S 5 EP 8: How To Cultivate Culture and Safety In Afterschool Programs feat. Juan Alvarado

[00:00:00] Juan Alvarado, School & Safety

[00:00:33] Hello, hello, everyone. Welcome to School After Hours podcast, where we talk about all things related to out-of-school sound programming and education. I am your host, Jaylee, and on today's show, we have a special guest, actually a returning guest, Mr. Juan Alvarado. He'll be sharing with us his insights on building a positive culture in after-school programs and also creating safe environments, not just for staff, but also for students as well. In this conversation, we'll

[00:01:00] discuss the vital factors of culture building, the foundational role of relationships, and how to make leadership expectations clear to all parties involved. But before we get into this interview, my agency School After Hours Consulting and KSC Leadership Consulting are coming together to host a workshop series that's going to help program managers and program directors plan the best

[00:01:25] summer programming they've had in forever. We have amazing facilitators coming together the week of April 14th to April 18th, that Monday to Friday, during your lunch hour to do wonderful workshops with you that are going to be helping you plan for program logistics, creating inclusive spaces, facilitating engaging activities, and giving you some tips on behavior management.

[00:01:52] If you're interested in learning more about this, there will be a link in the show notes and registration is open right now. Yes, registration is open as we speak. It is open for our early birth special, which is going to be $99 for all 10 workshops. You couldn't beat that if you tried. Don't delay your registration because prices go up after February 28th. So as soon as you see this,

[00:02:19] make sure that you register. Okay. Now, with that being said, let's go ahead and start the show. Thank you once again for being here with us on the show. I appreciate it. Thank you. No problem. So let's go ahead and jump into these interview questions, right? So my first thing is go ahead for the people that don't know you, give them a little bit about yourself, the highlights,

[00:02:47] and we can go ahead and dive a little bit deeper into our conversation. Highlights. So I grew up in Los Angeles, California, before I left to the military, went to the military right after high school, graduated following day, had a graduation party slash go-in-away party, and then left where I learned not only just basic stuff in the military, but intel, counterintelligence, and intelligence school. So just a lot of strategic thinking

[00:03:14] kind of things. And from there, moved to the Central Valley in California, where I live with my wife now and three boys. And I worked in that school program for 11 plus years after the police department and grew programs, started programs. And now I get to travel and speak, uplifting their leaders and leadership to help them have better programs, better staff, things like that.

[00:03:41] But yeah, I've got to speak in a bunch of different states and a bunch of different really big programs, especially here in California. And yeah, that's pretty much it. I just love the fact that I get to help leaders and leadership pour into those people who they lead, whether that's directors and to staff or staff for students. We're going to go ahead and dive into our interview questions. So what are some important factors in culture building at a program site?

[00:04:13] Important functions. I think you have to figure out what your foundation is, right? And so your foundation, I teach two different things when I work with programs is your people are going to be the foundation, right? So again, we're talking about culture. What is the culture environment? Because there's going to be different culture environments, right? There's going to be the culture for the students, right? What does that look like? What does that feel like? What does success look like? I love these two questions. What does success look like? And what does finished look like?

[00:04:43] Right? Success can look one way, but success to me might be different than success to you. So if a staff was to say, I want to have a successful classroom environment, well, then I want to know what does success look like to you? And at the end of the day, when you're done, what does done look like? I think answering those two questions is big. So then you have the culture and the environment of staff. What does that look like? And staff is

[00:05:07] the staff environment and the culture within each other during program, right? You know, there's that saying, see something, say something. If you see a staff struggling, help them out. If you see a student doing something that they shouldn't be doing or is being disrespectful to another staff, you can jump in like a parent. Hey, we don't talk to mom that way. We don't talk to dad that way. Like, Hey, do you need help? Let me talk to him. Go ahead and go with your class. Let me help you with this student. Like, what does that look like? What does it look like between closed doors

[00:05:37] when it's just a staff and we're working on our prep or we're having a staff meeting? What does that culture look like? So what is your foundation? I think it's going to be different for everybody. But again, what does success look like? What does done look like? Here's the other thing that I will say also is the foundation of any structure for, excuse me, any foundation for when you're working with people is going to be relationships. So the culture needs to be based on the relationship. I had a conversation with my wife a couple of years ago when I said, what are we parenting towards? What is

