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Blog post Ashley ShawSREB Communications Specialist

7 Tools and Activities You Can Use to Keep Your Class Engaged

Picture of the "Breaking Out of the Box" session with an overlay and the text: Ideas to Make Your Class Engaging

In this post, we give you ideas on activities you can do to make your class more engaging for your students.

If you have been looking for ways to make your class more interactive, then this is a great place to start.

Blog post Ashley ShawSREB Communications Specialist

New Economy, New Class: Adam Welcome Provides Questions to Ask to Transform Your Class

Image of Adam Welcome on stage with an overlay and text that says "Questions to Ask to Transform Your Class:  Promising Practices from Our 2023  Making Schools Work Conference"

The world your students will encounter when they leave your classroom is different than the world you encountered when you left school. As job opportunities and technology changes, your classroom should change with it.

In the 2023 Making Schools Work Conference closing address, Adam Welcome shared ways to make sure your classroom is transforming with the times, and we have compiled them here for you.  

Blog post Ashley ShawSREB Communications Specialist

Is Your Glass Half Empty or Full? Lessons From Kelsey Tainsh on Shifting Perspectives to Improve Schools

Title image: Picture of Kelsey Tanish on stage at the 2023 Making Schools Work Conference with an overlay and the title of the post.

Kelsey Tainsh knows what it means to overcome adversity. At 15, a brain tumor caused her to become paralyzed. She didn’t let that stop her, though.

In her featured session at the 2023 Making Schools Work Conference, she talked about how a change in perspective can change everything, and what that means for your classroom.

Blog post Ashley ShawSREB Communications Specialist

Combining Education With Job Skills: Tips From the 2023 Making Schools Work Opening Address

Packed ballroom listening to the opening speaker

In his opening address at the 2023 Making Schools Work Conference, Adam Welcome talks about how the changing economy means we need some changes to the way we teach. 

Job experience and skills are more important than ever, and what those job skills will be are changing too. In this post, we give you insights into his opening address.

Blog post Ashley ShawSREB Communications Specialist

What We Learned at the 2023 Coaching for Change Conference

Coaching for Change opening conferenceSometimes seeing an abandoned hallway is scary…like if you are stuck in the middle of a horror movie, for example.

Other times, it is a bad sign…like if you are throwing a big house party, it’s two hours after it was supposed to begin, and still nobody has showed up!

Still, though, at other times, it’s a sign of a success…like at the 2023 Coaching for Change Conference, where you could walk down any hallway during a session and not see anyone (because everyone was so involved in the great lessons being presented.)

Blog post MariTere Molinet, Guest BloggerSREB-State Doctoral Scholars Program Graduate

Giving Feedback: The art of speaking up to collaborate and empower

MariTere Molinet
An occasional series from the Doctoral Scholars Program on postsecondary topics

When I first started my Ph.D. program, I was taken aback that none of the talks offered to graduate students focused on how to give feedback to others. Plenty of workshops discussed how to receive feedback, but coming from an industry where feedback was encouraged and expected, I felt we were missing a part of a very important equation.

Blog post Pilanda Watkins-Curry, Ph.D., Guest BloggerSREB-State Doctoral Scholars Program Graduate

Pursuing the Ph.D. – How to Get Your Research Published

Pilanda Watkins-Curry, Ph.D.
An occasional series from the Doctoral Scholars Program on postsecondary topics

Publishing a journal article is a significant milestone for a Ph.D. student’s academic journey. It showcases your contributions to your respective field and acts as a validation of your research skills and expertise. The process of publishing can often seem overwhelming and time-consuming, but with the right approach, it can be a relatively smooth experience.

Blog post Jhonatan Saldana, Guest BloggerSREB-State Doctoral Scholars Program Participant

Putting Yourself Before Your Work

An occasional series from the Doctoral Scholars Program on postsecondary topics

After working in research in one capacity or another for the past six years, the most common topic I hear about when speaking with fellow students is stress. We just can’t help but mention the stress of working on a time crunch, the stress of submitting grants, the stress of funding; stress is always an underlying theme to our careers and one that appears to have no end. However, not all is doom and gloom. There are many ways in which we can try to balance our work-related stress, and below are two which can get overlooked.

