LEADING MIDDLE SCHOOLS AND HIGH SCHOOLS TO PROFICIENCY

1. LEADING MIDDLE SCHOOLS AND HIGH SCHOOLS TO PROFICIENCY A Workshop from the Kentucky Department of Education and the Kentucky Association of School Councils

2. OBJECTIVES After completing this workshop, participants will be familiar with the following keys to School Council Proficiency: • Student achievement • Research-based practices, including those outlined in Kentucky’s Standards and Indicators for School Improvement • Community-wide participation in understanding and meeting school challenges • Positive relationships that support effective teamwork • A planning process of needs assessment, plan development, implementation, monitoring, and revisions • Policies that support school strategies • Ongoing learning about effective SBDM practices In addition, participants will understand: • Key issues that specifically affect middle and high schools • Three main strategies to use in leading secondary schools to proficiency

3. All the workshops approved by KDE for school Council member training credit are aligned with the School Council Proficiency Keys, the best practices in Standards and Indicators for School Improvement, and all legal requirements for school councils (What Councils Do).

4. STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT “Humans have a success instinct. This is what makes humans different from all other living things. They want success, and they strive for their success potential. You can accomplish anything with students if you set high expectations for behavior and performance by which you yourself abide.” How To Be An Effective Teacher: The First Days of School, Wong

5. Key 1A proficient school council keeps its focus on student achievement. What student proficiency goals does the law mandate for schools?PROFICIENCY GOALS DOES • Kentucky: An accountability index of 100 (of a possible 140) by 2014 for each school. • The overall goal is for all students to be proficient in reading, math, science, social studies, writing, arts & humanities, and practical living/vocational studies. However, a school accountability index of 100 can still be reached without all students being proficient, since students who score distinguished score 140 points. The accountability index is primarily based on the results of the Kentucky Core Content Test (KCCT). • Two years of scores are averaged to judge whether schools have reached incremental goals on the way to 2014. These biennial (two-year) goals are unique to the school and are based on where the school started.

6. Proficiency Goals Mandated By Law (cont’d) • Federal requirements / No Child Left Behind (NCLB): Every student must be proficient in reading, and math by 2014. • The focus is on proficiency in every population — free and reduced lunch, minority groups, students with disabilities, and students with limited English proficiency (ESL). • Each state defines proficient; Kentucky uses the same definition for NCLB as for our state accountability system. There is no separate NCLB test. • Schools have to meet the NCLB goal — Annual Measurable Objectives (AMO) — for every population of students to be successful. The objectives are a specified percentage of students scoring proficient or above. If a school meets the goals for all populations, it is labeled as making Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP). If a school misses AYPfor two years in a row the tiered sanctions begin.

7. For NCLB, the expectation for the district is the same as for schools — proficiency for all students. The district could be labeled as not making AYP even if some of the schools do make AYP. The district numbers for populations are taken from ALL the students in the district in that student population group. It is best for school councils to work closely with the district to make AYP.

8. WHAT MAKES A SUCCESSFULSECONDARY SCHOOL? As a part of the Kentucky Department of Education “Voices of Reason” Student Summits, Middle and High School students attended a session entitled “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.”When discussing what is “good”about their schools, students were asked to talk about what is awesome—what makes them want to go to school every day.

9. WHAT MAKES A SUCCESSFULSECONDARY SCHOOL? Teachers and administrators who care, students having a voice, teachers having high expectations, positive teacher attitudes, a good sense of community, student-teacher relationships Kentucky Students

10. WHAT MAKES A SUCCESSFULSECONDARY SCHOOL? According to the CATS Briefing Packet 2007 on the Kentucky Department of Education’s website, there are only eight middle schools and four high schools that have reached an accountability index of 100. This session will focus on leading schools to high levels of achievement, guided by research focused on secondary education. Part of having a clear mission and vision for your council is defining what success means. You can start with some basic measures of success: • Reaching proficiency as a school • Every demographic group reaching proficiency • Every student reaching proficiency • Students not needing remediation in college

11. Research on successful secondary schools reveals that a school must have two foundational beliefs: • We believe all students can master the necessary content: High Expectations for All Students • We believe it is our job to help students master that content: High Expectations for School Staff • If the culture of your school doesn’t reflect high expectations, begin leading your school in having high expectations for your students and staff.

