Community Engagement Initiative, CEI, is part of California’s Statewide System of Support, designed to help school districts engage in meaningful conversations about improving community life. The initiative focuses on elevating the voices of students and parents, strengthening school-family partnerships, supporting students, and recognizing cultural values within education. 

Currently, CEI includes 129 districts, more than 1,100 team members, and an average daily attendance of more than 850,000. One of the team members, Jina Poirier, the Community School Coordinator for ACCESS–a support-based education program designed for students who may struggle in a traditional school environment, team leader of her CEI group, and Mater Dei alumnus, gives an overview of what CEI is and how it can benefit schools and the community at large.

“This is a huge initiative from across California,” Poirier said. “We meet five times throughout the year, with about 1,000 people from across California and multiple school districts, [including] charter schools, public schools, and county offices of Ed. The whole purpose is to get us all at the table, discussing our unique roles in how we can plan systems that are sustainable in our districts with student voices, parent voices, community partners, and educational teams.”

CEI challenges the conventional idea of how schools work, particularly in what students are learning and how they learn. Instead of schools listening to the state school boards, then relaying the information to teachers, who teach students, they start with the students. Preston Walrath, an ACCESS teacher and coach at Mater Dei, explains why CEI stands out.

“What is special about CEI is the idea that we are incorporating student voices as our primary concern,” Walrath said. “Which is a big change from top-down education, meaning teachers get told what to do and what to teach and then teach that to the students. In CEI, we flip that grid, and we say, ‘Hey, how does the student need to be taught?’ Then we work from there forward.”

CEI is a two-year commitment from participating districts. During that time, districts receive funding to create programs and initiatives that strengthen support systems for students and families. The long-term goal is for districts to continue those efforts independently once the initial support period ends.

“The whole point of CEI is to build capacity in us as a team,” Poirier said. “The goal is to train us to be able to do this with our own teams, in our district, and sustain the work on our own.”

The two-year plan has been successful in many schools, creating momentum for the organization to keep going and grow. Gilbert Sanchez, a principal of several schools in North Orange County and Anaheim, has seen a lot of this kind of growth in his schools. CEI has given districts the resources to host events like Father Fest, which brings together all of Anaheim to celebrate father figures. This has been an amazing way to engage the community and foster greater connection among all participants.

“After the first Father Fest, we actually brought on quite a few local sponsors and donors who want to have a bigger event,” Sanchez said. “We’ve been including Segerstrom Performing Arts Center, local police, sheriff, firefighters, [because] there are a lot of resources within the cities that can help sustain these things.”

Ideas like Father Fest are gathered from the school administration, teachers, principals, and others, listening to the voices of students and their families. Sanchez discusses how they came up with the idea for Father Fest.

“We were talking with the CEI families, and they had mentioned that we really didn’t have any type of support events or training events for fathers,” Sanchez said. “We had a lot of family events, open houses, and here was plenty of training and events for mothers and female caregivers. Based on their input, we decided to put together Father Fest, which celebrated any positive role models in our students’ lives. They could be an uncle, a dad, a grandfather, a neighbor, or even a probation officer, a local police officer, or a firefighter. [We also] offered training on how to be a better parent, how to be a better mentor, and [many] resources.” 

After understanding how CEI works, the question becomes: how could the initiative benefit a private school community like Mater Dei? Poirier believes Mater Dei already has a strong foundation, but that a program like CEI could provide additional structure to its planning and collaboration.

“I think Mater Dei has a strong sense of community, which I really value and respect,” Poirier said. “But something like CEI could benefit Mater Dei in bringing structure and intention to planning. We already had a partnership with Chapman University [and] Segerstrom Orange County Performing Arts Center in our planning phases, [which] which has been very powerful. Having parents, students, and community partners at the table is what I think [would] benefit [during the] planning process.”

This idea of listening to the students and the community is evident many times when considering how CEI could aid Mater Dei. Sanchez reinforces and builds on Poirier’s ideas.

“CEI could benefit all schools, not only at Mater Dei, ACCESS Anaheim Union, [or] Anaheim High School,” Sanchez said. “It’s a great way to bring a wrap-around community, to not only support students, but to support families. [It also creates opportunities to meet a few times a year] and really have tough conversations about, ‘Hey, we thought we were good at this, but we’re really not. Or we thought families needed this, but they don’t need this, this is what they need, [and so on].’”

CEI can improve all schools in California by sharing ideas, listening to all voices, strengthening communities, and building capacity. CEI and Mater Dei could create a great partnership and help continue improving the already amazing community of Mater Dei.

“It’s changing our mindset and how we think about families coming to school, being available to support schools, and also supporting their students’ education,” Sanchez said. “I’ve been in education for almost 30 years, so I’ve enjoyed a different look at [educating people].”