Where Superintendents Swim with Sharks
What is “Supe Tank”?
The Classroom of the Future Foundation (CFF) invites all superintendents in San Diego County to attend this unique event where several superintendents are given a short timeframe to share innovative programs, initiatives, and ideas that they are working on in their district. Industry partners are invited to attend, listen to the pitches, and are given a chance to hear the ideas first-hand then meet with the superintendents after the presentation.
The hope would be that school leaders and industry leaders would come together and form their own partnerships around some of the ideas presented. Think of this as a speed-dating opportunity to link schools and businesses. This program results in benefits for everyone involved and for the San Diego County community.
Supe Tank 3.0: October 26, 2023
CFF’s Supe Tank 3.0 will be hosted by the University of San Diego’s Jacobs Institute for Innovation in Education on Thursday, October 26 from 3:30 to 6:30 pm. Industry partners, educators, and community leaders are invited to learn about the innovation in our school districts.
Click for information about tickets and sponsorships for the event.
Supe Tank 3.0: October 26, 2023 - Superintendent Speakers
| SUPERINTENDENT | PITCH TITLE | PITCH DESCRIPTION | THE ASK | CONTACT | VIDEO |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mr. Joseph Clevenger Bonsall Unified School District  | Bonsall Forward Initiative, Increasing STEM for female students and students of color | The Bonsall Forward Initiative aims to address the disparity in female and underrepresented populations in STEM academics and careers. To encourage and support all students to continue in STEM, BFI provides job shadowing, internships, informational resources, and hands-on experiences starting in the 6th grade. BFI also provides scholarships biannually to students in 6th through 12th grades. Bonsall Unified School District brings together students, families, community leaders, and STEM related businesses to honor our student scholarship recipients in two awards galas. These events not only celebrate our student achievers, but also unite our community. BFI: “Building tomorrow’s community today.” | 1. Educational opportunities: Partner with us by providing opportunities for job shadowing. Host a group of 10-12 students for 2-3 hours. Let them see what your job looks and feels like first hand. 2. Funding: Well all know money talks, but in the populations we are accentuating, it does way more than that. Scholarships can be used to buy computers, books, food, tuition or to fulfill any other educational need when the students and their families need it the most: Today. | Send email | Coming soon |
| Dr. Andy Johnsen San Marcos Unified School District  | Creating a Partner Hub with SMUSD for CTE Pathway / Workforce Integration | SMUSD currently has 19 CTE pathways for high school students. We would like to work with a local industry partner in a "win-win" realtionship where our partner would help influence the curriculum for our course offerings, and whre multiple pathways (Construction, Culinary, Health Care, Agriscience) could be housed under one roof. Benefits for the industry partner would be the creation of an entry level workforce and job applicants who have already been trained in industry standard skills and competencies. Benefits for SMUSD would be internships, externships, and work experience for students that is aligned to current industry standards. | Identify one person with decision making power in your organization to meet with SMUSD senior staff to explore possibilities. We are open to collaborative, win-win ideas where both partners "give" and both partners "get." | Send email | Coming soon |
| Dr. Eduardo Reyes Chula Vista Elementary School District  | Innovation Centers: Libraries of the Future | TBD | $300,000 to build Innovation Centers | Send email | Coming soon |
| Dr. Matt Tessier San Diego County Office of Education  | Linda Vista Innovation Center Career Experiential Learning | Support students starting in 4th grade through 12th grade experience industry careers that are tied to their individual strengths based on the RIASEC assessment. Engineering design process problems that replicate the real-world work environment will be experienced by students and they will be able to identify two industry careers that are replicated in the form of badges for them to take home, creating a strong home – school connection. | The ask is for 10 hours of human capital from industry partner workforce and $20,000 to support the creation and distribution of career badges and career journals (for student writing and processing before and after the experiences). | Send email | Coming soon |
| Dr. Ben Churchill Carlsbad Unified School District  | The Future is Soon | We have students in our schools today who will potentially enter the workforce in 2040 (our current kindergarten students will graduate from high school in 2036; if they earn a four-year university degree, they’ll be starting their careers in 2040). As we think about high wage, high growth careers in the next 15+ years, K12 schools are wise to collaborate with innovative industry professionals who are working on “the next big ideas” that will change our lives in the future, to better prepare our students for the careers of the future. | I propose we put together a team of futurists, creatives, entrepreneurs, technologists, and more. Our think tank will advise schools and districts about what to expect in 5, 10, 15 years. The future is soon… will you help us get ready for the careers of 2040? | Send email | Coming soon |