[00:06:07] the deal behind our parenting? What is the goal behind our parenting? Discipline, our structure, structure, and the positivity, like the reward system is what do we want it to be based on? And she said, I want it to be based on relationship building. I want us to be close as a family and I want it to be structured. Okay. So then our discipline is going to be family-based and structured. So when my son says something, my wife hates the word stupid. Don't use the word stupid in

[00:06:35] the house. Like if she was listening, she'd get mad that I even use that word twice right now. Like that's, that's a curse word to her, right? Don't say stupid. Oh, I said it three times. Someone's going to hear me, but we've heard our boys say, say it like, dude, you're stupid. And she's like, no, don't be saying. And so it's like, is that our structure? Is it saying don't do that? Is that the culture? Is that the foundation? So if it is based on relationships, then it's,

[00:07:00] do you understand what the word stupid means and what you're saying to your brother? Right. Um, if it's based on, well, he did this and that's not fair. Cool. Then I want you to talk to him about what respect is. He keeps on borrowing my sweater and then he doesn't return it. He doesn't wash it. Right. So then where's the hurt at? Well, I feel like it's being disrespectful. Okay. So then what does respect look like to you? What does success look like for you? Right. And so now is what you

[00:07:25] guys are going to do. Take the ball, football, baseball gloves, go to the park. This is your discipline. You're going to spend 30 minutes with each other. You're going to walk to the park, which is down the street from us. You're going to play catch or whatever you're going to talk about and then come back. And I'm going to give them the environment and their discipline is based on our structure. Our structure and our foundation is relationships. So their discipline is going to be, how do you build relationships? My son said something negative to his mom and talked back. I said,

[00:07:54] this is what you can do. You're going to apologize, but then you're going to take the bikes. You're going to ride your bike to Dutch Bros and you're going to pay for mom. But I don't have any money. Yeah, you do. What did you just get last week? But that's my birthday money or that's my Christmas money. Sorry. You're going to build the relationship with your mother using your money. I'm not going to give you money to do that. You do that. Right. So when we think about structure in our after school program, what are we leading towards? What is our foundation? So I try to teach

[00:08:22] foundation is relationships. You build structure and you build safety. And if you look at the building that you're in or the building that I'm in or wherever you're at, where you're listening to this, there's structure. You're standing or sitting on a foundation and the walls around you are leaning on one another. One wall is safety. One wall is structure and they have to lean on each other for support. They support one another. So your culture needs to have safety and it needs to have

[00:08:49] structure. How do your staff or your students want to feel? How do they feel safe? And what is the structure? And you can't have structure without safety. You can't have safety without structure. You can't have either without the foundation of relationships. Yeah. And I'll even take it a step further where you're at and look at the wall and look at the other wall where they meet. It comes to a point. Your safety and your structure need to have a point.

[00:09:16] Without a point, if they don't meet, then they're just walls. And these two walls, if they're opposite of each other, are going to fall. But if they meet, there's a point. Is there a point behind your safety and your structure? So in that process, are you defining what that point is? Or you're just going to willy nilly figure it out? Yeah. Yeah. And nothing, nothing should be willy nilly, right? As you go, it should be like, what, what is our structure? What are we trying to do? Right. And in today's world,

[00:09:42] we want our kids to feel safe. And I hate this. Our schools are a safe environment for our students. What is safe? Because there's physical safety. There is mental safety, right? So how do we make our students feel safe? And then with our staff, there's some staff that don't feel safe. So how do we feel safe? Well, you feel safe when you're comfortable and you feel comfortable when you're confident. Well, how do my confident routine? So routine brings confidence, brings a sense of being

[00:10:12] assured. And then you become confident. I give the example this way. When you're teaching or when you're a student and your teacher said, you know, Frank, read the first paragraph. Frank's looking around the room like, oh crap, I heard my name. What? You just primed me, right? And now I need to figure out what we're doing. Is your book open? Yes, it's open. You're on page 32. Yeah. Okay. Read the first paragraph. And now they're like, uh, the, the, the ship went and

[00:10:39] they're not confident. However, when a teacher used to tell us we're about to read in about 10 minutes, open your books to 47. I'm already priming right in the military. We call this a preparatory command. I would say our drill sergeant would say left. And also our ears picked up. We're going to go to the left face. And then we would move. It's a preparatory command. And then the command. So in schools, the teacher would give us a preparatory command in 10 minutes. We're going to read, open up your book to 47 and we're going to read the first six paragraphs. I'm going to go here.

