Rebeca Cerna 

Overview

Rebeca Cerna (she/her/ella) is an expert in school climate, health and wellness, and the strategic use of data and participatory approaches. As Director of the Resilient and Healthy Schools and Communities area at WestEd, Cerna is dedicated to creating and maintaining safe, supportive, and collaborative learning environments that are supportive of children and youth as well as the adults who guide them. She has extensive experience working with communities that have been challenged by infrastructure deficiencies and in lifting the voices of all community and educational partners.

Currently, she supports multiple regional community school efforts and leads the statewide evaluation for the Learning Community for Schools Success Program.

Most recently, she directed the California Center for School Climate, a 3-year initiative of the California Department of Education, by designing and directing local- and regional-level school climate and data use technical assistance benefiting 616 districts and oversaw the development of 75 resources that included written products, websites, public service announcements, and event recordings.

Previously, she served as Director of a school and community health data project to support the needs of 14 communities in their data use practices and led the evaluation of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Health Equity Technical Assistance project. Cerna has collaborated in diverse settings including rural and urban communities, recent immigrant and mixed-status immigrant communities, K–12 settings, after-school programs, alternative education settings, and correctional youth facilities. Cerna has taught in adult education and, before joining WestEd, worked for the University of California, Riverside, supporting research on resilience and reducing risk factors. She also brings to her expertise her bicultural multilingualism and lived experience as a daughter of immigrants.

Education

• MPH, community health, University of California, Los Angeles
• BS, school health education, California State University, Long Beach 

Select Publications

Valdez, A., Walrond, N., & Cerna, R. (2024). Essential conditions for advancing and sustaining cross-sector collaboration: A reflection guide for child-, youth-, and family-serving agencies. California Center for School Climate at WestEd.

Hashmi, S., Cerna, R., & Stern, R. (2024). School climate essentials: A call to action. In K. Perks (Ed), Transformational leadership for rapid school improvement, (143–152). New York: Teachers College Press/San Francisco: WestEd.

Valdez, A., Cerna, R., & Hashmi, S. (2023). Participatory systems change for equity: An inquiry guide for child-, youth-, and family-serving agencies. California Center for School Climate and Center to Improve Social and Emotional Learning and School Safety. WestEd.

Paredes, M., Cerna, R., Buckner, L., & Guidi, C. (2023). Making data meaningful in educator-to-family communication. California Center for School Climate at WestEd.

Magby, N., & Cerna, R. (2023). Understanding school climate: An overview of school climate domains. WestEd.

Cerna, R., Stern, A., Austin, G., Betz, J., Zhang, G., & Hashmi, S. (2021). Understanding the experiences of LGBTQ high school students in California by race/ethnicity. WestEd.

O’Malley, M., Cerna, R., Romero, L., Zhang, G., & Furlong, M. (2021). Reducing the impact of bias-based bullying on suicidal thoughts among sexual and gender minority youth: Are psychological strengths enough? Journal of School Mental Health.