CUMMINGS & ASSOCIATES CONSULTING, INC.

Improving Educational Organizations Through Our HOLISTIC SYSTEMS APPROACH® Services

You want to serve the community better and collaborate more effectively with stakeholders. We can help. We are focused on creating strategies and solutions for our clients that support student- and community-centered decision-making. At Cummings and Associates Consulting, Inc. (CAAC), we are dedicated to improving educational organizations using our Holistic Systems Approach® services.

We believe a strong focus on the health of an organization, from inside-out and outside-in, is necessary to create a seamless pipeline from PreK-to-career for our nation’s youth. We believe ALL children deserve a rigorous education that develops intellectual, social, and emotional capital as well as the skills needed to attain a living-wage job with a stackable career ladder.

Our Services

Board and Superintendent Support

Our focus is to work in collaboration with you to identify the right metrics, analyze information, and translate data into decisions that positively impact teaching and learning.

Organizational Health

Our Holistic Systems Approach® services is as an approach that looks at all aspects of the entire system as a collaborative unit when working toward implementing work and achieving goals.

Organizational Leadership Consulting

We'll help you build bridges across classrooms, schools, and communities, overcoming barriers and maximizing growth opportunities.

Learn More

Board and Superintendent Support

Your role as a board member or superintendent is to meet the needs of students, parents, staff, and the community. In fact, the Board and superintendent need to work in partnership to measure progress, evaluate opportunities, and make decisions.

Our focus is to work in collaboration with you to identify the right metrics, analyze information, and translate data into decisions that positively impact teaching and learning. It’s at the heart of what we do at CAAC.

Benefits from Becoming a Client:
• Make data-driven decisions by analyzing trends in your district’s metrics
• Communicate your district's data story in an authentic and transparent way
• Prepare for a superintendent search by identifying current and future key qualifications
• Build a stronger partnership between the Board and superintendent
• Develop cycles of inquiry to understand problems in your district
• Develop stakeholder feedback loops
• Implement initiatives using a holistic systems lens
• Improve collaboration between the district and community and increase partnership opportunities
• Induct new Board members
• Conduct quarterly/annual organizational health reviews

Learn About Our Process

Testimonials

"Thanks so much for your help. The webinars lead us toward possible [superintendent] qualities and qualifications that we may not have thought about without your insight. Thanks again!!!"

"I deeply appreciated the work you did with us. Thank you for helping public education be its best!"

"I liked the focused, structured approach to the data analysis...The data spoke clearly about the needs. It felt like a clarion call to action that, this time, we would agree to do something about."

School Board Member

Learn How We Can Help

Let’s talk about the challenges facing your organization. We’ll discuss a path forward toward change.

Testimonials

"Teresa is an incredible thought partner and coach. Her exquisite listening skills paired with her extensive leadership experience are exactly what leaders crave in strategizing and visioning sessions. Her boundless energy and tenacious follow-through drive all this good thinking to actions that make a difference for students."

Carrie Wilson
Executive Director, Emeritus, Lead by Learning, Mills College of Education

Organizational Health

Our Holistic Systems Approach® services help districts discern the health of their current educational system.

Too often, educational systems are addressed as parts of a whole rather than considering the whole as the sum of its parts. Given the current silos in many educational systems, the task of developing a collaborative environment for co-creating, implementing, and evaluating district-wide initiatives is daunting.

Only a holistic perspective can determine what is needed inside and outside the system to scale any district-wide initiative, such as Whole Child – Whole Adult – Whole Community Education (WCACE).

We developed our Holistic Systems Approach® to Education rubric to give districts the right tool to help discern their organizational health. The rubric is an inventory of the district’s approach to education based on central office, school site, and community metrics. The tool evaluates the district’s approach to relationships, culture, structures, and implementation.

CAAC’s rubric uses a proactive approach to understanding the entire system. The tool results in a road map of partnerships, support systems, and practices. It offers critical information needed to ensure quality implementation of Whole Child – Whole Adult – Whole Community Education, as well as other initiatives.

The Rubric Identifies:
1) Strengths and challenges within the current system
2) Potential pitfalls that may arise during creation and implementation of priority initiatives
3) Components of the organization that function cohesively
4) Opportunities for success
5) Possible barriers to success

Help Discern the Health of Your District Based on Critical Elements Including:

• Educational leadership capacity – central office, school, and teacher-leaders
• Alignment of vision, mission, LCAP goals
• Systems of reflection and continuous improvement
• Curriculum development and support
• Staff ownership and wellness
• Strategic budget processes
• Talent management
• Pipelines to post-secondary opportunities
• Student academic performance
• Promotion of whole child education
• Family and Community partnerships

Learn How We Can Help

Let’s talk about your unique needs for organizational change. We’ll discuss the most pressing matters affecting your district.

Organizational Leadership Consulting

You have discovered the need to make focused and impactful changes in your organizational and need help defining and implementing the changes. We provide tools to develop a system-wide collaborative environment that makes student- and adult-centered decision-making possible.

CAAC provides the following services to help build bridges across classrooms, schools, and communities, overcoming barriers and maximizing growth opportunities.

Get Help in Driving Change in One or More of the Following 8 Key Areas:

Coaching: Executive Leadership, Transitional, and Dissertation Completion
Organizational Restructuring
Talent Management
Performance Management
Project Management
Research and Development
Strategic Planning
Grant Acquisition and Management

Testimonial

"Teresa is not only an experienced and knowledgeable executive leader and coach, but she displays tactical empathy with skill, conviction, and grace. She says what needs to be said and she does what needs to be done. I have had the privilege of both working with and being mentored by Teresa and know her to be a skillful listener and dedicated professional who has a laser-like focus on working to meet the needs of those she serves. Whether she is leading systems through change or supporting individuals who are leading systems through change, Teresa can be counted on to provide what is needed. She is an unrelenting voice for equity and access. I don't know what I would do without her support and counsel - I am so appreciative!"

Executive Cabinet Member, California School District

Learn How We Can Help

Let’s talk about your unique needs for organizational change. We’ll discuss the most pressing matters affecting your district.

Contact us now to schedule a time to chat.

Testimonial

"I've worked with Teresa Cummings for over 15 years and can attest, first hand, to her skills and passion for public school success. I first met Teresa when she was teaching math a Hiram Johnson High School in Sacramento. Teresa had the trust of her students, colleagues and families and she agreed to lead a new project we were launching at the high school level: parent teacher home visits. The work Teresa led became the model for secondary school visits throughout the country.

Years later, our non-profit grew into a national network, we needed someone to coordinate an important evaluation of our efforts across multiple states. I asked Teresa to lead this effort as I knew we could trust her to understand both the academic evaluator perspective and the ground-level practitioner experience. Finally, Teresa and I both spent a year together working on a systems design for whole child education in the state of California based on the work of Peter Senge and MIT. Teresa is smart, funny, direct and ALWAYS gets the job done!"

Carrie Rose
Executive Director, Emeritus, Parent Teacher Home Visits

About Cummings & Associates Consulting, Inc.

Cummings and Associates Consulting, Inc. is focused on creating strategies and solutions for our clients that support student-, adult-, and community-centered decision-making. We are dedicated to improving educational organizations using our Holistic Systems Approach® process. Our mission is provide tools to develop a system-wide collaborative environment that ensures district initiatives are created, implemented, and sustained using a holistic systems lens.

Learn more