12. This workshop will focus on three main strategies that build on the foundation of high expectations: 1. Know the students personally 2. Know the students academically 3. Make students part of the team

13. 1. KNOWING YOUR STUDENTS PERSONALLY - RELATIONSHIPS Extensive research has shown that building relationships with students is essential to their achievement. We will be exploring the importance of relationships with middle and high school students and how this translates into the “real world” after high school.

14. From: National Association of Secondary Principals, Breaking Ranks II: Strategies for Leading High School Reform (2004) “Many of the practices associated with personalization set the stage for learning. They are practices that address the school environment, climate and culture, such as: • Establishing schedules and priorities that allow teachers to develop an appreciation for students’ abilities… • Creating structures in which the aspirations, strengths, weaknesses, interests, and levels of progress of each student are known well by at least one adult… • Ensuring that the physical and mental health needs of students are addressed… …Research shows that personalized learning initiatives can increase attendance, decrease dropout rates, and decrease disruptive behavior.”

15. From: Blankstein, Failure is NOT an Option: Six Principles that Guide Student Achievement in High Performing Schools. (2004) The research is clear that relationships are a crucial element of student achievement and school success. (Barth, 2001; Bryk and Schneider, 2003) Leaders create relationships, and often those relationships are between individuals and their work. Ultimately we all work for a purpose, and that purpose has to be served if we are to feel encouraged. Encouraging the heart only works if there’s a fit between person, the work, and the organization. Schools reporting strong positive trust levels in 1994 were three times more likely to be categorized eventually as improving in reading and mathematics than those with very weak trust reports…schools with weak trust reports in 1994 and 1997 had virtually no chance of showing improvements in either reading or mathematics. (Bryk and Schnieider, 2002)

16. From: Purkey and Novak, Inviting School Success:A Self-Concept Approach to Teaching, Learning and Democratic Practice (1996)Also from: High-Performing Kentucky Middle Schools and High Schools;presentations from annual KASC conference 2004 through 2006 “Emerging research continues to support the concept that boys and girls are more committed to academic learning when they are surrounded by a caring and supportive school environment.” (Eccles & Midgley 1989; Matthews, 1991) • Success requires close relationships between students and staff. • Schools need to have positive parent (family/guardian) relationships and communicate high expectations for students. • Know the students and the parents. • Students need to know that the staff cares about them. Staff needs to know that the administrators care about them and will provide support for their student learning efforts.

17. From Sanborn, The Fred Factor (2004) Here is proof that success is built on relationships. The Fred Factor is a true account of an amazing mail carrier who is passionate about his job and serving others. Fred went so far above and beyond the call of duty that one of his clients, Mark Sanborn, was moved to write a book about him. The Fred Factor has been on The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and Business Week bestseller lists.

18. FRED FACTOR PRINCIPLES The idea of building relationships is not unique to schools. Relationships are crucial in the “real world” and important to all organizations. Principles from The Fred Factor provide a way for us to explore the importance of relationships with middle and high school students. Principle 1: “The quality of the relationship determines the quality of the product or service.” Principle 2: “Leaders succeed when they recognize that their employees are human.”

19. Strategies for Building Relationships The Fred Factor proposes actions you can take to build relationships. These strategies are worded in the book as ways to “Be” (Be interested, Be a better listener). We’ve adapted The Fred Factor’s list to address the middle school and high school setting. • A) Be a better listener. • B) Be consistent with high expectations for all students. • C) Be empathetic. • D) Be helpful. • E) Be interested.

20. 2. KNOWING YOUR STUDENTS ACADEMICALLY—CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT What Do We Mean By Continuous Assessment? An important key to success for individual students is the use of regular classroom assessment to guide instruction. Continuous assessment occurs throughout instruction and encompasses all the different ways to find out what students know and are able to do. When we use this information to guide instruction, we are talking about assessment for the purpose of improving learning. Assessment for learning is using the assessment process not merely to gauge student learning, but also to cause students to learn more—that is, to increase student achievement.

