Programs

Help students embrace school goals

We create spaces for dialogue, reflection, and decisions, authorizing student perspectives so they can identify their unmet needs.

• Reduce phone use
• Grow attendance
• Build trust

Reduce phone use by authorizing student perspectives

"Less homework! Shorter school days! Better food!" Inundated with these revolutionary ideas from students, schools closed their suggestion boxes a long time ago. But with phones in their hand and between 2.4 and 5 GHz of bandwidth at their fingertips, students have something we never had as kids: leverage. Instead of wrangling phones out of their hands (pain, angst, a frustrated PTO), ask them, what do you want in exchange?

When students are involved in the decision-making process, they are more likely to accept the change—and when they feel heard, they'll start voicing actionable, feasible opportunities for change.^1

"More class time when we don’t have to sit at our desks! A lower student-counselor ratio! A career day? More basketballs in the gym!"

Bringing student ideas to conversations with administrators changes student perspectives, whether that’s an invite to a weekly PD or running a schoolwide assembly. When students understand why phone use hurts teachers, their learning, and the school itself and when students can negotiate for their unmet needs, school becomes a place of trust, not powerlessness.

This is not to say students should be involved in every decision: you can’t lead by committee. But giving kids a voice—and not only to the outspoken student leaders, but to every student—is life-changing. Students have actionable ideas in every school community: let's help them raise their hand.

We facilitate these conversations at no cost to public schools.

We reach out to chronically absent students and families

We observe classes, hold focus groups, and listen 1:1

We teach students constructive, transparent strategies for being heard

We structure transparent, constructive discussions

We propose innovative, mutually beneficial solutions

We empower students to stay engaged in their community beyond the dialogue