School Improvement Recommendations for the ESSA State Consolidated Plan(Draft)

School Improvement Theory of Action

If Minnesota

  • Partners with districts to facilitate school improvement;
  • Focuses school improvement efforts on equity and underserved student groups;
  • Builds districts’ and schools’ capacity to use the principles of active implementation;
  • Delivers supports through onsite coaching, opportunities to network, and leadership development;
  • Meaningfully involves stakeholders in school improvement planning and implementation; and
  • Focuses school improvement on Minnesota’s Common Principles of Effective Practice;

Then

  • Districts and schools will be able to identify, name, and eliminate inequities,
  • Districts and schools will have the capacity to implement evidence-based practices using continuous improvement processes,
  • All schools will have high-quality instructional leaders,
  • Teaching will be standards focused and culturally relevant, and
  • Educators will be meaningfully engaged in the improvement process,

And the result will be

  • Increased outcomes for all students,
  • The elimination of achievement gaps between groups of students,
  • Increased educator effectiveness, and
  • Improved climates for teaching and learning

So that all students have access to high-quality schools.

Consolidated Plan Decision Items

Decision Item 1: Roles of the State and Local Districts

How will the role of the state change as ESSA increases responsibility of the LEA compared to our NCLB Waiver? How can the state best support districts to then support schools? (Toni Cox)

Recommendations for Comprehensive Support and Improvement
  1. Continue, expand, strengthen current support model (Regional Centers of Excellence) which offers on-site coaching, training and capacity building to engage in continuous improvement and effective implementation practices.
  2. Expand RCE staffing to address specific needs and ESSA requirements (i.e. Equity specialists, High School leadership specialists, Principal leadership specialists)
  3. Develop differentiated supports or interventions based on school needs. Create Individualized District/School Service Plan to determine RCE resource and personnel allocation.
Recommendations for Comprehensive Support and Improvement and Targeted Assistance
  1. Establish a clear, comprehensive communication plan that articulated the roles and responsibilities of the state, district and school (i.e. notification requirements, how work is aligned to WBWF and embed equity definition as the focal point).
  2. Purposefully articulate and embed connections of school and district leadership team work with WBWF, nested improvement plans that align WBWF to district plan to school plan.
  3. Support a model Comprehensive Needs Assessment process that is focused on equity. The needs assessment would be used by districts to determine interventions for a school’s improvement plan. Measurement/data examples:
  4. Partnerships with community and families
  5. Resource allocation teacher effectiveness, assignments, leadership, per pupil expenditures, use of Title I funds
  6. School climate and engagement beyond attendance data, dig into “why”
  7. Adult behaviors and mindsets
  8. Teaching and learning conditions
  9. Standards implementation
  10. PLC performance
  11. Data-Driven Decision making processes
  12. Student survey data
  13. Equity, disproportionality, discipline referrals
Recommendations for Targeted Support and Improvement
  1. Explore partnerships to meet the needs of increased number of identified schools to support a consistent process (aligned with RCE model) for school improvement planning and implementation

Decision Item 2: Differentiated Supports for High Schools

How can the state best support high schools? How should supports be differentiated for high schools versus elementary schools? How can the state best support dropout prevention efforts in schools and districts? (Tyler Livingston)

  1. Provide clear communication for all stakeholders regarding:
  2. The purpose, meaning and calculation of the CSI designation for graduation rates.
  3. The requirements for school, district, and state that result from the designation.
  4. The vision and design of the support model provided by the Regional Centers of Excellence and the opportunities therein.
  5. Ensure that any state pre-approved list of evidence-based practices include practices that have been studied at the secondary level (high school) and represent secondary needs including but not limited to: instructional and assessment practices, standards implementation, credit/course offerings, staffing and their roles (e.g. school counselors) special programming for transition years or for career/college readiness, etc.
  6. Include, highlight and support practices/interventions/programs that are targeted to increase student group graduation rates (e.g., students of color, Native American students, students with disabilities)
  7. To the degree that research is available, also include evidence-based practices that demonstrated success in alternative learning center and credit recovery settings.
  8. Increase the support for the Minnesota Early Indicators and Response System (MEIRS), and prepare Regional Center advocates to support school/district leadership to review and interpret data to make decisions about how to support students; select strategies and practices that will better engage students; and use tools and guidelines to effectively implement practices and measure progress.
  9. Build the capacity of secondary principal(s) to be instructional leaders. Differentiate for alternative learning center and credit recovery schools.
  10. Revise the Regional Center’s comprehensive needs assessment tools and practices to reflect relevant secondary data (e.g., course offerings, credit accumulation, MEIRS).Differentiate for alternative learning center and recovery schools.

