How Efland-Cheeks Elementary Integrates Global Learning into Daily Instruction

It was Earth Day. And Arts Night. And a ribbon cutting ceremony to celebrate newly completed building renovations. It was a full, joyful, slightly chaotic day. And it was also a regular school day at Efland-Cheeks Global Elementary (Orange County Schools, NC). 

In many ways, the day felt exactly as you would expect in any elementary school. In the library, students weighed their options at the folding tables of the Scholastic Book Fair. In the cafeteria, students deliberated an important lunch choice: barbecue chicken sandwich or hot dog? In the hallway, a teacher wearing a blue “Efland-Cheeks Global Elementary” t-shirt paused to receive hugs from a passing line of first graders.

These are familiar, everyday moments, the kind that happen in schools across the country. And they are what made the rest of the day stand out.
At Efland-Cheeks, those moments are the foundation for something more intentional. This is a school where global learning is woven into daily instruction and school culture, helping students connect their learning to real-world contexts and understand their role in an interconnected world. As a result, they begin to see themselves as individuals with both the responsibility and the agency to shape what happens around them.

How mindset shapes global learning

That work begins with how the school sees its students. 

“When people hear we have students from forty-eight countries, they say it must be so hard to have so many students learning English as a second language,” principal Kelly Parks shares.

Her response reflects a different way of thinking: “I don’t have students learning English as a second language. I have bilingual students.” 

Seeing students as bilingual—and, further, recognizing every student’s culture, language, and lived experience as invaluable assets, whether rooted in a U.S. American background or shaped by experiences beyond it—creates a natural entry point for global learning. With this shift, classrooms become spaces where perspectives are shared, where cultural and global connections are part of the lesson, and where students are positioned to contribute their knowledge rather than set it aside. 

Global learning connects academic content to real-world context and helps students investigate the world, understand different perspectives, communicate ideas, and take informed action. 

At Efland-Cheeks, that work starts with the belief that students already bring the world with them when they walk into school, and that recognizing those assets helps students build the confidence to participate, lead, and contribute, no matter where their future paths take them.

As Parks explains, “Instead of asking ‘How do we support students who are behind?’ the question becomes ‘How do we leverage what our students already bring to deepen learning for everyone?’”

That question creates the conditions for global learning to take root in a way that is consistent and sustainable. Through Global Leaders, an instructional framework that schools use to integrate global learning into existing curriculum, teachers have a clear way to connect academic content to global contexts and real-world application. This approach empowers students to see their learning as a tool for making meaningful contributions and shaping a better future.

Efland-Cheeks Elementary increased student proficiency by 30 points.
And they did it without adding another initiative. In this white paper, we break down the approach, the outcomes, and what made it sustainable. Read the full story: Rethinking School Improvement Through Alignment and Community →

How global learning shows up across the school day

The day of our visit was a typical Wednesday in April: a warm, sunny Earth Day. Students had created a timeline of Earth Day’s history for the school lobby, starting with the Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969 and ending with its fiftieth anniversary in 2020. The display reflected both content knowledge and a growing awareness of environmental responsibility. It was bookended by banners reading “Plant kindness, grow change,” and “Grow kindness, grow green,” reinforcing the connection between learning and action. 

As the day unfolded, teachers worked in the gym to set up displays for Arts Night, PTA volunteers laid stones to create a labyrinth in the school garden, giving students a quiet place to walk and reflect, and two student ambassadors proudly guided us through the building, pointing out projects, classrooms, and spaces that reflected their learning.

Spending time in these spaces made something clear very quickly: the same mindset that shapes how the school sees its students also shapes how learning is designed.

How global learning shows up in instruction

If you only visited Efland-Cheeks during their Earth Day celebration, you might assume that global learning happens during special events or themed days. In reality, the displays and projects reflect work students have been building in their classrooms every day, connected to academic content and real-world issues. 

That global learning is not a separate initiative or occasional project is by design. It shows up in daily instruction in ways that are both practical and intentional. The bulletin board of collaged sea turtles (an endangered species), paper plate macaws (with party streamers for tails), and coffee filter butterflies reflects global learning in action as students studied biomes in preparation for Earth Day. Students are better able to understand why protecting the planet matters when they know what’s at stake if those environments disappear. 

In one classroom, students reading How to Build a Taco explored where each ingredient originates and how those ingredients make their way to a local grocery store. The lesson connects literacy standards with geography, economics, and culture, helping students see how their everyday experiences are linked to global systems. This kind of learning builds key global competencies that prepare students to ask better questions, consider different perspectives, and apply their learning beyond the classroom.

Each grade level studies a continent throughout the year, giving students time to build knowledge, revisit concepts, and deepen their understanding. This sustained focus allows global learning to move beyond surface-level exposure and into meaningful comprehension.

Students also engage in projects connected to real-world issues. They investigate pollution, recycling, and energy use. They explore ecosystems such as oceans, rainforests, and deserts. They participate in hands-on experiences, like community gardening, that connect them to food systems and sustainability. They even adopted a cow named Sallie, who lives at Dusty Road Jersey Farm and whose certificate of adoption reminds students that “it’s important to keep track of her health and wellbeing, just like her farmers do every day. One day, she will produce wholesome milk for you.” 

These experiences build key global competencies. Through them, students are developing the ability to ask questions, make connections, and see themselves as people who can contribute in meaningful ways, not just as learners, but as active participants in their communities and the wider world. 

A culture that reinforces learning

What happens in classrooms is reinforced by the culture of the school.

In the music room, students learn songs from different languages and cultures while exploring instruments such as guitars, ukuleles, and xylophones. These experiences build cultural awareness and create opportunities for expression. 

Events like Arts Night extend learning into the community. Families participate alongside students in activities like using fabric scraps to create a community weaving, building structures out of spaghetti and marshmallows, folding origami, beading, and face painting. These shared experiences strengthen the connection between school and community while reinforcing the idea that learning is collaborative and ongoing.

Throughout the building, small indicators reflect those same values. Outside every bathroom are signs reminding students that washing their hands is a way to care for others by preventing the spread of germs. Students are consistently reminded that their actions affect the people around them, helping them learn to balance their own needs with what is best for others and the community, a foundation for the kind of leadership our world needs.

What this means for school and district leaders

Efland-Cheeks provides a clear example of how global learning can be integrated into daily instruction in a way that feels cohesive and manageable. The school demonstrates that implementation at scale across grade levels is possible without requiring a complete shift in existing structures. 

The work is grounded in existing curriculum and carried out consistently across classrooms. Teachers are not adding something entirely new. They are connecting what they already teach to a broader context and helping students see the relevance of their learning.

For school and district leaders, this points to a practical path forward. Global learning becomes sustainable when it is embedded into daily practice, when educators are supported in making meaningful connections, and when students are seen as bringing valuable knowledge and perspective into the classroom.

Global Leaders provides structure for this work, while the focus on global competencies ensures students are building the knowledge and skills needed to engage with an interconnected world.

Looking ahead

As the school community gathered on the front lawn to celebrate the ribbon cutting and reflect on both its history and its future, there was a clear sense of community. A group of students sang “We Are the World,” and the cheerleading squad, wearing large blue and yellow hair ribbons, celebrated the school’s identity as a global community. 

The moment reflected something that had been visible throughout the day: students are learning in an environment that connects their daily experiences to a wider world, and they are beginning to understand the role they can play within it, growing into the kind of informed, compassionate individuals who will shape a better future for their communities and this planet.