The Community Leadership Team is a group of stakeholders including Danville Independent Schools staff and students, community members and organization leaders who gather to collaborate on how the Kentucky Community Schools Initiative is implemented in the school district. 

The group met on Oct. 3, and Full-service Community Schools Director Dakota Yates shared that, now that action plans have been established for Danville High School and Edna L. Toliver Intermediate School, some of the work outlined in the plans is already taking effect. 

DHS and Toliver are the two schools part of the  $1.5 million five-year grant through the Prichard Committee to begin the Kentucky Community Schools Initiative in the DISD, chosen because they have the largest population of students compared to Mary G. Hogsett Primary and John W. Bate Middle School, creating more impact initially.

The four pillars of Community Schools are: active family and community engagement, integrated student supports, expanded learning time and opportunities, and collaborative leadership. The action plans for DHS and Toliver have initiatives outlined under each of these pillars, and some of these initiatives are beginning to be implemented. 

Visit danvilleschools.net/community to view the action plans (as well as a snapshot view of the plans that summarizes them), more about Community Schools, and how to get involved.  

A few examples of how the action plans are already taking effect are: 

Active family and community engagement

The action plans for DHS and Toliver focus on the goal of having regular family and district learning nights in the district. Yates shared at the meeting that there is a new fall family night series for families in the district. 

The first event in this series is a Substance Use Awareness Night on Thursday, Oct. 17 from 5:30-7 p.m. at Toliver. 

Reminders about the other events will be posted on the Danville Schools social media platforms and in newsletters, so stay tuned. A list of upcoming events in this series is included below.

 

Integrated student supports

Mentor programs and attendance are a large part of the action plans’ focus. On the “community” page on the district website (linked above), there is information about how to become a mentor in the Danville Schools. Both DHS and Toliver have mentorship programs.

Some programs and activities focused on attendance in the schools are an attendance tags program to incentivize attendance at Toliver, a drumming program at Toliver, a collaboration with the Art Center of the Bluegrass to offer activities through a drawing, and attendance celebrations. 

Expanded learning time and opportunities 

A few focus areas based around this pillar are Lunch Bunch groups, student-led groups and career exploration. 

The DISD currently has a Lunch Bunch group where DHS students who are part of Educators Rising, which is geared toward students interested in becoming educators later in life, visit with second and fourth graders at Toliver.

One goal at DHS is to make the school’s career fair more interactive.

There is also an Admirals University program at Jennie Rogers Community Center, and among the activities offered are art classes, yoga, and life skills classes for students. More information about this program is included below. 

 

Collaborative leadership

This pillar focuses on community involvement with the district schools. 

Both schools have a Family Partnership Cadre and a Family Friendly Schools group. According to the Prichard Committee, the organization that offers Family Friendly Schools certification, the Family-Friendly Schools distinction recognizes schools focused on “building strong family-school partnership in Kentucky schools.”

Both schools are also involved in the Commonwealth Institute for Parent Leadership based in Lexington, which offers training for family members to take on leadership roles. 

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More highlights from the meeting are summarized alongside the photos below.

 

Below: The tablecloths used at the meeting were decorated by students in the Danville Schools, who wrote and illustrated what they love about the Danville Schools.

 

Below: Individuals at the meeting were asked to add their names to the tablecloths. Here, a few DHS students who were at the meeting add their names.