Blog post Precious Hardy, Guest BloggerSREB-State Doctoral Scholars Program Participant

Structuring Your Dissertation Committee

SREB scholar Precious Hardy
An occasional series from the Doctoral Scholars Program on postsecondary topics

In graduate school we are bombarded with decisions. We decide whether to be quantitative, qualitative or mixed-methods researchers, what classes to take, and what topic to expand on for our dissertation. One of the most important decisions we make, though, is deciding which faculty members will sit on our dissertation committee.

Blog post By Alan Richard, SREB News

No Longer Alone
Instructional Coaches Find Their Peers at SREB Conference

Being an instructional coach can be a lonely journey.

Just ask LaTonya Bolden, a former high school math and science teacher who now works with teachers and schools across the country as a school improvement coach for SREB.

Becoming a teacher-coach wasn’t always easy for Bolden, who suddenly had to work with teachers in academic subjects outside her own and with teachers in early- and middle-grades schools. She also found herself mainly working with adults all day.

“I miss the kids, I miss that daily interaction that I had with the students, because a lot of times that’s what kept me going,” Bolden said. “Interacting with adults is a little different.”

Bolden and other educators now working as instructional coaches — who focus on helping K-12 teachers hone and improve their classroom instruction — gathered in May for the first SREB conference designed just for them.

Blog post By Charlotte Dailey and Tiffany Harrison, SREB© 2022. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons BY license.

Momentum grows for open educational resources
After first-ever conference, leaders can tap additional workshops on using OER to support students

Charlotte Dailey of SREB speaks at the OER conference.

SREB continues to build momentum from the first conference of its kind — the Open Educational Resources and Dual Enrollment Conference: Making a Case for Student Success, held in Atlanta in late February — by embarking on more ways to bring education leaders together around this topic.

Blog post By Diane James, SREBPart 1 of a Two-Part Series

School and District Strategies for Addressing Student Mental Health Crises

As we approach two full years of pandemic-related school closures and disruptions, more schools are reporting crisis-level threats to students’ mental health and social and emotional well-being.

Emotions are running high as students are thrown back into social situations after a year or more of isolation. Anxiety and depression are on the rise. More students are dying by suicide, and waitlists of those seeking school-based therapy are long.

Blog post By Megan Boren and Kim Anderson

Meeting Workforce Demand Won’t Happen With Teacher and Faculty Shortages
States aren’t connecting all the dots between education and workforce development, and it's hurting our economy.

Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you know we’re experiencing record worker shortages in certain careers.

SREB has analyzed data on the economy, labor markets and education, and asked: In what ways is our economy tied to the success of our schools and colleges? How can we improve our economic future through education?

Blog post

Teacher shortages, workforce issues demand bolder solutions from states

SREB President Stephen Pruitt

By Stephen Pruitt, SREB President

Across the SREB states, many leaders are realizing the need for action on one of the biggest challenges in education: ensuring every student has a well-prepared teacher in every class, every year, no matter where they live.

I know personally how teachers can impact students’ lives. I started my career as a science teacher in Fayette County, Georgia, and I’m still humbled when former students tell me how I helped them become who they are as adults and find satisfying careers to pursue.

Blog post Megan Boren, SREB

To See Teacher Compensation, Look at More Than Salaries
Teacher Pay Is Increasing. So Is the Cost of Benefits

Salaries 2014 to 2020 Health benefits 2019 to 2020 Retirement benefits 2019 to 2020 Take-home pay 2019 and 2020

This spring, the National Education Association released its annual teacher pay analysis a bit earlier than usual. This data is widely used across the nation as the main source for average teacher salaries by state. The headline for 2021: Teacher salaries are going up by an average of 1.5% across the nation, and average spending per pupil is up 5%.

This is fantastic news ─ no bones about it.

It’s also not the whole story.

Blog post By Alan Richard, SREB News

WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT TEACHER SHORTAGES — AND HOW STATES, DISTRICTS CAN RESPOND

WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT TEACHER SHORTAGES — AND HOW STATES, DISTRICTS CAN RESPOND

What do we know about teacher shortages in each state and across the country? How severe are they? What has caused the shortages — and how can leaders help solve them?

SREB joined leaders from EducationCounsel, FutureEd at Georgetown University, and state and local school systems for an online event Nov. 8 to answer these important questions. (See the video of the event at the end of this story.)