#340 – Amplifying Excellence in Career Education and Development, with Ben Solomon

Ben Solomon, Manager of Learning Programs, Products, and Services for AVID Center, joins us in this episode to discuss an exciting project focused on sharing stories from teachers who are supporting students with disabilities and learning differences in the area of career education and development. This project was made possible by the Educating All Learners Alliance, who hosted a Community of Action convening that resulted in the funding of two projects. One of the projects selected was the Amplifying Excellence Initiative pitched by AVID and Getting Smart. Ben shares the origins and background of the project as well as some of the stories represented in the work.

All students need to have the opportunity to decide what they like and don’t like as well as to have multiple opportunities to develop skills they may not know they have.

Linda Stewart, an educator in the Tucson Unified School District

Resources

The following resources are available from AVID and on AVID Open Access to explore related topics in more depth:

• Roadtrip Nation, with Mike Marriner (podcast episode)
• Career Exploration with Roadtrip Nation (podcast episode)
• College and Career Connections, with Tasha Henderson, Television Writer/Producer, and Her Former AVID Teacher, Ben Solomon (podcast episode)
• College and Career Connections: Women in STEM, with Dr. Carolyn Colley, Science Instructional Facilitator (podcast episode)
• College and Career Connections: Women in STEM, with Dr. Ailene Ettinger, Quantitative Ecologist (podcast episode)
• College and Career Connections: Women in STEM, with Lisette Terry, Structural Forensic Engineer (podcast episode)

Opening Doors to Career Exploration and Development

Ben says that while “we talk about that word ‘all’ a lot . . ., we haven’t talked enough about students with disabilities.” The Amplifying Excellence Initiative seeks to begin changing that by highlighting five stories of teachers who are demonstrating excellence in career exploration and development. Educators featured in the project include Claire Enderson, Marquise Anderson, Linda Stewart, Nicole Paner, and Sara Salinas. The following are a few highlights from this episode:

• About Our Guest: Ben Solomon is the Manager of Learning Programs, Products, and Services at AVID Center.
• Amplifying Excellence Initiative: This is the grant earned by AVID in collaboration with Getting Smart. They pitched their idea to attendees at a Community of Action convening hosted by the Educating All Learners Alliance last December. Ben shares that the grant’s goal was to create “a contest to highlight teachers that were intentionally supporting college and career readiness, especially with students with disabilities.” He adds, “It’s such a great opportunity to get to just celebrate some great teachers that are doing this well that aren’t being recognized.”
• Choosing Stories: Ben shares that through a national nomination process, AVID collaborated with Getting Smart to select five stories that “we really felt exemplified what we were looking for—the teachers that go above and beyond in helping their students just have opportunities that might not have been available to them otherwise.”
• Claire’s Story: Ben highlights Claire Enderson’s story. Claire combines AVID’s emphasis on opportunity knowledge in her special education classes at Patapsco High School and Center for the Arts. Ben says, “She wove those worlds together.”
• Linda’s Story: Another story features Linda Stewart. Ben explains, “Linda and others at Cholla High School have done an amazing job of building these pipelines of opportunity, internships, field trips, things like that, and making sure every student is included in those.” He adds, “Every student across the school gets these same opportunities to step foot on a college campus, to step foot on a workplace, to feel that they are prepared and exposed to a lot of different options.”
• Nicole’s Story: A third story shared by Ben is that of Nicole Paner. Her story stands out in part because she’s emphasizing career exploration at the elementary level. Ben says, “It was just a reminder to me and us as we were doing this, you can’t wait until they’re in high school, right? You can’t even wait until they’re in middle school.”
• Philanthropy: The Amplifying Excellence Initiative would not have been possible without the generosity of the Educating All Learners Alliance, an organization that evolved during COVID amid concerns about learning loss. Ben is thankful for the opportunity that this organization provided, saying, “It was just cool to see folks that have access to resources, turning those resources into opportunities for us, which then allowed us to turn those into opportunities for teachers to highlight the opportunities that they’re providing for students.”
• Getting Smart: AVID’s partner in this initiative was Getting Smart. Ben says, “They do an amazing job of taking stories and turning them into just compelling pictures of the power that we have in education.” AVID knows college and career readiness, and Getting Smart added their expertise in storytelling to make the project work. Ben says, “It felt like a really good partnership right from the beginning.”
• Finding Stories: Ben says, “Teachers don’t like the spotlight a lot of times, and the idea of self-nominating, saying, ‘Hey, you know, pat me on the back for my work,’ is not the way that we roll. ‘Hey, I know that the teacher on my left and on my right deserve just as much of a pat on the back as I do.’” Despite that natural reluctance of teachers to self-promote, the initiative received quality submissions, from which five were chosen. In the end, Ben is grateful that they were able to “shine a light on some teachers” and give them some financial compensation for being selected.
• Exemplars: Although only a limited number of educators could be featured, Ben feels that they serve as an example of the greater work being done. He says, “We know that the five of you are doing amazing things, and we know that you represent 5,000, [even] 500,000 other teachers out there that are doing this work also.”
• A Personal Connection: Ben has personal experience with this topic, as his daughter struggles with dyslexia. It was this personal connection that helped transform his understanding of strategies used to help students with special needs. He says, “What was theoretical became practical and has now become personal. This is part of my lived reality.”
• A Path Forward: Ben ponders, “How do we tap into students’ skills and students’ passions that they don’t even know they have? Well, the way we do it is we talk about it more, and we share stories of teachers that are doing this, and we figure out practices that are scalable. We come together as organizations and work together, and then we can start making some impact.”
• High Expectations for All: “Maybe there are some groups within the walls of our schools [for which] our expectations might still be a little bit too low,” says Ben. In that light, he asks, “How can we really raise the expectations for all of our kids?”