May 3, 2022 | Jay Stansell
Find Your Grind: A Guide to Expanded Learning Programs Implementation
Local Education Agencies (LEAs) from around the United States often approach Find Your Grind for our product implementation for expanded learning opportunity programs.
We’ve produced this guide to address some of the common questions that are asked.
Safe and Supportive Learning
Describe how Find Your Grind will provide opportunities for students to experience a safe
and supportive environment. Will Find Your Grind be offered on the school site or off-campus? If not on-site, describe where in the community it will be and how students will be supported to get there.
Find Your Grind (FYG) provides LEAs a safe and supportive digital learning environment where students can independently progress through self-discovery, self-awareness, future-planning, and career exposure activities to better understand who they are and who they can be. In return, students develop a greater connection to the classroom and a better sense of academic relevance. Educators are able to monitor and track progress to engage students individually on their personal development.
Active and Engaged Learning
Describe how Find Your Grind will provide opportunities for students to experience active and engaged learning that either supports or supplements, but does not duplicate, the instructional day.
Find Your Grind (FYG) provides a personalized digital learning experience for students. FYG’s focus is on social-emotional learning (SEL) and student agency while challenging students through inquiry and reflection. The interactive learning journey empowers students to develop greater self-awareness, gain exposure to careers and industries, and begin the process of designing their ideal lifestyle.
This experience engages students through gamification, bite-sized learning, student choice, and interactive patterns native to this generation. FYG supports and supplements the instructional day by providing enrichment learning opportunities for personal development while creating a greater connection to the classroom. Example: Students will learn math during the instructional day. Students will be inspired to be mathematicians through FYG during expanded learning time.
Skill Building
Describe how Find Your Grind will provide opportunities for students to experience skill
building.
Our technology enables us to help learners discover skills they never knew they had.
Find Your Grind (FYG) delivers multiple opportunities for students to develop skills. Through interactive micro-skill assessments, students gain greater clarity around their skills, strengths, and values. Students are provided an opportunity to learn more about each skill and how they can apply it in their everyday life.
Through the FYG curriculum, students build skills around self-awareness, social awareness, digital citizenship, financial literacy, growth mindset, and more. The development of these skills is captured through the Find Your Grind Future-Ready Indicator, which tracks student growth in four key skill areas:
-Self Awareness
-Social Awareness
-Career Awareness
-Action Awareness
Youth Voice and Leadership
Describe how Find Your Grind will provide opportunities for students to engage in youth voice and leadership.
Find Your Grind delivers a learning experience that develops self-confidence, self-efficacy, and personal development. Students learn more about who they are and who they can become. Students are provided opportunities to practice student-choice through personalized elective content, showcase their learning outcomes, and practice their leadership development skills.
Healthy Choices and Behaviors
Describe how Find Your Grind will provide opportunities for students to engage in healthy choices and behaviors.
Healthy choices and behaviors involve more than just our physical bodies.
Goal-setting and decision-making are an integral part of the Find Your Grind curriculum. Students learn how to make healthy, informed decisions to support personal and professional relationships and create a balanced lifestyle.
Diversity, Access, and Equity
Find Your Grind is an equitable learning experience that meets all students where they are, how they want to learn, and exposes them to every pathway that is best suited for them. Through the Find Your Grind explore library, students are introduced to a diverse population of mentors and career opportunties that highlight unique and traditional pathways – college, military, technical, and professional work experience.
FYG career library offers non-traditional, traditional, and emerging careers brought to life by diverse mentors. No matter which direction a student wants to pursue, Find Your Grind has a career and industry they can learn about.
Quality Educators
Describe how Find Your Grind will provide opportunities for students to engage with quality educators.
Find Your Grind (FYG) delivers personalized insights about each student. These data points are delivered back to educators both individually and as classroom aggregrated insights. This data empowers staff to better understand their students and to develop greater connection and engagement. The staff are able to tap into FYG’s data to build quality relationships with each unique student.
Clear Vision, Mission, and Purpose
Describe Find Your Grind’s vision, mission, and purpose:
Find Your Grind’s mission supports the goals of high-quality Expanded Learning Programs by providing every student with the skills and confidence needed to be Future Ready in a world that is changing faster than ever.
To achieve this we designed a curriculum that changes the conversation around career exploration – asking students what kind of lifestyle they want to live, then guiding them to create it.
Our focus is on social-emotional learning (SEL) and student agency while challenging students through inquiry and reflection. Our learning journey empowers students to develop greater self-awareness, gain exposure to careers and industries, and begin the process of designing their ideal lifestyle.
Collaborative Partnerships
Describe Find Your Grind’s collaborative partnerships. Local educational agencies are encouraged to collaborate with non-LEA entities to administer programs:
Find Your Grind (FYG) works in partnership with LEAs to provide Career Exploration opportunities through interactive digital learning experiences.
The FYG curriculum is ideal for Expanded Learning Programs, easy for staff to successfully implement, and provides valuable data and student insights to guide personalized learning.
Program Management
Describe the plan for program management.
Find Your Grind (FYG) is perfect for implementation in High School and Middle School Expanded Learning Programs, including before, after, intersession, and summer learning programs.
FYG can be used as an enrichment curriculum to support College and Career Readiness, and/or as a stand-alone Career Exploration program, as well as enrichment for other Career Tech Ed (CTE) programs and classes.
Contact us if you’d like to understand more about how Find Your Grind can be implemented into your Expanded Learning Programs – contributing to a more future-ready generation.
