Network Leaders’ Guide

1. Network Leaders’ Guide

2. Agenda • Introductions: Goals of the new Quality Review and Alignment with goals of the Department of education (15 mins) • Exploring the Goals of the Quality Review (45 mins) • What is New in 2009-10? (15 mins) • Questions/Supports Principals will Need (15 mins) • (Optional: moderations to better understand the rubric--60 mins)

3. Children First Reforms: Phase III Vision Four Year Achievement Targets: • K-8: Close the gap with the state in ELA and Math • 9-12: Increase graduation rate to 75% Leadership, Empowerment, Accountability:Continue to focus on the development of great school leaders, who are empowered to make key decisions for their schools, while also being held accountable for improvements in student achievement. Expand this focus to our teaching corps by: (1) Succession planning – including identifying and training future school leaders from within current teacher ranks; and (2) Empowering teachers and increasing their discretion – while holding them accountable for student achievement.

4. Instructional coherence • Gather and analyze data • Monitor and revise • Plan and set goals • Align capacity building The Revised Quality Review • Increases level of rigor in evaluating school quality • Promotes organizational and instructional coherence • Increases focus on teacher teams engaged in collaborative inquiry practice • Clarifies language and relevance to practice and research • Reduces inadvertent paperwork burden • Improves inter-rater reliability QS1 QS2 QS5 QS3 QS4

5. Exploring the Quality Review Rubric • Goals: • Identify differences in Quality Review Rubric across Proficient and Well-Developed practice • Acclimate to what’s new in rubric • Break into small groups, with each group charting one of the Quality Statements • Document the differences between Proficient and Well-Developed for your Quality Statement • Explain • Brainstorm evidence of how you would know/see/hear the differences between P and WD

6. Share Out • Each group should identify five key concepts (not whole sentences--pick a word or a phrase) that are essential to the Quality Statement • For your Quality Statement, give at least one example of what a reviewer would see if they walked into a well-developed school. Be very specific: what would they hear people saying, what documents might they see, what would the student work reveal, etc.

7. Quality Review: New! for 2009-10 • Focus on Instructional Coherence • Revised Rubric • Enhanced SSEF • Modified School Visit Schedule • Abbreviated Report Format • Modified Classroom Visit Form • QR School Selection Criteria • The Academic Quality Team: Promising Practices Library

8. QR 2009-10 Revised Rubric • Quality Statements re-ordered to prioritize instructional practices • More descriptive as opposed to proscriptive (removed quantified indicators) • Greater emphasis on instructional coherence and teacher team collaborative inquiry across the rubric • Explanations, examples and a glossary

9. The School Self Evaluation Form (SSEF) • Evaluate the effectiveness of the school’s processes for ensuring logical and powerful connections between school-wide, grade/departmental and classroom joint decision-making • More supportive to school-based teams in thinking through connectedness of school goals and quality review rubric • 5-page suggested limit for narrative

10. QR 2009-10 School Visit Structure Required Components • Meetings • Meet with principal • Meet with teacher teams (2) New! • Meet with students: large group • Meet with students: work group • Meet with parents New! • Observations • Class visits • Site Tour • Other • Principal Debrief (end of Day 1) • Feedback Presentation (end of the review) • Case Study New!

11. School Visit Schedule

12. Abbreviated Report • Cover page (1 page) • Part 1: The School Context (1 page) • -School Demographics • -Overall Evaluation • Part 2: Overview (2-3 pages) • -Strengths • -Areas for • Improvement • Part 3: Quality Criteria Rubric (2 pages)

13. Classroom Visit • Focus Areas: • Instruction and Engagement • Student Work • Assessment for Learning

14. QR School Selection Criteria • B, C, D, or F on 2008-09 Progress Report • U or UPF on 2008-09 Quality Review • Schools that opened in 2008-09 • Schools with new principals (appointed between February 1, 2009 and January 31, 2010) • Schools that require an in-school review from NYSED. *  Schools without PR grades will not be reviewed unless they meet the other criteria above.

15. School Support: 5 Levers for Coherence and Instructional ImprovementChoose one of the 5 questions below and reflect:- Where is it in the QR rubric?- How does it connect with your school goals and current work? - How does it relate to the support of your network team? • Curriculum: What are the academic tasks (content, knowledge, skills) that we ask students to do? • Teacher pedagogy: How do teachers support student learning? • Assessment/data: How do we know students are learning? • Collaborative inquiry: How do adults learn and improve their practice? • Structure: How do we use time, space, and other resources to enable student learning?

16. School Support: Next Steps Select a targeted focus from the rubric that connects with your school goals and can inform and drive inquiry work. • What can the network do to support your school in this targeted area? • What has worked in the past? • What more/different support will you need this year? • How can schools support each other?

17. Closing Reflections • What is one key learning from this experience? • What is one question that reflects the work to come?

18. Optional Exercise MODERATION STUDY of SCHOOL ARTIFACTS (60min)

19. Exploring Evidence: Moderation for Coherence As a network, choose one school to supply one of the items below to be reviewed by the group: - a curriculum map from one subject -A video of a teacher team meeting -A set of school goals/SEFF/CEP -A video of a teacher’s lesson Individual principals should take time to examine the document/video individually and then each principal should make 1-2 non-evaluative data statements about what they’ve observed. Reference to Ladder of Inference.

20. I adopt Beliefs about the world I draw Conclusions I make Assumptions based on the meanings I added I add Meanings (cultural and personal) I select “Data” from what I observe Observable “data” and experiences (as a videotape recorder might capture it) Exploring Evidence: The Ladder of Inference I take actions based on my beliefs

21. Examples of Data Statements Stems: • “The data shows…” • “I read that…” • “The principal said that…” • “I saw that …” • “The CEP summary shows…” • “In the Inquiry Team vignette, the facilitator did…”

22. Discussion and Reflection on Moderation • Which Quality Statement indicators does this evidence relate to? • Individually, using the QR rubric, evaluate where the document or video falls…Well Developed? Proficient? UPF? Underdeveloped? • To support your evaluation, point to very specific language in the rubric. • As a group, share evaluations. • What additional data might you want to collect and study? • What questions might you want to ask school personnel during the different meetings? • How might you use this protocol and/or this work within your leadership team, your teacher teams, your departments, etc?