[00:11:06] First one, first paragraph, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, Johnny, you're going to be our sixth. Be ready to read. We're going to get started in a couple of minutes, but make sure I'm going to go grab this or everyone get their water, whatever. And now if you were number five, you're Frank and your paragraph five, you'd count one, two, three, four, five. Okay. And then you start to practice. So then when it happened, you were confident because you were prepared because now you have routine. We're going one, two, three, four. And so, yeah, you shouldn't go anything willy nilly,

[00:11:34] but your staff will be more comfortable and confident in that structure, in that safety, in that relationship building. If you have routine. I know that's right. And clear instructions, giving them direction in the way that you want to go. I feel like that's very, very important. Not just, not just go left, go right, but these are the reasons why that we're doing it. You're giving them the why behind it. Right. And again, it goes back to what does success look like to you? And what does done look

[00:12:01] like to you? Like you just said, go left, go right. If I just give somebody directions, they go right. How long are they going? Right. Well, when are they turning? Right. And then how far are they going? Right. Done is when you get to this corner that's done. So that's very important to have those questions built in as well. I know that's right. All right, everybody don't go nowhere. We're going to take a real quick break. We're coming right back. Okay. See you in a minute. Are you a program provider or administrator struggling with planning day-to-day logistics for your

[00:12:27] after-school program? Or maybe you have a complete brain freeze when it comes to planning program activities. Or somewhere along the lines of when it's time to plan your activities, you have no idea where to start. What if I told you, you don't have to figure those things out by yourself? Hi, my name is Janice Lee. I'm a former after-school program director and the founder of School After Hours Consulting, where we help youth program managers create impactful programs that ensure

[00:12:54] student success. With my 20 years of experience, I can definitely help you figure out all those things. Book a free 20-minute discovery call where we can get to know each other a little bit more. See if we can find simple solutions to your current challenges. And if you need it, we can see how we can work together. I look forward to hearing from you soon. Hey, everybody. Welcome back. Welcome back. We're jumping back into the show. We are

[00:13:20] talking about the importance of building of culture. So with that being said, we last time, before we left and went on break, we were talking about the importance of direction, also the importance of giving instruction, but also defining, having that defining line of what do you want to look like? Well, also, why do you want it to look this way? Giving them the why behind it. So in building culture in your programs, one of the things that I wanted to ask you on was

[00:13:48] should students feedback but be included in building that culture? Yeah, 100%. I think that students know what they want, again, but they might not know what they need. And so it's our job to give them that. But I know that in the program that I was a part of, kids kept on saying that they want, I just want to hang out, right? Especially in junior high.

[00:14:18] And in elementary, I'm trying to think of where we did this, but you have a group of friends, and then they get put into two different third grade classes, and they'll never see each other until recess or lunch. In junior high, same thing. High school, same thing. You might have a friend that you have in one period or two, but not in your other ones. And so it's like, we just want time to chill. Well, in our programs, you weren't allowed to have where they changed on some of the

[00:14:44] requirements for your grants. You weren't allowed to have, quote unquote, free time. And so when we took free time away, students were very upset. So I said, all right, let's get to the dictionary because I love being a wordsmith and looking at the things of words. And so we added fellowship time. And so fellowship time, when you look at the word fellowship is spending time with one another.