| Dr. Patrick Keeley Mountain Empire Unified School District  | Mentors for the Mountains | MEUSD graduation requirements to include a Senior Project component. Each project provides students with an opportunity to engage in meaningful community service or internships. We offer a seminar class that is designed to guide students through the process of planning, executing, and presenting a comprehensive project. Each project integrates academic knowledge and skills demonstrating mastery in their chosen project. Mentor Sponsor - A Mentor Coordinator to connect students with mentors, coordinate internships, coordinate transportation to internships. Mentor Internship - Provide internship opportunities for our students. Students will gain valuable experience in a chosen field of interest. Mentor - Meet virtually or in person with a student twice per month providing feedback and guidance and participate in the final panel presentation of learning by the student. | Mentorship Sponsor to fund the cost of a Mentor Coordinator at the cost of $100,000. We are happy to have multiple sponsors participate. One on one mentors to make themselves available to mentor or to offer internships. One on one mentors to review and guide senior project learning. | Send email | Coming soon |
| Mary Beth Kastan Grossmont Union High School District  | Patient Care Pipeline | Offering an intensive seven week summer program to high school students will remove barriers to certification courses, increase social mobility, and strengthen the Patient Care Pipeline by providing high school students with the real world experience they need in order to meet the needs of San Diego County’s healthcare workforce and be ready to meet the challenges of tomorrow’s industry. | A $32,925 investment in support for our summer training programs will provide our health pathway students a real-world experience that’s vital to their success. Support for the Patient Care Pipeline is also needed through placement of students in healthcare facilities for clinical hours or by guest speaking, providing industry tours, mentorship, or job shadowing. | Send email | Coming soon |
| Mr. Karl J. Mueller Coronado Unified School District  | Connect, Challenge & Champion | TBD | Asking to partner with industry leaders to develop new innovative applicant screening and hiring practices. We are rebranding who the ideal CUSD teacher will be, and we need your help developing the instrument to get us there. | Send email | Coming soon |
| Dr. Leighangela Brady National School District  | Bring a Business to School Day | Bring a Business to School Day is an opportunity for business partners to visit National School District classrooms. When you sign up for Bring a Business to School Day, you will be hosted for a morning at one of our ten amazing elementary schools. You’ll witness innovative lessons, talk directly with students, and provide us with invaluable feedback. Most educators grew up dreaming about working in schools; yet we are asking our teachers to prepare our students for a workforce that they themselves have never experienced. Bring a Business to School Day bridges the experience gap. Following the school visits, we’ll host a debrief session (over lunch of course) for you to tell us what you saw, and offer ideas of how we might strengthen our programs. | Invest in "Bring a Business to School Day" on February 8, 2024. RSVP to participate. Click to sign up and attend on 2/8/24 | Send email | Coming soon |
Supe Tank 3.0: October 26, 2023 - Photo Gallery
To view all 90 photos from the event, click to visit the Supe Tank 3.0 Photo Gallery
Supe Tank 2.0: November 1, 2022 - Superintendent Speakers
| SUPERINTENDENT | PITCH TITLE | PITCH DESCRIPTION | THE ASK | CONTACT | VIDEO |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dr. Ben Churchill Carlsbad Unified School District | Career Pathways | For success after high school, students need to build career awareness AND apply their learning through practical experience. Our goal is to facilitate learning about work AND to facilitate learning through work. We rely on industry partners to help students apply their learning in a supervised setting. | Carlsbad Unified School District is looking for industry partners to provide experiences like student internships, apprenticeships, service learning and other work-based learning opportunities. | Send email | Play video |
| Mr. Joseph Clevenger Bonsall Unified School District | The Bonsall Forward Initiative | The Bonsall Forward Initiative increases access to STEM careers and expands future readiness for all BUSD students. Through the combination of early exposure through job shadow opportunities and incentives such as scholarships as early as 6th grade, Bonsall Unified is aiming to not simply reward students who complete high school and are prepared for college and career, but to significantly increase the number of students who fall into this category. | (1) Time: Hosting a job shadow opportunity for up to 15 students for 2-3 hours. (2) Money: Contribute to providing scholarships and transportation for students | Send email | Play video |
| Ms. Ilsa Garza-Gonzalez Fallbrook Union High School District  | First First Responders | We need to provide our staff and our students the tools to respond to emergencies. The basic first aid kit found in many classrooms is not enough for the traumatic events of today. Our staff and our students, our schools, are many times the first first responders and they need the tools to be able to respond to emergencies and save lives. | The ask for potential district partners is financial and, for those that have the expertise, a partnership that would provide training. | Send email | Play video |
| Mr. Karl J. Mueller Coronado Unified School District | Mental Health Support | Objective: Mental Health First Aid to all CUSD graduates by school year 2025-26. CUSD is looking for a sponsor to support mental health awareness initiatives. The initiative includes funding to proctor a universal screener of all high school students, support tracking and responding strategically to data, and helping build capacity of district staff for sustainable tracking and monitoring of initative. Funding will also train CUSD staff in a 'train the trainer' model to promote mental health literacy and support students in earning MHFA certification. | Partner with CUSD! | Send email | Play video |
