Schools and Communities Organizing for Racial Equity (SCORE)

The Center for Youth and Community Leadership in Education (CYCLE) at Roger Williams University in Providence, RI partners with youth, families, educators and other stakeholders to build collective power and fight for educational justice. Established in 2017, Keith Catone is CYCLE’s founding executive director.

Background information

SCORE represents an effort to:

Schools and Communities Organizing for Racial Equity (SCORE) is a community-driven, action-oriented research project that brings together an intergenerational Community Research Team consisting of students and parents/caregivers recruited in partnership with community-based organizations. With support from higher education partners, this team:

Conducts community research.

Identifies community priorities for educational and racial equity.

Identifies indicators to measure school district progress on these priorities.

Develops a “SCOREcard” tool that presents the community priority areas, identified indicators and related data.

1

Measure what matters to students and families of color, students and families experiencing economic hardship, and others most directly impacted by inequities.

2

Help school districts understand, be responsive to, and be held accountable to community priorities for educational and racial equity.

3

Share school district progress on community priorities with youth, parents, and other community members. Parent and student leaders’ ideas, wisdom, and visions for educational and racial equity are starting points and driving forces of SCORE.

The inaugural SCORE project took place in Providence, RI in 2021-2022 with a nine-member Community Research Team of Providence Public Schools parents and students. The Providence SCOREcard will be launched soon! In fall 2022, SCORE launched in two new sites—Central Falls, RI and Newport, RI. These sites are currently analyzing data they’ve collected and developing indicators in their identified equity priority areas.

This set of public goods aims to share why it’s essential for school districts to measure what matters to communities. We provide tools for schools and communities to 1) better understand SCORE’s purpose and process; 2) self-assess how their own work aligns with SCORE’s values, which are focused on centering youth and families in the work of educational equity and accountability. Both documents link to the SCORE Toolkit, which gives users more detailed information and concrete tools to develop SCORE projects in their own context. Additionally, the video above tells the story of SCORE from the perspectives of youth, family, and district partners who have engaged in it.

Wins

14 youth and 11 parents/caretakers have been engaged as SCORE Community Research Team members since 2021.

Contact Information

For more information about CYCLE’s work, please contact Keith Catone and Tracie Potochnik.

Related Resources

Center for Innovation in Education (C!E)

At The Center for Innovation in Education we facilitate connections, build relationships, and share learning among those who must work in concert to bring about equity-seeking change in education. We often, but not always, orient this work around innovation in assessment and accountability systems as a key lever for systems change.

Point of Contact: Rita Harvey and Doannie Tran
Visit the Website: Click Here

Click here to read their equitable assessment example >>