[00:15:09] Free time is what it was, right? But we had structured fellowship. There was a group of people who loved basketball. There was a group of kids that loved soccer. There was a group of kids who loved their instruments. And there's other kids that love to just kick back and sit and draw. So then we had a staff with the soccer kids. We had a group of kids with basketball. We had a group of kids with the music slash hangout on the picnic tables or the lunch tables out and things. But there had to

[00:15:37] be a staff there and there had to be a communication piece. So with basketball, it was like what basketball shoes were coming out, what game was played yesterday, who's going to win the West, the East. And there was communication while you're passing the ball around and taking shots because it built community. We were actually fellowshipping with one another. Same thing with soccer, you know, who's the teams who got the best uniforms, who's got the worst uniforms. It was conversations that

[00:16:03] the students that we would listen and hear the students have. I mean, there would be fights over who had who had the better uniforms. And so it was like, instead of kids arguing about it, they want to talk about it. So given the platform to talk about it while they're playing soccer. And so and then we okay, could you build a better soccer uniform? And so then we would have a club or an enrichment on who could create a better logo for the soccer team. And so now and then it turned into

[00:16:31] like, let's learn Photoshop. And like, it just it did a whole bunch of other things. And then the students that were just sitting down, it was like, it was conversations that you would have that you probably didn't want to necessarily start with students if you're a teacher, but it was like, what teachers really cool? What teachers, not the teachers that you hated, right? Strong words. But what were the teachers that you're like, Oh, man, I have them for this period, or I have them for this class, or which one is not your favorite, right? And then it was like, why? And how do you feel?

[00:16:59] And what would make that relationship better? And then it was like, Hey, Mr. Hernandez, you know what the teachers that students really want from you? They really would just want you to listen and not to cut them off or whatever. And we would give some of our teachers feedback. But it all goes back to the students having feedback, us listening to them and us giving them what they wanted. But I made sure that we said, Hey, we're not allowed free time, look at this paper, I would show them the grant paper, you're not allowed free time. So what are we gonna do about it? And so it's almost like, let's figure out how smart we can be,

[00:17:27] but how can we trick them into thinking that, right? And so then we looked like the heroes, one, because we heard them out. And two, we went around the system and gave them what they wanted, but in a quote, unquote, legal way, that was structured that gave them and they knew, Hey, have a seat, or we're gonna lose fellowship time, like sit down, chill, relax, or else we're gonna lose this. Yeah, their voice is, is big. And I think a lot of times we run program from an adult perspective,

[00:17:53] which is why students don't show up junior high students will vote with their feet, we need to start running program with the hearts and the eyes of our students. That is so true. I was talking about that in another conversation. And I was like, children vote with their feet. If they like what you're doing, they're going to show up. And not only will they show up, they'll also recruit for you at the same time to get their friends and to get other students and even sometimes other parents and other staff involved in what you're doing.

[00:18:20] And you'll have that support. But so often we're doing it thinking our, what we want, instead of thinking of, okay, what do they want? And then executing from there. Right. Absolutely. Absolutely. So let me say, how should leadership make their expectations known to students and staff in the process of building culture? So I go over when I teach, when I go into programs and I teach staff and organizations for the actual

[00:18:49] programs, I go over the three expectations, the expectations that I have of myself, the expectations that I have of you, and then the expectations that you have of me. And that will be completely complete communication, right? This is what I expect from our program. This is what I expect from my staff. This is what I expect from my students. This is what I expect from culture. And that's for me. I will add this to culture. I will add this to my program. I will do, I will do this, right? The expectations I have of myself, the expectations I have of you.

[00:19:16] My expectation is that you add this way, you help students culture this way, you help our staff this way. And then it's, what are your expectations of me? So you guys as a staff, you guys as students, right? We're listening to the voices of our students and voices of our staff. What are your expectations of me? Or what's your expectations of the culture, right? To feel safe, to feel supported, to do this, to, to, you know, whatever it is for the students, whatever it is, it is for the staff. But when we have those conversations or surveys, I know some people

[00:19:43] want them anonymous, right? They don't want to know who said what or whatever. And I get that. But my thing is, is if somebody says, I want more conversations, I feel understood. I need more of your time. I wish the culture took time for us to talk to us. But then somebody is like, I just want some space. Well, if I'm going to talk to you, and I'm going to give you more time, but I'm actually doing it to the person who wants space, then I'm doing them a disservice. So it's very

[00:20:11] important to know who said what. But I understand that there's other times where people want to be, you know, anonymous. My thing is like, if you want something specific, and you need it for you, then bro, put your name on there. Because it's going to help me say, I need to be able to give you what you need and what you want. But yeah, the three expectations, I think is huge to set that communication when it comes to culture. And again, what are we striving for? Awesome. And I believe I had this conversation with another guest that I had on the show

