Presented by Patti Moon, Chief Communication Officer, Aurora Public Schools (CO); Simón Miera, Senior Partner Success Manager, TalkingPoints; and Kate Pechacek, Senior Director of Partner Success, TalkingPoints

Sponsored by TalkingPoints 

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Reversing revenue declines tied to attendance and enrollment is a top concern for district leaders across the country. As U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona noted, to recover lost ground from the pandemic, “it must be a top priority to reengage every student and family.” In addition to playing a crucial role in school resourcing, attendance can also provide a useful signal of the health of a school community. It can highlight areas where wraparound support for students is needed.

This edWebinar offers district leaders practical, actionable ways to improve enrollment and attendance through positive school culture. Viewers explore best practices for proactive and positive attendance management for both families and school staff, review promising results from a recent quasi-experimental study meeting the ESSA Tier 2 standard of evidence, and hear how leaders in other schools and districts are innovating new approaches to attracting and retaining students.

This recorded edWebinar is of interest to K-12 school and district leaders.

About the Presenters

Patti Moon has served as the chief communication officer for Aurora Public Schools since September 2016. She first joined APS as the public information officer in March 2014. Prior to working for the district, Patti was a television journalist who worked in Colorado Springs, Oklahoma City, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. She was a TV reporter and anchor who covered stories on a wide range of topics including education, health, and crime. Patti also serves the Aurora community as a board director for the Aurora Mental Health Center, which she joined in 2021. She earned both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in journalism from Northwestern University. She is fluent in Korean and speaks French conversationally. Patti is a Colorado native who graduated from Lakewood High School. She and her husband love exploring the world through food, music, and stories.

Simón Miera has been in education for over 20 years. He has a passion for providing a voice for students as they learn to navigate their journey and discover their place in the world. He has served as a middle school and high school English and social studies teacher for 15 years in New Mexico and Oregon. He has also served as a school and district administrator and supported students in their pathways to college and career readiness. Simón has a wide range of knowledge related to education and holds a master’s degree in education from Lesley University. He has utilized his experiences to lead professional development for school districts throughout the nation and help educators build systems supporting their districts’ Multi-Tiered System of Supports goals.

Kate Pechacek has over 20 years’ experience in education. She taught secondary math for 15 years in Iowa, Oregon, Texas, and Minnesota and has 10 years of experience working at the district level in curriculum, instruction, assessment, professional development and MTSS. She served as Director of Secondary Ed for Minneapolis Public Schools before moving to the edtech sector. She then spent almost six years helping districts leverage edtech solutions to support equitable outcomes for students before joining TalkingPoints.

At TalkingPoints, Kate leads the Partner Success team in supporting school and district partners to ensure they are able to leverage the TalkingPoints solution with impact. Kate earned her master’s degree in curriculum and instruction and worked with the developers of an equity-based learning supports model developed out of the UCLA School Mental Health Project. She is driven to ensure schools move toward an equity-focused, asset-based approach for all students.

Learn more about viewing the live presentation and the recording, earning your CE certificate, and using our new accessibility features.

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TalkingPoints is the leading K-12 two-way translated family engagement and communication platform, offering the highest-quality human- and AI-powered translation in 125+ languages. Grounded in research-based best practices, TalkingPoints has fundamentally redesigned family-school partnerships to shift mindsets and build capacity to support students in a scalable, equitable, and low-cost way.