Amplifying Voices: A Digital Storytelling Partnership

Beginning in Fall 2023, the Digital and Public Practice Lab (formerly CSUF’s Digital Ethnic Futures Initiative or DEFCon) and the UCLA Center for Community Schooling partnered to create an eight-month training and development series on Digital Storytelling for the first cohort of Community School (CS) Fellows. What started with three teams representing deep-dive transformation sites in Anaheim, Shasta, and West Contra Costa, California has now grown into a robust program currently working with its third cohort of fellows in Fall 2025.

The objective of this partnership is to engage CS Fellows in hands-on workshops and coaching sessions, empowering them to develop digital assets that effectively share their stories, insights, lessons, and legacies from community schooling. By amplifying the voices of these fellows which include: students, parents, community school staff district administrators, and school partners, this collaboration strengthens both the Center for Community Schooling's commitment to creatively advance community school strategies. Additionally, it aligns with the Digital and Public Practice Lab's mission to help partners leverage digital technology for social justice, effective storytelling and data accessibility. The stories housed in this platform amplify the diverse voices and experiences of people across the Golden State. They are also direct products of this ongoing collaboration led by Dr. Leyda Garcia and a team of educators and researchers at the UCLA Center for Community Schooling, along with Dr. Jamila Moore Pewu and Scherly Virgill from the Digital and Public Practice Lab. Auut Studio, a design firm dedicated to social justice, provided support for the platform’s web design and development.

To date, we have worked with 32 fellows representing school districts and communities throughout the state—from north to south, inland empires and coastal regions, rural, suburban, and urban areas. We continue to expand our impact with each new cohort. The stories showcased here also reflect the learning journey our storytellers experience—from concept development through filming and up to final edits. Their work highlights the value of tackling difficult challenges and engaging in meaningful conversations. Together through this process, we are telling new stories about community schools while illuminating the diverse voices and countless decisions that shape each school site and partnership.

California Community Schools Partnership Program (CCSPP) is an initiative of the California Department of Education that is designed to accelerate efforts across the state to reimagine schools as empowering, racially-just, relationship-centered spaces where all students thrive – which is the essential concept of community schools.

The CCSPP came about in July 2021 when the California State Legislature passed the California Community Schools Partnership Act in response to grassroots advocacy and organizing.  In 2022, the legislature allocated additional funds and extended the program through 2031, bringing the total of this historic investment to $4.1 billion. To ensure the success of schools in the grant program, it established a series of Technical Assistance Centers — there are 8 regional centers (“R-TACs”) as well as a lead center called the State Transformational Assistance Center (“S-TAC”). Currently, this S-TAC is operated by the Alameda County Office of Education in a partnership with three supporting organizations of education professionals:

• UCLA Center for Community Schooling,
• National Education Association (NEA), and
• Californians for Justice (CFJ)

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Learn more at scs.gseis.ucla.edu

Official page at CA Dept of Education

Find your Regional TAC

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The UCLA Center for Community Schooling is a campus-wide initiative to advance university-assisted community schools. As stable anchor institutions, universities play a unique role as K-12 community school partners. Our research, teaching, and service missions inform and are informed by the work of local schools and communities. In partnership, we are poised to disrupt historical inequalities and reimagine schooling as a public good that prepares all students to succeed in college, careers, and civic life.

The Center publishes both a monthly newsletter and an open-access, online multimedia journal called Community Schooling, where each issue centers around four main features: a School Case study, a highlight on Teacher scholarship, as well as new research by Youth, plus Policy Actions & Briefs. 

Learn more at communityschooling.gseis.ucla.edu

The Digital and Public Practice Lab, LLC is a public benefit, mission-driven organization that continues the work previously undertaken through the Digital Ethnic Futures Grant Initiative (DEFCon) led by Dr. Jamila Moore Pewu. We empower communities through public history, creative placemaking, and digital storytelling practices. Drawing on our experience with diverse institutions and cultural heritage sites, we help partners leverage digital technology for effective storytelling and data accessibility. Our lab creates communities of practice around digital cultural heritage, connects memory workers, preserves endangered community histories, and develops innovative solutions that transform how public knowledge is created and shared.

Learn about our previous work at csufdigital.org

The Stuart Foundation is committed to supporting meaningful learning opportunities for California’s adolescents, while strengthening an equitable school system that supports them.

Throughout its history, the Foundation has understood that adolescent learning and development extends beyond academics, and believes that the public schools that serve youth underpin vibrant communities, inclusive economies, and a functioning democracy. These interconnected commitments – to helping adolescents thrive, to equity and to public education – guide the Foundation’s support of robust, just and well-resourced schools that value every young person.

Learn more at stuartfoundation.org