Decision Item 3: Implementation of Evidence-Based Practices

How can the state best support schools and districts to ensure that improvement plans include evidence-based practices that are based on a needs assessment? How can we best support the implementation planning for those plans? (John Gimpl)

  1. Offer a menu of evidence-based practices – not programs or products (e.g., phonemic awareness, not Read 180) and consider how the practices researched by Hattie and Marzano, for example, might fit the ESSA definition of evidence-based.
  2. Ensure culturally relevant practices are embedded in the choices.
  3. Include practices on the menu that the state and regions have the capacity to support (e.g., operationalize and measure) to help ensure that practices are implemented as intended.
  4. Help schools with how to match practices with needs based on a comprehensive needs assessment highlighting inequities and provide tools and processes to determine the best balance of evidence, fit, need, resources, capacity, and readiness (e.g., Hexagon tool, Initiative Inventory, needs assessment coaching process).
  5. Consider grade spans, disciplines, social-emotional issues.
  6. Allow for flexibility when an evidence-based practice is not available to meet a discovered need (might need a change in statute or a waiver).
  7. Require districts to build a rationale for picking an evidence-based practice that is not on the menu and to identify core components and methods to measure that the practice would be implemented as intended.
  8. Assume that because we need to close racial and economic achievement gaps by raising achievement for all students, educator and instructional quality is the foundation of any evidence-based practice.

Decision Item 4: Required Review, Approval, and Monitoring of Support and Improvement Plans

How can the state best support school improvement through the required review, approval, and monitoring of schools’ improvement plans? (Lisa Grundstrom)

  1. State creates a rubric for monitoring that is shared with districts – including all components of the plan and district process for approval.
  2. District provides MDE an explanation of their internal review / approval process, including stakeholder engagement.
  3. Using monitoring rubric, District reviews and approves site plans prior to submitting to MDE/RCE. Indication of district approved plan is included in WBWF submission.
  4. Plans that are approved by the district are approved by MDE. An audit is done on a percentage similar to other monitoring, with follow-up as needed.
  5. MDE monitors the work of the districts through WBWF plans, and provides support through RCEs.

Decision Item 5: Additional Supports for Schools Not Meeting Exit Criteria

What additional requirements and supports will apply to schools that fail to meet exit criteria? (John Gimpl)

Decision Item 6: Required 20% Title I Set-aside for School Improvement

Will Minnesota continue to require a 20% set-aside for school improvement? For which schools? How will use of the 20% set-aside be monitored? What guidance will be offered for use of the 20% set-aside? (Lisa Grundstrom)

  1. Provide guidance to districts to make a local decision as to how to fund School Improvement plans, including the opportunity to use up to 20%.
  2. Because the many of the schools in districts that will be identified will not necessarily be Title 1 schools, this may no longer be a relevant expectation. ( CSI <5% schools will already receive additional support from RCEs, TSI and CSI-Graduation schools may not be Title 1, and therefore may not have funds to set aside.)

Decision Item 7: Differentiation of Supports and Allocation of Resources

How will we differentiate support or prioritize districts and schools for support? What process and criteria might be used? How does this align with World’s Best Workforce? (Toni Cox)

  1. Examine previous identification status-Has the school been identified as a Priority or Focus school? If so, examine progress and past support effectiveness.
  2. Prioritize based on lowest accountability measures
  3. Examine WBWF data, such as kindergarten readiness, Reading Well by Third grade, achievement gaps, graduation and college & career readiness measures
  4. Assess district readiness to support school turnaround (Refer to District Readiness to Support School Turnaround, Center on School Turnaround), which examines leadership, infrastructure to provide differentiated support and accountability, conditions for effective talent management and effective instructional infrastructure
  5. Utilize District Capacity Assessment (National Implementation Research Network)

Decision Item 8: Planning Year Option

Will we allow the optional planning year? If so, what will happen during the planning year? (Tyler Livingston)

  1. Establish a timeline—including clear action steps and deliverables—for schools in their first year of identification.
  2. Note: Generally, the group was not in favor of the term “planning year.” Without clear guidance around critical, stage-based actions that the LEA or school should accomplish in that time period, past experience suggests that active planning would not begin until the summer before the second year of identification. “Guided planning year” or another term may be more apt and would lead to better implementation of school improvement activities.
  3. For schools that were previously identified and supported by Regional Center staff, the process of conducting a Comprehensive Needs Assessment and using the Record of Continuous Improvement should not start over. These schools might revise or update plans based on new data, and they should continue to implement and improve strategies.
  4. Provide a “Give/Get” chart as part of an orientation for newly identified LEAs and schools that clearly articulates roles and responsibilities for the state (Regional Centers), LEAs and schools. Build relationships among RCE, LEA and school staff.
  5. Note: There was some discussion about previously identified schools that did not meaningfully engage in a robust planning process with RCE staff. This recommendation was one idea that might help reset a productive relationship between RCE staff and previously identified schools. The tool might also be useful in building the relationship for newly identified schools as described above.

School Improvement Recommendations for the ESSA State Consolidated Plan – January 10, 2017 1