborative discussions on ways to support the AVID site team at each school. Workshop topics included AVID for All, which focused on utilizing the best AVID strategies with all students; deepening AVID-Schoolwide, which focused on spreading the most impactful practices in all courses; and a World Cafe Conversation, which focused on the sharing of new ideas for all schools to bring back to their sites. Participants from each site team were asked to bring at least one idea to share. The experts from each group shared while the other team members circulated to the various tables. Some of the topics included fundraising ideas, college field trips, curricular lesson plans, technological resources, and school-wide instruction.

In addition, participants were able to collaborate as a site team with their peers across grade-levels, departments, schools, and even school districts. Participants walked away having expanded upon their skills while receiving the support and resources needed to be more effective in preparing all students in all classes to be college and career ready.