A Systematic Approach for School-Wide Sustained Growth

1. A Systematic Approach for School Wide Sustained GrowthMark Cerutti – Director of Secondary Education – Elk Grove Unified School District

2. What are you doing right now and how did you decide to do it? • How do you determine – • What to do? • Who should do it? • When should it be done? • What are the risks of doing it? • What are the risks of not doing it?

3. No Options and Necessities • Wasting time, material or human resources is not an option • Employing inefficient action is not an option • Measuring efficiency and accuracy of actions is a necessity

4. Characteristics of a proven model • All decisions emanate from the school’s Mission and Core Values • Four integrated key elements of leadership focus • A balance of process/system with people power in the school

5. The flexibility of the model is key • Fitting a school’s unique environmental and organizational characteristics into the model • Not losing sight of the four key elements • Evaluating the school’s present condition and the level of leadership required for each key element

6. Key Elements of Leadership for Sustained Growth

7. An example of the Sustained Growth Model in action • Florin High School • As each slide is reviewed, keep your school in mind and begin to apply the information to your specific situation

8. Florin High School Mission and Core Values Essential Teaching and Learning Questions Professional Learning Communities 2009-2010 School Wide Focus “Effectively support the ongoing development of our collective teaching & learning practices, resulting in every student meaningfully connected to school and experiencing academic success” Use of Effective Monitoring and Project Management Strategies Steering Committee School Climate Action team Technology Action Team Professional Learning Action team Parent/Community Action Team

9. Our Mission :“Inspiring and Educating Our Diverse Community to Achieve Excellence”

10. FHS Core Values • PROFESSIONALISM • Florin High School Staff Values: • Professional behaviors and qualities we instill in our students. • Autonomy and innovation while encouraging and supporting collaboration. • STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT • Florin High School Staff Values: • High expectations for academic achievement and personal growth. • Meeting individual student needs and offering varied paths for student success. • FLORIN HIGH COMMUNITY • Florin High School Staff Values: • Parents, community members and local businesses as partners in the education of their children. • A safe and inviting campus. • INSTRUCTIONAL PRACTICE • Florin High School Staff Values: • Critical thinking and problem solving as the focus of instruction. • The use of engaging instructional practices.

11. School Wide Focus • Describe what you are doing for students • Be succinct • Make it understandable to all • Highlight key words/phrases • Reference it often

12. 2009-2010 Florin High School Focus “Effectively support the ongoing development of our collective teaching and learning practices, resulting in every student meaningfully connected to school and experiencing academic success.”

13. Effective TeamsProfessional Learning Communities • A focus on student learning • A collaborative culture • Collective inquiry into research-based best practice • Action orientation – professional learning by doing • All members mutually accountable for targeted results • Dufour – Professional Learning Communities at Work

14. Effective Project ManagementEnsuring talk is moved to measured and evaluated action • Date Source – Knowing what to look for • Data Analysis Results – Converting data to meaningful information • Design, Development and Implementation – Knowing what to do and why you’re doing it • Program/Initiative Evaluation – Knowing how you’re doing (Logic Model of Program Evaluation) • Professional Learning Needs – Making sure we have what it takes to get the job done • Human Performance Technology – International Society for Performance Improvement

15. A Focus on Essential Teaching and Learning Questions • What are we supposed to teach? • Standards- based content • How do we prioritize, sequence and deliver our instruction? • Curriculum mapping and instructional design • How do we know they’re learning? • Formative and summative assessment/progress monitoring • What do we do when they’re not learning? • Academic intervention and support

16. Florin High School – Integration of the Sustained Growth Model • Steering Committee • Action Teams • Departments, Specialized Academic Programs (CA Partnership Academies, NJROTC, AVID) • Grade Level/Course Specific Teams • All are assessed in terms of the five characteristics of a PLC

17. Steering Committee • School-Wide Governance • Collaborative Leadership • Essential Communication Link • Open Membership

18. Action Teams • Technology, School Climate, Professional Learning, Parent/Community Partnership • Teacher led; Administratively supported • Data based • Gap/cause identified • Progress monitored • Results communicated

