WeLdele Smart Goal Draft

1. WeLdeleSmart Goal Draft EDLS 643 Week 3

2. Budget • Strengths • We somehow always seem to take it through the year • We are very supply conscious and do not (cannot afford to) waste • Families have a financial investment (due to tuition) in their children’s education • Weaknesses • We start every year with a proposed budget with a deficit • We are well below the Diocesan pay scale in teacher salaries • There are programs and assessments that are critical that we cannot afford

3. Parent Involvement • Strengths • Parents are very involved through volunteering in classrooms, the office and numerous other tasks • Parent teacher communication is very high though usually face to face or email (phone calls are less frequent) • Weaknesses • Parents draw conclusions about student performance and teacher effectiveness school wide based on their own student’s performance or teacher of their limited observations • The gossip mill operates at full tilt when student achievement is in question • We do not communicate well about assessment data, research based teaching, student achievement, etc. We tend to ‘put out fires’ when parents complain (usually after the fire has been spreading without us knowing it)

4. School culture • Strengths • Mission awareness and identity are high • Traditions and activities support the mission • Recent Strategic planning is centered around mission • Weaknesses • We are “doing” much more than we are communicating to stakeholders outside of the school community • We have recently made a big push to contact media such as TV, the Gazette and the Catholic Herald to publicize our events

5. Student Discipline • Strengths • Fighting/Major Infractions/Bullying are not a widespread problem • Teachers handle most discipline situations in the classroom through strong classroom procedures and expectations and enforcement • Weaknesses • There is a need for school-wide behavior expectations and consequences • Discipline tracking to determine “frequent fliers”, trends in behavior infractions and connection to student achievement is critical • Parents and students tend to call all unfriendly behavior bullying

6. Student Achievement • Strengths • Students are at/above grade level in every subject for every grade • Data portfolios are being created to identify individual student needs • Conversation around data as well as in-services are starting • Weaknesses • The data is not currently driving instruction • Parents do not have sound understanding of the data or current practices • We show relative weakness in Math at all grade levels: primarily in math computation

7. Accreditation background • Accreditation Next Year • 1.0. Recommendation 1 • Source: QAR • Date: 03/05/2008 • Recommendation: • Develop a continuous school improvement plan that is based on disaggregated data and includes specific research-based goals and activities, timelines and responsibilities. • Evidence: • An improvement plan is necessary to improve the academic achievement of students and to identify instructional strengths and weaknesses. • Rationale: • The school does not currently have a robust continuous improvement plan that includes a careful analysis of student achievement data, identified goals and measurements.

8. Challenges • The ITBS is a norm referenced and not a criteria referenced test • Parents are very focused on the National Percentile Ranking even though that is not necessarily the most informative data • Pinpointing the greatest need for improvement is difficult since data fluctuates some by grade level • We have data overload on ITBS reports but do not have enough data to triangulate and confirm conclusions • We do not have formative data for Math (we are working on it for next year) • We are up against a significant time crunch with accreditation

9. Conclusions • Relative to other scores, math scores are lowest • Computation is the lowest of the 3 math components and the foundation for the higher level skills • Teachers need to use data to impact instruction • We need to communicate to parents about what the ITBS scores mean, what other data we are using and how we are using this data in the classroom with their children • We have to do this without a budget to increase formative assessment to triangulate data • We need to know if there is a correlation between discipline referrals and student achievement • We need to be systematic and have school wide implementation as opposed to the ‘one-room schoolhouse’ approach

10. Current Reading Proficiency 2nd 55% Proficient 45% Advanced 3rd 21% Basic 63% Proficient 16% Advanced 4th 7% Basic 63% Proficient 30% Advanced 5th 19% Basic 50% Proficient 31% Advanced 6th29% Basic 52% Proficient 19% Advanced 7th 23% Basic 46% Proficient 31% Advanced 8th 22% Basic 48% Proficient 30% Advanced Overall 17% Basic 54% Proficient 21% Advanced

11. Current Language Proficiency 2nd 9% Proficient 91% Advanced 3rd 21% Basic 58% Proficient 21% Advanced 4th 3% below Basic 23% Basic 33% Proficient 40% Advanced 5th 6% Below Basic 31% Basic 25% Proficient 38% Advanced 6th 3% Below Basic 23% Basic 45% Proficient 29% Advanced 7th 11% Below Basic 20% Basic 46% Proficient 23% Advanced 8th 22% Basic 35% Proficient 43% Advanced Overall 3% Below Basic 20% Basic 36% Proficient 41% Advanced

12. Current Math Proficiency 2nd 14% Proficient 86% Advanced 3rd 37% Basic 42% Proficient 21% Advanced 4th 7% Below Basic 37% Basic 27% Proficient 30% Advanced 5th 38% Basic 13% Proficient 50% Advanced 6th23% Basic 55% Proficient 23% Advanced 7th 6% Below Basic 37% Basic 46% Proficient 11% Advanced 8th 39% Basic 35% Proficient 26% Advanced Overall 2% Below Basic 30% Basic 33% Proficient 35% Advanced

13. Smart Goal • In the 2012-2013 school year student Math scores on the ITBS will improve from a low of 57% proficient to 80% or above proficient in every grade level.