| Dr. Luis Rankins-Ibarra Escondido Union School District  | Medical Discoveries Program | Through a partnership with Palomar Health all 8th grade students get a first-hand look at the world of medicine. Students participate in a fun day of hands-on instruction to inspire career explorations. We would like to expand this opportunity by having interested students actually train to be first aid and CPR certified. | We are asking for funds to pay for the certification courses for our 8th grade students by expanding our partnership with our local fire department or first responders to have students obtain first aid and CPR certification to get a jump start into the world of work. | Send email | Play video |
| Gina Potter, Ed.D. San Ysidro School District  | Ecosystem of Support of Concentric Partners | San Ysidro School District is a culturally vibrant, binational community that serves one of the most vulnerable populations of students in the county of San Diego and within California. Our preschool through 8th grade learning community of 3 preschools, 5 elementary schools and 2 middle schools fosters the success of a student demographic characterized by 24% unhoused youth, almost 60% English language learners representing predominantly Spanish and 18 languages, and 75% socioeconomically disadvantages. With general obligation bond funds our district has the opportunity to build a multicultural community resource center that can provide much needed resources to students and their families in need of a centralized hub for laundry services, a food pantry, clothes, shoes, glasses, toiletries, academic tutors, after school student programs with ballet folklorico, mariachis, art, sports, and more! | Our district hopes to establish an ecosystem of support with concentric partners to help fund the operational costs of the community resource center. | Send email | Play video |
| Dr. Mark Stevens Borrego Springs Unified School District  | Planting the seed of financial freedom | BSUSD students are among the poorest in San Diego County. As part of a robust career technical education program, students will learn personal finance skills to overcome the trappings of poverty and start their journey toward financial freedom. Partners can provide "seed" money, actual money to students, to start investing for their future. | $1,000 per graduating student at BSUSD. | Send email | Play video |
| Eduardo Reyes, Ed.D. Chula Vista Elementary School District | World of Work: Sound Station | The mission of the CVESD Innovation and Instruction Department is to ensure that every student has the opportunity to identify and explore their personal strengths and interests and align them with potential careers in the future world of work. | $20,000 for Sound Station. With your support, nearly 4,000 Chula Vista ESD students will have the opportunity to explore their strengths and interests and connect them with potential careers in the creative economy with our Sound Station. | Send email | Play video |
| Dr. Leighangela Brady National School District | Value-Added World Action Team | The Sustainable Development Goals can only be realized with strong value-added partnerships. Be one of the first businesses in San Diego to join our World Action Team. This value-added World Action Team will commit to working side by side with students to address the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals in and around National City and within their businesses. | Join our World Action Team or contribute funding which would be used to support sustainable development projects identified by the team. | Send email | Play video |
Supe Tank 2.0: November 1, 2022 - Photo Gallery
To view all 103 photos from the event, click to visit the Supe Tank 2.0 Photo Gallery
Supe Tank 1.0: April 26, 2022 - Superintendent Speakers
| SUPERINTENDENT | PITCH TITLE | PITCH DESCRIPTION | THE ASK | CONTACT | VIDEO |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dr. Ben Churchill Carlsbad Unified School District | Mentor-Intern-Shadow-Ship! | An opportunity for career-bound high school seniors to learn about the high-priority sector jobs in our area and to connect them to possible jobs after graduation. | $20,000 for part-time teacher/coordinator for the program. More importantly, we need the commitment of local industry partners. | Send email | Play video |
| Dr. Holly McClurg Del Mar Union School District  | Kids Beyond the Kitchen | We want to partner with the local industry to teach students what actual goes into running a business, having an idea, being an entrepreneur, and follow through on a business model. | $15,000 to partner with an owner, CEO, or senior management of a restaurant to develop a template for a curriculum for a group of 5th graders. | Send email | Play video |
| Mr. Karl J. Mueller Coronado Unified School District | Mental Health First Aid | Help prioritize mental health literacy in our schools to meet the immediate needs of our students while building their capacity for future gainful employment | $20,000 to facilitate mental health first aid training for all of our high school students | Send email | Play video |
| Dr. Leighangela Brady National School District | Bring a Teacher to Work Day | Open up the doors of organizations so teachers could experience business on a first-hand basis to help teachers prepare our students for a world of work. | $20,000 investment would open up the doors for 100 teachers participate in this business venture; Time to host teachers at your business. | Send email | Play video |
Supe Tank: Get Involved
To get involved with Supe Tank and the Classroom of the Future Foundation (CFF), please contact Jane Turk-Schlosberg at jane@classroomofthefuture.org