19. Technology Action Team • Purpose Statement: To effectively manage the procurement and utilization of technologies and to support all stakeholders to ensure an efficient flow of accurate communication. • 2009-2010 Areas of Focus: • School Loop management and evaluation • Web Site Management and updating • Education Technology Professional Learning • Panther Access Card Support

20. Professional Learning Action Team • Purpose Statement: Support PLC development in their work to ensure every student is meaningfully connected to school and experiences academic success. • 2009-2010 Areas of Focus: • Support and monitor the development and implementation of SMART goals for all PLCs. • Provide needed time and structure for sharing results and /or recommendations of our PLC work   • Support PLC leaders in facilitating these teams by providing: • data support • leadership support • goal-writing

21. School Climate Action Team Purpose Statement:Support and lead efforts to ensure students, parents, staff and all stakeholders are positively connected to Florin High School which is: Safe, Respectful and Clean Academically Rigorous Culturally Diverse 2009-2010 Areas of Focus: Researching master schedule options with a focus on small learning communities Pilot Targeted Student Project Saturday School Program Improvement Minute bell case study project School events and activities promoting cultural awareness

22. Parent/Community Partnership Action Team • Purpose Statement:Collaborating with our essential partners/stakeholders to ensure the optimal learning experience of all students. • 2009-2010 Areas of Focus: • Implementation of DeVry and Siemens Partnerships • Expansion of CPAs • ASSETS • Continued expansion of partnerships

23. Why consider this model? • The principles of the Sustained Growth Model originated in the biological sciences and have been used by successful businesses for over 30 years

24. It’s a proven model for sustained growth - • Peace Corps • Nature Conservancy • AmeriCorp • Intel • Cisco

25. The Sustained growth model enables you to: • Accurately predict points of delayed growth • Quickly and accurately identify barriers to continued growth • Replicate or originate to overcome barriers • Minimize the duration of the plateau • Maximize the duration of the gain

26. Understanding Sustained Growth • It is not perfectly linear in nature • It is series of steps of varying width and height

27. Understanding Sustained Growth Maximize Duration of the Gain Minimize duration of plateau by eliminating barriers to growth Point of Best Practice Replication or Innovation Point of Delayed Growth

28. Effective Leadership Must: • Have an explicit “making a difference” sense of purpose • Use strategies that mobilize many people to tackle touch problems • Be held accountable by measured indicators of success, and • Be ultimately assessed by the extent to which it awakens people’s intrinsic commitment, their sense of moral purpose. - Adapted from Leading in a Culture of Change, Michael Fullan, 2001

29. “Whatever one’s style, every leader, to be effective, must have and work on his or her moral purpose. • Moral purpose cannot just be stated; it must be accompanied by strategies for realizing it. Those strategies are the leadership action that energize people to pursue a desired goal. - Adapted from Leading in a Culture of Change, Michael Fullan, 2001

30. Distributed Leadership, in which formal leaders widely distribute leadership responsibilities among various groups in the organization, plays a crucial role in generating school reform and instructional improvement. Richard Elmore Building a New Structure for School Leadership

31. Improve your ability to accurately predict success and growth • Determine correlations among actions and results • Reduce reactivity • Increased target, pro-activity • Eliminate random acts of improvement • Increase targeted, measured interventions

32. 100 50 Personal Change Capacity 0 50 0 100 Organization Change Capacity - Douglas B. Reeves, 2009

33. Move to the upper right quadrant! • Doug Reeves – • Organizational Change Capacity • Ready for Change • Learning Leadership • Leading – High results and High Understanding

34. Learning Leadership - Only by evaluating both cause and effect can educators understand the complexities of student achievement and the efficacy of teaching and learning practices.(Adapted from the work of Doug Reeves) High Scores Lucky High Results Low Understanding Leading High Results High Understanding Student Achievement Losing Low Results Low Understanding Learning Low Results High Understanding Low Scores Understanding what improved student performance Low LevelHigh Level

35. Are you ready to accept the challenge of sustained growth?

36. Thank You - • If you are interested in further information – please contact me: • mcerutti@egusd.net