HOUSE SYSTEM

Implementing the RCA House System will provide benefits that deeply impact the entire school community. Students and teachers where the House System is in place have raved about the impact it has had on the educational experience. The ties and connections can help students in trauma build connections. Every students will have multiple adults connected to them aside from their classroom teacher alone. The House System is about a deep connection and positive school culture.

Culture of Belonging - Houses provide students with a culture of belonging. School can be stressful for students and some may feel out of place if they don't know where they fit in.

Houses - Schools generally have between 4-8 Houses that students are randomly divided between. Each House has a "House Leader" (teacher) and all other teachers and staff are randomly sorted into the Houses. Once a student is in a House they remain in that House for their time at the school. If we were to have 5 Houses it would be about 85 students per House with 1 House Leader, 3 Teachers and 2 additional staff per House.

Sorting - There are different ways I have seen school sort students into Houses. Here are the different ways I've seen schools sort students into a House:

• Spin a color wheel to sort students
• Online random color generator
• Pop a black balloon with a different color square
• Open a paper sack with a different color paper or bracelet

The first year will be the longest sort and then after that you would only need to do new students and Kindergarten. There is a video below at Deer Creek Elementary of their "sort day" aka "Slide Day" of their 2nd year. We would not include PK because they will be distributed to different campuses after PK.

House Points - Students help earn their team House Points. These can be paper or some schools I have seen use Dojo and this would be super easy to implement since we already use Dojo. Students earn points by doing things that are above and beyond. They can also earn points for attendance and other positive behaviors. Each six weeks there is a House party for the House with the most points. There is also a House trophy for the end of the year for the House with the most points.

House Pep Rallies & Meetings - Typically there is a House Meeting and students wear their House colors each Friday (it could be any day) with team building, SEL lessons or lessons about the House pillars. (It would be easy to have a schedule with a 30 min SEL time at the beginning of the day where House Meetings could happen on Friday.) Each six weeks there is a Pep Rally for Houses. We could easily incorporate our six weeks awards at this time. At Austin we already have PRIDE - Positive, Respect, Integrity, Determination & Excellence. These could easily be our 5 House pillars.