21. Examples of Continuous Assessment • Common Assessments or Learning Checks are an effective way to monitor each student’s progress. Working in teams, teachers identify the standard(s) they will assess and develop a test all of the students will take. After completing the assessment, teacher teams analyze the results and use the data to guide instruction for adaptations such as enrichment, review, and reteaching. • Bell Ringers and Flashbacks are popular review tools. Before a class or lesson begins, the teacher gives students about 5 questions that review content. The questions are usually fill-in-the-blank, multiple choice or short answer. The teacher can collect these daily to see where content knowledge is lacking and provide appropriate re-teaching.

22. Examples of Continuous Assessment • Exit Slips or Exit Tickets are given during the last few minutes of class. The teacher gives the students slips of paper with space for writing. One or two questions are written on the board for students to answer. The teacher collects slips as students leave class. The teacher reviews the student responses to learn how many students got the big idea and what kinds of misunderstanding exist. Lessons for the next day are adjusted to address student needs. • Journals, Learning Logs, and Electronic Blogs allow teachers to respond to each child individually, sharing their questions and ideas. Some teachers hold individual conferences with their students and use these journal/learning logs as part of the conference discussion.

23. Why Should Your School Use Continuous Assessment to Know Your Students Academically? 1. Uses respected, common-sense, research-based practices 2. Focuses the school’s work on student results 3. Allows teachers to catch gaps or misunderstandings early and address them before the problem worsens

24. CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT INFORMATION The successful schools, described in It’s Being Done: Academic Success in Unexpected Schools by Karin Chenoweth, use data analysis to know more about their students. They embrace and eagerly study all the data they can get their hands on: state test data, district data, classroom test data, and any formative assessment data. That data represents a kid’s face or a group of kids’ faces. Each of these schools has found ways to pay attention to every student. That’s a life. That’s a future.

25. CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT INFORMATION Success in your classroom has to be defined by student work that demonstrates mastery and meets the minimum standard of proficiency. The goal is always for every student to do quality work, not just to get work done. We want demonstrations of learning. The focus has to be on the end result of student learning. With this as a foundation: • Students understand and can say what they are expected to know, understand, and be able to do. • Students know and can explain quality work. • Teachers constantly assess student progress mastery and adjust instruction. • Students know about their own level of mastery and how they can work to increase it. High-Performing Kentucky Middle Schools and High Schools; presentations from annual KASC conference (2004-2006)

26. Special Note to Teachers Knowing what students need to know and be able to do and continuously assessing their learning can actually give you back more time in your life. Education is overwhelming and being able to focus specifically, frees up time for you and your students, because you are working smarter. Once you are focused on the needed outcome and you are monitoring student progress toward that outcome, you can focus your time and energy at the heart of the problem.

27. 3. MAKING STUDENTS PART OF THE TEAM Students are great, untapped resources in improving student achievement. We need to include students as part of their own education team. Many students are not mature enough to realize the limits they are putting on their future by not learning. In schools featured in the book, It’s Being Done: Academic Success in Unexpected Schools, students are part of a team. The schools know what the stakes are. They know that if their students don’t get a good education, they face the probability of a lifetime of struggle.

28. WAYS TO INVOLVE STUDENTS AS PARTNERS IN THEIR OWN EDUCATION: Ask Students How to Solve Problems Expect Students to Know What They Need to Learn and Help Monitor Their Own Mastery Lead Students in Setting Goals For Their Future and Using The Individual Learning Plans (ILP) Give Students Choices

29. THE GOOD, BAD, AND UGLY—KENTUCKY STUDENT RESPONSE SUMMARY Earlier we shared what Middle and High School students who were part of the Kentucky Department of Education “Voices of Reason” Student Summits said was “good” about their schools. They were also asked to tell what they did not like about their schools, “The Bad”. Last, they were asked to indicate what was absolutely in need of change in their schools, “The Ugly.” While “The Good” and “The Bad” lists indicated many cultural issues, it was “The Ugly” that revealed serious barriers, particularly in light of recent Refocusing Secondary discussions. Here is what the kids said…

30. COMMITMENT TO ACTION In order to make sure the adults in our school know the students personally, academically, and include them as part of the team… • What work do we need to as a council? • What guidance and direction need to be given to the professional development committee? • What policies need to be reviewed?