We were lucky to catch up with Cletis Allen recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Cletis thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s start with education – we’d love to hear your thoughts about how we can better prepare students for a more fulfilling life and career?

From my experiences and expertise, the current educational system has an unbalanced focus on Humanities content areas. In many districts and educational spaces, reading and math mastery has more importance than science and social studies mastery. Reading and mathematics instruction is allocated to more than 75% of instructional time in many classrooms and learning spaces. With a strong background in Literacy, I believe that reading mastery is a human right. I also believe readers reach mastery when they have opportunities to apply learned skills across contexts and spaces. With the current emphasis on reading and mathematics, this inequity in instruction creates limited time for topic exploration in science and social studies/history. I strive to balance learning schedules so all content areas receive equitable time for teaching and learning in Humanities. I believe literacy integration across the Humanities will increase time and space for learners to explore and implement these skills in mathematics, science, and social studies/history content areas. CLETIS Education Consulting LLC collaborates with small and large educational learning institutions with designing lessons with ‘literacy in mind’ across content areas by providing customized services and learning products.

We can prepare learners for a fulfilling life and career by creating learning spaces where collaboration, accountability, and self-awareness are valued for all. Learning opportunities that value collaboration give learners a space to share their experiences and listen to others’ experiences. Their collaboration cultivates collective responsibility and individual responsibility for taking risks and reaching learning goals. The implementation of ideas and skills provides learners a space where they become more aware of themselves as unique members in a collective with similar learning goals. Our learners can apply skills in collaboration, accountability, and self-awareness to their real-world experiences. When learning spaces value collaboration, accountability, and self-awareness, we create the next generation of lifelong learners that can grow in spaces within society.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your background and context?

This year starts my 12th year in the field of education. Throughout my years in education, I have served in many roles: classroom teacher, grade level chair, curriculum writer, professional learning facilitator, curriculum writer, instructional support specialist, and now elementary education consultant. CLETIS Education Consulting LLC (CEC) is a seed that was planted by my mentor and past principal, Dr. Susan McClendon. In January 2019, she encouraged me to use my love for supporting teachers and parents with creating engaging and rich learning spaces beyond the classroom. When she transitioned from elder to ancestor, I began to water and harvest that seed to build CEC!

CLETIS Education Consulting is a woman-owned, melanin-owned elementary educational consulting firm that believes in instructional equity and excellence in all learning spaces. The six C.L.E.T.I.S. principles guide our work to cultivating these spaces for learners: Collaboration, Literacy, Engagement, Teaching, Integration, and Standards. These principles are rooted in my pedagogy of teaching and learning: Culturally Responsive Literacy Instruction, where learning occurs at the intersection of culture, context, and content.

What’s unique about CEC is we have both learning opportunities and resources that support both small and large educational institutions! For example, the Literacy Integration Unit Planner©️ is designed to support any learning facilitator (teacher, homeschooling parent, tutor, etc.) with organizing and planning literacy-integrated units of learning in P-5 spaces. Additionally, I believe in cultivating spaces for peers and colleagues to support parents who need specific services or resources for their learner(s) to master content-specific skills. The CEC Educational Directory is an educational hub for parents to access experienced and qualified learning facilitators who specialize in specific content areas or educational resources. All of our resources are digital.

What warms my heart is when I receive emails and messages from past and current clients that share how they are implementing the strategies we’ve discussed in sessions or how their lessons are influencing their learners to explore beyond the learning space. I know that I’ve done my job.

What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?

As a new business owner in education, the most effective strategy with my growing clientele is two-fold: targeting my audience and presenting myself in those spaces. CEC’s main clientele are learning facilitators that support Pre-K to fifth grade learners. These learning facilitators include a range of people, including parents, teachers, tutors, coaches, leaders, and more. So, the ideal clientele will be at schools, districts, educational companies, after-school institutions, and educational conferences. You increase your exposure to potential clients by going to those specific educational spaces. Over the past 3 years, we’ve attended conferences and professional learning spaces where we can speak with learning facilitators that want to know about our services and products we offer to support their purpose in cultivating equitable learning spaces for elementary-aged learners. It will take time, financial investment, and dedication to place you and your business in spaces to attract clientele.

Any thoughts, advice, or strategies you can share for fostering brand loyalty?

CEC uses both an email list and our CEC social media platforms to connect and engage with clients and the online community. The CEC email list gives people a direct message filled with news, updates, and opportunities to collaborate with us in-person and online. Our CEC social media platforms are used to connect with others that have similar goals in education, share weekly instructional tips for our audience, and continue to build the CEC presence online. We’ve created strategies for both email lists and social media postings to engage past and future clients with the CEC brand.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.cletiseducationconsulting.com
• Instagram: @cletiseducationconsulting
• Facebook: CLETIS Education Consulting, LLC
• Linkedin: CLETIS Education Consulting, LLC