We hope you had a restful and rejuvenating summer break with an opportunity to do all the things that bring you joy with your loved ones. Equally, we hope that you can continue to prioritize your overall health and wellbeing, and will lean on us for support this year.

This school year continues to bring unprecedented challenges and opportunities to ensure our students can understand and make meaning of what they are experiencing in their world. CPS educators ensure students feel safe and supported, have space to digest societal issues, and engage meaningfully in their communities - your dedication to our students is truly inspiring and we feel privileged to be your partners in this historic work.

Best wishes with the new school year. We are here for you.

Sincerely Yours,

As we transition back to our school buildings this fall, we have an opportunity to ask ourselves and reimagine: What is the community to which we want to return? How will we know our community is strong and meeting the needs of its members? Utilize this toolkit to amplify student voice and engage in student-adult partnerships at your school.

Tools for Welcoming Students in This Moment

Illinois Civics Hub compiled a powerful set of resources to support you in building community over the next several weeks - tips on how to reflect on the past to inform the present, engaging student voice to build community and classroom culture, ways to connect with parents, and tips for responding to social science fear-mongering. This is worth a good look!

Teachers, check out this one-week unit from Facing History and Ourselves that is designed to help support your teaching to develop students' social-emotional skills in order to engage in an open and supportive classroom community. 

Middle School and HS teachers! Use this resource from Facing History and Ourselves to help students engage with current events to help young people to be informed and humane participants in a democracy. The resource includes teaching Ideas on specific topics and adaptable strategies – to foster thoughtful classroom conversations and build your students’ capacities for critical thinking, emotional engagement, ethical reflection, and civic agency.

Ensure your 8th grade students are accurately programmed for the required 8th grade civics course. All 8th grade students should be enrolled in the following two course codes for the entire school year: 7071000 (Middle School Civics) AND 2020000 (Social Science). Academic Center Course Codes and Specific Guidance can be found here.

If your 8th grade SS/Civics teacher has not attended training, please contact Dorlande Charles for more information at djcharles@cps.edu.

Launch Participatory Budgeting at your school!

Participatory Budgeting (PB) is a process used around the world in which community members decide how to spend part of a budget through an inclusive, democratic process. Please join us at one of the following upcoming PL opportunities. Sign up here!

If you need support in deciding who will run the PB project, we can help you decide at the kick-off session or feel free to email us for a quick meeting so we can help. Contact Emma Kornfeld Knapp, ekornfeld@cps.edu.

Additional information: Here is a video that explains the process and purpose of PB. More information on opportunities for building student voice and democratic leadership can be found here.

Please find more information and sign up here. The Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Experiential Learning PLC is a new opportunity within CPS available to teachers in every content area, at every grade level. Participants will receive training, guidance, supplementary resources and support for inquiry to action projects. This opportunity is available for individual teachers, and for school teams such as grade level, content teams, or schoolwide projects. Grants are available too!

6-12th grade teachers! Looking for support to guide your upcoming school year? Check out our newly updated Social Science Scope and Sequence Social Science Scope & Sequence (Grades 6-12). Our guidance will walk you through how to review the scope and sequence. In early September we will start office hours so that you can come to us with any questions as well.

Teaching the High School Participate Civics course for the first time? Join us at the SY22 Participate Civics Kick-Off on Monday September 20th, 4pm-6pm.

Please register here.

For teachers looking to deliver the required 9-week Financial Education unit during Q1, stay tuned for news on PD. Until then, take a look at our NEW Curriculum Crosswalk resources to partner with our Empowered! Curriculum (currently being updated). Built on the feedback from teachers in last year’s PLCs and Cohorts we hope you find this resource useful. One teacher said, “where was this when I started teaching Financial Literacy?”

Join us at one of our upcoming SVC 101 PDs on the following dates by registering here:

In addition, we will also be hosting office hours for schools to drop in to discuss SVC launch/implementation if you would like to connect prior to the September workshop. Those can be accessed via this link and will take place on Tuesday August 24th, 1:30pm - 3:00pm and Thursday August 26th, 10:00am -11:30am.

Congratulations to Mrs. Monique Thorpe, Social Science Teacher at South Shore International College Prep who was recognized by the Obama Foundation for her amazing work in the classroom. Last school year, Mrs. Thorpe’s students participated in a Black History Exchange Program with students from Booker T. Washington High School in Tulsa, OK. Students met to discuss connections between the 1919 Chicago Race Riot, the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, modern racial tensions, and community activism. Learn more about the program here and view the video of Mrs. Thorpe and her students meeting President Obama. 

Congratulations to Mx. Rivanna Jihan, Social Science Teacher at Simeon Career Academy High School who was awarded the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History Illinois History Teacher of the year award! Mx. Jihan is thankful to their students and Social Science colleagues for the amazing collaborative work they have done together to gain this recognition. Learn more about the recognition here.