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Who are the direct customer(s) these improved outcomes will benefit?
This change should benefit all AHS students but there will be a special focus on students
classified as non-white.
1st Year Building Smart Goal: AHS will teach a more culturally appropriate material
with focus on English and Language Arts classes as well as have specific emphasis on
ACT power skills. Through more appropriate material and more focused teaching
methods, AHS will raise the percentage of all students who met the college readiness
benchmark score in reading from 21% to 30%.
What work has been accomplished already to meet this long-term goal?
Currently work has started by looking at the current curriculum and what skills have been
focused on by teachers. This has included switching novels that are taught in class to
include a more diverse selection of readings. Certain novels that have been written by
African-American and Latino writers have been brought in to meet the diverse
backgrounds of our learners.
What is insufficient with the current status or system?
The ACT Reading scores have declined by 8% in the past 5 years. Last year, was the first
year it was higher than the year before, going from 18% to 21% proficient. In 2011, AHS
had 29% of students proficient in Reading. Compared to the state AHS is 34% behind the
state average.
State the strategies that will be implemented to improve the gap(s):
The three following strategies will be implemented in the classroom and the effectiveness
will be researched during the first year.
Outside of the classroom we will rely on PLCs, curriculum development with a focus on
ACT Power Standards, and taking opportunities to collaborate with peers.
Data:
Table 1: Five Year TrendsAverage ACT Scores (composite)
Year
School
State
2011
17.5
22.3
2012
17.0
22.1
2013
16.5
22.1
2014
16.6
22.0
2015
17.0
22.2
Table 2: Five Year TrendsPercent of Students Who Met College Readiness Benchmarks
Year
English
School State
Math
School
State
Reading
School State
Science
School State
2011
37
77
17
52
29
62
12
40
31
2012
34
77
15
51
26
62
13
38
30
2013
28
76
13
50
22
54
14
32
2014
31
75
48
18
52
10
47
31
2015
28
75
10
48
21
55
14
48
33
46
Table 3: Percent of Students Who Met ACT College Readiness Benchmark Scores by Race/Ethnicity
Student
Group
English
Mathematics
Reading
Science
Composite
All Students
28
10
21
14
Black/Afric
an
American
18
18
White
56
27
48
40
23
Hispanic/La
tino
26
24
12
Asian
33
17
17
Two or
more Races
50
25
Reported
Observations
and
Walkthroughs
Monthly
Data Teams
Information
Every
three
weeks
Alignment
with
curriculum
with ACT
Power Skills
Monthly
Reported
Cultural
Proficiency
in classroom
materials
Monthly
PLCs
including
data teams
and CFAs
Every
other day
Professional Monthly
Development
opportunities
focused on
ACT Power
Skills and
Data.
Reported
Benchmark
Scores
Every 6
Weeks
CFAs &
Lexile
Scores/Gains
Interim
Exam
Every
nine
weeks
Staff Survey
Every 9
weeks
DO:
Do: 45 Day Action
Plan
Steps- What steps
will team take?
End DatePerson(s)
When will work Responsible
be completed?
Administrator
and department
chair
PLCs
After nine
Administrator
Professional
Development
weeks of school
Professional development
opportunities will be set up for
the first nine weeks. The staff
survey during the end of the
nine weeks will give the
opportunity for feedback to
adjust the professional
development as needed.
After nine
Administrator
weeks of school and department
chair
STUDY:
Study Process
The Administrator overseeing the English department will analyze the multiple data
points given to them by the staff. The measures of data that will be focused on would be
the CFAs, Lexile Scores and Gains Interim Exam. These data points would be analyzed
and then shared with the building staff. If students scores are growing on these
assessments, it would lead us to believe that the ACT Reading scores will improve. PLCs
would be expected to take their data points and to learn from the members of the PLC. It
is the hope that these discussions can rely on each members skills to help everyone
improve on their These discussions and the results of the first 45 days will lead to the next
45 day action plan. This plan would include improvements involving cultural proficiency,
the PLC process and professional development.
Is PD ineffective?
Is the staff on board with this change in
curriculum, if not will the change last?
Do classroom and district assessments
mirror the skills that are needed to succeed
on the ACT?
ACT:
Act: Revise or
continue with
implementation
based on data
analysis (45 day
action plan #2)
Steps- What steps
will team take?
End DatePerson(s)
When will work Responsible
be completed?
Cultural Proficiency
After 15 weeks
of school
Administrator
and department
chair
PLCs
After 18 weeks
of school
Administrator
and District
Administrator
Professional
Development
Professional development
focused more on the needs of
the system that werent met
after nine weeks.