[00:20:41] in talking about culture. But keeping in mind school day culture, right? So sometimes that may be a little bit different than what you're trying to build on after school of how do you begin to make that a collaborative effort for individuals that are in extended day programs that are within schools, or even trying to collaborate with the community and what's going on? Yeah, so a lot of stuff needs to be on both sides of the page. I think in the last episode, we were talking about, you know, when kids go to grandma's house, they get all crazy, and then they

[00:21:10] come back to the house. And like, it's different. There's some things that have to be on both pages on both sides, regular school day and out of school program. For us here in California, I don't know where it is everywhere else, but there's PBIS positive behavior intervention support. And every school has like an acronym, like one of the what is it? The Alta Eagles have SOAR, S-O-A-R, how to how to have selfless service and how to be obedient and how to have a good attitude and how to be respectful.

[00:21:39] And how do you do that in the classroom and in the hallways and in lines and in the restroom and at lunch. And then the regular school days, like, but the actual organization or company doesn't doesn't do that. And we want to be on the same page. The culture in the regular school day is very important for that culture to be an after school program. The other thing is for teachers and administrators to understand that after school program doesn't have to run the same way that the regular school day does. We don't have to have we don't have to have library quiet when the kids

[00:22:05] are building rockets and painting and doing crazy things. Like it's not a classroom environment. We don't have to go through a curriculum like you do and get to a certain point and test and do state testing and all that other stuff. Yes, we have a curriculum. Yes, we're building rockets. Yes, we're painting. Yes, we're doing paper mache. It doesn't have to be quiet. So yes, there's going to be different cultures. However, the structure of the bottom line that foundation that we were talking about before of building relationships, if the structure is still building relationships, and

[00:22:35] that relationships is safety and again structure, then you can still have other things built off of that foundation. So regular school day culture, after school culture, but the foundation is the same. There needs to be some understanding that some rules will be on both. And then there's other ones that, you know, we don't need. Right? Right. Some of them can be chopped and left at the water. It's

[00:23:00] fine. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Awesome. Well, everybody. Well, that was great. Thank you for sharing so much of this wonderful information with us, Lana. I greatly appreciate it. But before we go, let's go into our Boop Boop Professionals Lounge. Professionals Lounge is a segment of the show that allows guests to share advice with other practitioners in the OST and youth development field about how they can begin growing their gifts and talents, but also develop themselves as professionals in the field.

[00:23:27] Here's our Professionals Lounge conversation. All right, everybody, we are at our Professionals Lounge section for the show. So with that being said, why? My question for you for Professionals Lounge is what advice would you give to youth development professionals who want to build a career career in this field of work? And they're starting off maybe as a site aide, or they've even gotten the

[00:23:51] position as a director, and they want to continue to pursue this field of work. So one of the things that I did when I was a director of programs is I made a rule that nobody liked. Nobody liked this rule. And not until I would say six months went by, people were like, I get it. I get it. And so what it was, was as a staff, you could not move up to that lead position

[00:24:20] at the school that you were a site of. So if I was at Alta School as a staff, and there was an opening for the lead position there, if there was a lead position somewhere else, that person had to, if they wanted to be a lead, you wanted to be a lead. It didn't matter at what school, it shouldn't matter. If you want to lead, you want to get paid more, and you want to do all this other stuff, then you just want to lead. Then you want to lead. You had to do that position, that lead

[00:24:45] position at a different school. You could not be the lead at the same school that you worked at as a staff. And here's the reason why. Clicks would start to evolve and, you know, other staff complaining about there being favorites and how come they could show up late and not get written up, but I did. And so this alleviates everything. The other thing that it does is person X worked at this school, school one, and now they're going to be a lead at school Y. And now when they go for another position,

[00:25:15] or they're going to make it a career, as you said, you can now on your resume, I've been a second grade staff. I've been a lead at a junior high. I've helped out at this side. I've been helped out at this site. And if I'm hiring for a director's position, and I see a staff that's worked for five years or eight years at a program, the same program, they work third grade for five years, and then they became a lead for three years. But then I have this new person that applied, who's worked at a

[00:25:43] second grade staff, a fifth grade staff, a sixth grade staff, you know, an eighth grade staff, and that's their four years experience versus the other person's who was just a third grade staff. And then they became a lead at a junior high. And then they went to a different junior high, and then they went to another elementary school. And they wanted to have that experience. I know that that person has had to deal with different staff, different environments, different cultures, different parents, different students, that person is more well rounded and equipped for this position.

