The CharacterStrong Podcast

We are celebrating National School Counseling Week! We talk with Roberto about ways that he builds great relationships at Milwaukie HS, and the role that authenticity plays in those relationships. He also shares about the impact that student affinity groups have had and how they started them. Roberto Aguilar is a proud, native eastern Oregonian, Latinx/Chicano, "Spanglish" bilingual, first-generat...

We are celebrating National School Counseling Week! We talk with Kat about the critical role that counselors play in our schools. She shares about the importance of advocating for school counseling, and overviews ways that CharacterStrong is helping to celebrate all of the counselors in our schools.

We talk with Dr. Clayton Cook about his new role at CharacterStrong and he shares why implementation is needed today now more than ever. Dr. Cook also talks about ways the CharacterStrong team is partnering with schools, and he gives 3 practical implementation steps that schools can do right now.

Today our guest is Sonjanita Moore, a Secondary Specialist here at CharacterStrong. We talk with Sonjanita about the need for including student voice and student choice in our classrooms. She also shares how community agreements are one way that we can include students, and gives examples of impact that came from creating space for students to share.

Today our guest is Julie Hinshaw, the Director of K-12 Curriculum for CharacterStrong. On this episode we talk to Julie about community agreements. She shares about what community agreements are, why they are important, and gives 5 ways that we can help keep them fresh for our students.

We reflect with CharacterStrong Co-Founder Houston Kraft about things that are going on in education, and how disappointment is the result of unmet expectations. Houston also shares how we can be proactive with the time that we have, and gives 3 strategies that put a focus on well-being.

Today our guest is Dr. John Salovardos. Dr. Salovardos is the Director of Pupil Services in the Athol-Royalston Regional School District, in Athol-Royalston, Massachusetts. He has been working in special education in public schools for the past 23 years. We talk with Dr. Salovardos about ways that we can help all students feel connected at school, and how we can help students to thrive in our comm...

John talks with CharacterStrong Co-Founder Houston Kraft & Team Member Don Bartel about the recent CharacterStrong leadership conference, and the role and impact that student leadership has in school culture & climate.

Michele Borba, Ed. D. is an internationally-recognized educator who has spoken to over one million parents and educators. She is recognized for her solution-based strategies on raising resilient kids, and has appeared over 150 times on the TODAY show and featured in New York Times, Washington Post, Time, and Dateline. Her 24 books are translated in 20 languages and her latest (March 2021) is Thriv...

Tyler Bastian is an educator, filmmaker, father and the founder of Roots Charter High School. Tyler loves to teach and has a passion for discovering and developing potential in everything around him. For four years Tyler taught Character Education at a local High School and believes positive character is the greatest indicator of success. In 2012 Tyler began to develop the concepts that have becom...

John shares a powerful reminder of a teachers impact thru perseverance, a short reading from Jacob Riis, and he gives some encouragement as we live, teach & work during this season.

Dr. Bikowsky is a Child & Adolescent Clinical Therapist and an Educational Staff Associate Certified School Counselor with a Ph. D. in Educational Counseling/Psychology. Bella has diverse experience in the education and mental health fields spanning 20 years. Over her career, Bella has gained clinical experience working in long-term residential treatment centers as well as at Seattle Children's Ho...

Kelly has been in education for the last 15 years. She did her undergraduate work at the University of Portland, majoring in Political Science and got my Masters in Teaching through Concordia University. Kelly began her career teaching pre-school in Ireland and when she moved back to the states, she began teaching Kindergarten. Kelly spent the last two years before becoming a principal working as...

Josh Godinez is a high school counselor at Centennial High School in Corona, California. He also serves as the Board Chair for the California Association of School Counselors (CASC) and was named the 2019 California School Counselor of the Year. Josh supported the development of a data informed program for a new high school in Fontana, California, where he served as head counselor prior to his cur...

For the past 12 years, Michael Adams has been passionately serving youth in the K-12 setting as a School Counselor. Growing up on the Hopi reservation in Northern Arizona, Michael is driven to support Native/Indigenous populations through educational experiences. His youthful energy has been invited to speak all across the southwest to share messages of inspiration. Michael's book "A Warrior's Min...

Kelly has been in education for the last 16 years. She did her undergraduate work at the University of Portland, majoring in Political Science and got her Masters in Teaching through Concordia University. Kelly began her career teaching pre-school in Ireland. When she moved back to the states, she began teaching Kindergarten and has taught pre-K through 3rd grade. Kelly spent the last two years be...

In part 3 of this series on implementation, Megan shares why we need to focus on continuous improvement in our implementation process. She also gives some practical ways that we can get feedback as we move forward on the path of implementation.

On this episode Megan dives into using an implementation framework, and how implementation is a process. She talks about 2 steps of implementation: pre-implementation & active implementation, and shares important elements of each step.

CharacterStrong Director of Implementation Megan Gruis talks about the importance of creating a strong implementation team, and the components of successful teaming. Megan also shares about the need for having effective practices that work.

Darrell Marks is a single parent of two sons and a daughter, and is an indigenous Dine'/Navajo. Darrell is am White Corn Zuni Edgewater born for those going home, and his maternal grandparents are Red House and paternal grandparents are Salt. He is originally from the community of Tonalea which is northeast of Flagstaff, Arizona. Darrell serves as the academic advisor for Native American students...

Today our guest is Kat Pastor, Kat was the 2016 ASCA National School Counselor of the Year, and is now the Director of School Supports at CharacterStrong. We talk with Kat about the Educator Listening Sessions that CharacterStrong is hosting, she shares some of the insights that came out of these sessions, and she talks about ways that we can best support the students, staff and families that we s...

Danielle Yepa Gunderson is a Citizen of the Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma and from Jemez and Laguna pueblo in New Mexico. A proud wife of twenty-one years and a mother of two beautiful & intelligent teenage daughters. She is the Associate Director of College Counseling and Director of Native American Studies at Sandia Preparatory School (Sandia Prep) in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She earned her Bache...

Dr. Lynn Kepp is the Vice President of Executive Communications and Project Management Office at AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination), a nonprofit training 85,000 educators annually to close the opportunity gap and prepare students for college, careers and life. She has a Doctorate in Education from UC Riverside with a research focus on Teacher Development and has a Master's in Science...

Today we have a special episode for you. It is the first episode of a new podcast called the Adult SEL Podcast by CharacterStrong where we focus on improving our personal well-being through research and practical strategies in order to better serve the people we care about. Instead of weekly episodes, each season will be a series that we drop all at once, bringing together experts in the field. We...

Dr. Larberg has served over 30 years in public education, serving as a school counselor at every grade level and an adjunct instructor at college. Before public education, she started her career in psychiatric and community mental health. She has been serving in Sumner-Bonney Lake School District as a Whole Child administrator for the past few years. Larberg earned her doctorate from Grand Canyon...