What's at stake?
Parsec Education, an education data visualization company based in Fresno, held its third “Measure What We Value” summit that sees local educators and administrators come together for discussion and trainings around improving student performance and outcomes.
Parsec Education held its annual summit that brings local educators and school leaders together to discuss student success and outcomes.
Wednesday’s summit featured keynote panels and breakout sessions for educators to talk about student mental health, leadership behavior skills and leveraging data to improve student performance.
“We want to make sure that, especially in our own backyard, that we’re supporting our local districts with the best analytics tools,” said founder Eugene Park.
Now in its third year, the Fresno-based education data company’s “Measure What We Value” summit saw the inclusion of student art celebrating Black History Month and Black civil rights leaders, as well as a performance by professional West African drummers, Donté and Shar.
One of the summit’s keynotes featured Airick Journey Crabill, senior coach at Effective School Boards and the director of Governance for the Council of the Great City Schools. Crabill spoke about the need for school leaders to reflect on their own behaviors and goals for students.
“Student outcomes don’t change until the behaviors of us in leadership change,” Crabill said during his keynote panel/presentation.
Crabill also invited Fresno Unified Superintendent Misty Her, along with FUSD Board President Veva Islas and Trustee Valerie Davis, to talk about their experiences in shifting the district’s goals towards its student outcomes focused governance model.
Brandon Leake, a poet and winner of the 2020 edition of America’s Got Talent, emceed the event and shared his own personal experiences as a student and as an educator.
“We have illiterate students at higher grades at an all time high. We have students who are experiencing, I would say, a level of apathy academically at an all time high,” Leake said in an interview. “Inversely, we are seeing more driven students than I think we’ve seen in a long time,” Leake added.
Leake also said that he misses the prevalence that Black History Month had, recalling TV specials and decorations in public places celebrating Black civil rights leaders and activists.
“I follow the golden rule, or the golden two rules, to love your Lord, God above anything and everything. And the second is to love your neighbor as you love yourself, and I think that if we did that second one really well, we would be a lot better, because I think too many people don’t see their neighbor as themselves,” Leake said.