After 18 weeks
of school
Administrator
and department
chair
Cultural proficiency will be focused on first because we believe that this is a small
change that holds a lot of leverage. The current curriculum is geared towards white students and
because of that many of the narratives are written by white writers. We believe this is partially
the reason why 48% of our white students are scoring at or above the college benchmark score
for reading. Secondly, with 61% of our student population racially classified as a minority, we
should provide narratives that relate to those students background. In addition to creating a more
culturally proficiency curriculum, this will also give all of our students a more well-rounded
world view when they graduate.
As for ACT power skills, this change will rely on every teacher in the building to look at
how they conduct instruction in their classroom. It has been researched by the Administration
that teachers are asking questions that are broader than the detailed questions students need to be
able to answer to be successful at a post-secondary institution. Our curriculum needs to be driven
towards a focus on comprehension and literacy devices. This will be a change from our current
practice, which is focused on main idea vs. supporting details in many readings. These changes
may come abruptly but we will examine the ways we are teaching these skills to students in
order to make a greater impact on student achievement. To ease the discomfort of rapid change
we will have checkpoints every nine weeks to see how students are improving in reading, and to
give the opportunity of staff feedback. Both of these feedback points will drive our decisions for
what path we continue to follow.
In our first year implementation of this program, the goal will be to grow the number of
all students who meet the college benchmark in reading on the ACT by 9%. The long range
strategic plan is to have all students achieving at the level that currently white students sit at,
48%. Considering AHSs trends compared to other schools in the state this is an achievable and
manageable goal. Discussions have already began to take place to discuss what types of changes
can be made in instruction to better align our classrooms with ACT power skills. In addition, the
English department has worked to change a few of the novels that are taught in class to
selections that meet our culturally diverse needs. Once this system is put into motion we will rely
on PLCs and professional development to make sure all facets of the system are moving along
towards to projected outcome.
In the classroom, strategies have been devised on how to bring up the reading levels of all
students. Two of the strategies are student led, the literacy circle, and heterogeneous model. The
literacy circle requires students to read aloud to peers based on their comfort level and ability.
Students in this model are grouped by ability. Thus students who are more comfortable reading
aloud dont overwhelm and not give chances to students who may not share the same level of
comfort. The second student led strategy is the heterogeneous model. This model groups students
into groups with multiple levels forcing there to be communication with all types of learners. In
this model, the star students are going to be the mid-level students who will connect ideas shared
by both the lower and higher level students. The last in-class strategy is going to be teacher
directed and it is intentional questions focused on ACT power skills. These questions are going
to ask students to identify literary devices or comprehend the text rather than ask for
generalizations such as the main idea. These classroom strategy changes will be the start to
changing our curriculum and producing more college prepared readers.
We will execute our plan with emphasis on cultural proficiency, work in PLCs and data
teams, and meaningful professional development opportunities. Teachers will receive feedback
mainly through their administrator and department chair. There will be an open line of
communication for teachers as the Administrator over each department will be expected to sit in
on one PLC a week. In addition, the Administrator will be expected to give teachers timely
feedback in regards to cultural proficiency in each teachers classroom. On the staff side of this
system, they will be expected to give meaningful feedback about professional development and
to share their students CFA, Lexile Scores, and Gains Interim exam scores with the
Administration in a timely manner. This relationship should create meaningful data points that
allow us to see how valuable the current system is.
Once all of the data points have been entered, presumably after nine weeks of the school
year. The administration must study the data points to see if the system is effective. The main
evidence that will be looked at is the growth of students in the multiple data points. It need to be
seen how many data points exhibited signs of growth and how many exhibited signs of decay.
Based on those results it would be expected that tough questions are asked that get to the solution
of how to fix these problems. I expect if there are problems they will come from professional
development, trying to do too much too quick, or breakdowns in communication. These data
points will need to be studied and small changes with the highest positive leverage should be
made.
As this system moves along into the act stage, I expect that the changes that need to be
made will be most focused on professional development. Each staff is going to find an area that
they need to spend extra time on to master those skills. In terms of the CFAs I would expect that
they would become more common and maybe compared between schools rather than classrooms
within one school. The hope would be that these assessments could show the growth of AHS
compared to other schools with a similar population. At that point we would get another data
point that could give us our first idea of if this system has some merit. Ultimately this system
builds up to the spring of students junior year as they take the ACT in Anywhere Public
Schools. Obviously, students can take the ACT more times, with their own money but the test
during students junior year is the data that is most important and relevant to our school. That test
speaks volumes about the type of education offered at Anywhere High School compared to that
at other school around the state and nation. I believe that the system that has been presented will
allow Anywhere High School to beam with pride due to the growth they have made in reading
levels. Through collaboration and cultural proficiency AHS can provide students the skills they
need to be successful at the next stage of their lives.