UP Partnership’s Communications Council aims to share best practices and messaging across network institutions

UP Partnership's Communications Council aims to share best practices and messaging across network institutions

In April of this year, we launched the Future Ready Bexar County Plan which brings together nearly 70 institutions, across various sectors. Through institutional agreements, our community partners have committed themselves to working together in a collaborative effort to reach a collective North Star — to increase the percentage of Bexar County High School graduates enrolling in postsecondary degree or credential programs to 70% by 2030. Enrollment in Bexar County currently sits at around 50%.

In pursuit of that North Star, our partners have agreed to aligned communications celebrating the progress of the Future Ready Plan. Led by UP Partnership, partners will serve as media spokespersons and share the story of the Future Ready Plan through their own marketing channels. Through this Communications Council, we will share, in one voice, the narrative of healing, access, and voice as it connects back to the Future Ready Bexar County Plan and that collective North Star goal. We will collect and highlight stories of success as we look at the bigger picture of why the work that we and our community partners do is so important to ensuring a bright future for the young people of Bexar County.

With a newly designed Communications Council, we brought together leadership and communications experts from across the various sectors for an inaugural meeting that was held on Aug. 19, 2022.

During this virtual event, community partners came together to define the purpose of the Communications Council which is for its members to share best practices, stories of success, and new opportunities so that we can comprehensively share widely. We also discussed Future Ready Bexar County Plan messaging and how we can support and elevate each other as we do the important work necessary to reach our collective North Star goal.

The Communications Council will meet once again in early November in a quarterly cadence.

If your organization is ready to join in on the Future Ready movement, please contact admin@uppartnership.org to find out more information on how you can become a Future Ready partner or donate to the work here.

You can also follow our progress by signing up for our newsletter and following us on social media.

Restorative Practices Collaborative held its Principal Kickoff for the 2022-2023 school year

Restorative Practices Collaborative holds its Principal Kickoff for the 2022-2023 school year

On Sept. 1, 2022, the Restorative Practices Collaborative held its Principal Kickoff for the 2022-2023 school year at the San Antonio Area Foundation’s Wells Center located in historic Pearl. We brought together principals and community partners including Judson ISD’s Chief of Equity and Diversity Dr. Paula Johnson and Dawn Kulpa, Director of Restorative Practices for San Antonio Independent School District.

Through a check in process, partners came to consensus that they hope to change systems to scale restorative practices in both classrooms and the community to increase a sense of belonging, which will help foster better practices in the classrooms and decrease unfair disciplinary practices that disproportionately impact young men of color through their efforts in the Restorative Practices Collaborative.

There are two components of the Restorative Practices Collaborative, the first of those being community building, through partnerships with organizations like American Indians in Texas at the Spanish Colonial Missions (AITSCM) and Empower House. Both organizations practice and teach community partners about restorative practices such as peace circles and peace corners and how to incorporate these best practices into their own organizations, including many campuses from the previously mentioned school districts.

Those campuses that have this knowledge can help further build campus capacity in these restorative practices, Ramon J. Vasquez, Jr., said, particularly within other schools in the participating school districts.

A major obstacle the Restorative Practices Collaborative sees is that not all schools within a district carry out restorative practices, which can particularly be challenging for students that are in participating alternative schools who gain some skills to help with the transition back to a home school, but may not necessarily be enough to ensure their success, Vasquez added in a conversation during the event on trying to engage entire school districts, rather than on an individual campus basis.

The second component is collaborative improvement which is led by the work that we do at UP Partnership as the collective’s backbone organization, which includes making space for these organizations to meet and further collaborate and holding partners accountable to the community framework laid out in the Future Ready Bexar County Plan. Through that plan, there is a keen focus on the equity pillars of healing, voice and access—the must HAVEs for equity amongst Bexar County’s young people. Falling under the equity pillar of HEALING— Young people will be future ready when they all have the developmental relationships and healing they need— is the vital work of the Restorative Practices Collaborative.

Overall, this work feeds into the Future Ready North Star goal of increasing the percentage of Bexar County High School graduates enrolling in postsecondary degree or credential programs to 70% by 2030 (currently, this number sits at around 50%).

If your organization is ready to join the Future Ready movement or the Equitable Enrollment Collaborative, please contact admin@uppartnership.org to find out more information on how you can become a Future Ready partner or donate to the work here.

You can also follow our progress by signing up for our newsletter and following us on social media.

UP Partnership executive chosen to be part of national leadership class by The Allstate Foundation

UP Partnership executive chosen to be part of national leadership class by The Allstate Foundation

UP’s Chief Impact and Strategy Officer, Dr. Emily Calderón Galdeano, is one of 35 leaders accepted nationally

UP Partnership’s Chief Impact and Strategy Officer, Emily Calderón Galdeano, Ed.D., will be a part of The Allstate Foundation’s Nonprofit Leadership Center Executive Leadership Program’s Class of 2023, a national leadership program aimed toward augmenting the skills of nonprofit leaders to further transform their organizations, their communities and the nonprofit sector.

Dr. Calderón Galdeano is one of the 35 leaders nationally selected to be a part of the highly selective program’s 2023 class. Leaders chosen represent a variety of nonprofit sectors roles, locations, experiences and perspectives. Dr. Calderón Galdeano is one of two nonprofit leaders from Texas that was chosen for the class.

Launched in 2014, the Executive Leadership Program is administered in partnership with the Northwestern University’s Kellogg School Center for Nonprofit Management. Through the program, academic practitioners provide in-person training to thought-leaders through classroom training, executive coaching and peer-to-peer training. Program participants build leadership skills including personal leadership, organizational leadership and nonprofit management.

In addition, the cohort will discuss different topics such as developing high-performing teams, negotiating for mutually beneficial outcomes, guiding difficult conversations and understanding a nonprofit’s financial position.

“I look forward to bringing back ways to further transform our community as we work toward our Future Ready Bexar County Plan’s collective North Star goal,” Dr. Calderón Galdeano, said. Through the Future Ready Bexar County Plan, launched in April 2022, UP Partnership is working with a collection of partners, across varying sectors, in a collaborative effort to increase the percentage of Bexar County High School graduates enrolling in postsecondary degree or credential programs to 70% by 2030.