[00:26:11] And so my advice would be, if you're going to make this a career, people get really mad in this in this day and age about people who, especially the older generation gets mad at the younger generation for what they call career hopping or job hopping. And people see that they're not committed. Maybe they are and they learned what they needed to learn. And now they're going to the next thing, right? And they're learning what they need to learn there. And then they move to the next thing. My thing is, if the person saying, it's been after school program, after school program,

[00:26:41] after school program, before program, after program, and they have stayed in this realm, that's commitment to me, right? And so my advice would be, wherever there's an opportunity, take it. Like take that opportunity to learn something. If you're like, well, I don't want to do it because I only have elementary school experience. And this is a junior high, go get the junior high experience. It's going to make you that much better. The other piece of advice that I

[00:27:05] would give you is a shameless plug, but follow people on Instagram, me and other people or other podcasts or other things that might have programs or workshops that you can attend. And I think I said this on the last episode was, you know, people spend money on coffee and in fast food, and that's not helping you spend money on books, spend money on workshops, spend money on a mentor, get a teacher, right? As elementary school kids. And so this would be the third piece of advice.

[00:27:35] Elementary school students have a teacher, junior high students have a teacher, high school have a teacher. If you go to college, then you have professors and you have a leader. When you go get a job, sometimes you get a boss, but you don't really get a leader nowadays. So you've always have somebody teaching you to making you better, a music teacher, a coach, right? Somebody there to make you better. But once you get out of school, who's your coach? Who's teaching you? Right? You want this

[00:28:02] other job, but are you becoming better? There are people out there, and I'm one of them to help after school programs get better, help staff get better. Find someone that is going to help you get better investing yourself. If you're spending $100 a month on fast food, then you can spend $100 a month on or 200 bucks a month on a coach, like investing yourself. You're not investing in the

[00:28:27] coach, you're investing in yourself. It's not like, like I have a coach the after this, you know, I'm going on a call where I'm paying somebody, it's basically 200 bucks a month. I just got out of one that was $1,000 a month. And I'm like, where am I gonna get this money? I sold stuff. Like I sold clothes at a rowing machine, like exercise machine that I wasn't using and sold it. And I'm like, cool, I got like three or four months of coaching that I can get to make me better.

[00:28:54] The reason why I'm in a situation where I am now is because I started putting money in investing in myself, going to places, conferences, the boost conference, like go to the boost conference, learn from professionals, network, exchange emails, follow them on Instagram. Like, there's people out there that are going to help build you up, like you need to have a mentor, there will be a caveat, though. One, how do I find a good mentor? How do I know a good teacher? Every good mentor, every good teacher has their own mentor and has their own teacher,

[00:29:24] learn from somebody who's continuously learning. Right. Exactly. So you know, where they're poor, who's being poured into them. Yep. You know where you're filtering and where you're getting your information from. So it's a, it's an ongoing cycle. Yep. Awesome. So, one, thank you for being on the show. Yeah, thank you. So for the folks that want to get in touch with you, go ahead and give them your information.

[00:29:52] Yeah. So website is we raise the bar, R-A-I-Z-E, raise with a Z, raise the bar.com, we raise the bar.com. And then my Instagram handle is raise the bar CEO. So raise the bar again with the Z CEO on Instagram. And then you can find me, Juan Alvarado or RTB-Juan on LinkedIn. Well, everyone, that brings us to the end of our show. If you like what you heard and you enjoyed

[00:30:20] our conversation, make sure that you're following us on YouTube, but also hit that like button so we know what you are enjoying. You can also find us on other podcast platforms like Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts if you want to listen to our audio version as well. To get more behind the scenes stuff, make sure that you're following us on our social media accounts, Instagram and

[00:30:43] Facebook at School Actor Hours. Well, that's all I have for today. In the words of Mr. Arthur Ashe, start where you are, use what you have, do what you can. Until next time, y'all. Bye-bye.