I. High-Quality Instruction

Leadership

  • Teacher and Administrator leadership is the key to instructional improvement and closing the achievement gap.
  • The Oregon Leadership Network currently involves districts that represent over 50% of the student population in the state.
  • Focus is on equity and literacy.
  • Recent research by the Quality Education Commission indicates that high performing Oregon schools are characterized by teacher and principal leadership that focuses on instructional improvement. This is supported by the research literature.
  • The Literacy Leadership State Steering Committee has completed and promoted the first State Literacy Framework that many districts have used to develop their district literacy initiatives
  • The Harvard ExEL Project has assisted four large urban districts in focusing district improvement initiatives and district-state relationships on improvement of the “Instructional Core,” i.e., placing highly competent teachers in productive and positive relationships with students focused on rigorous content. The state and these districts (Portland, Beaverton, Salem-Keizer, and Eugene) are engaged in dialog to improve state-district interactions that improve the Instructional Core.
  • The state should consider making a clear statement that it supports district efforts to focus on the Instructional Core for all students and will provide leadership in highlighting best practices that does this, such as, promoting more information on the Closing the Achievement Gap schools and the results of the Best Practices Panel of the QEC.

Professional Development

  • Research on professional development indicates that providing sustained, instruction-based, professional development that links to teacher content and grade level is a key factor in improving student performance.
  • We need to make sure that all teachers can use data effectively and can map their instruction to state standards.
  • The State Board should consider approving the national standards of the National Staff Development Council as guidance for promoting high quality professional development practices.
  • At the state level, we should promote ongoing, high quality teacher and administrator professional development and build stronger statewide partnerships involving districts, ESDs, universities and community based organizations, such as, COSA, OEA, Chalkboard Project, OSBA, Stand for Children.
  • Professional development plans are a component of the Continuous Improvement Plan process and are a requirement in OAR 581-022-0606. Title IIa federal dollars are provided for professional development in most districts.

Support to Teachers

  • The single, most important thing we can do to improve student achievement is to support teachers and to provide support for continually improving the quality of instruction.
  • The QEC research on best practices indicates that providing time to allow teachers to work together on instructional improvement and targeted instruction was one of the central characteristics of Oregon schools that are successfully closing the achievement gap.
  • Teachers need ongoing assistance to help focus instruction on student needs. This requires providing access to information and tools that are most helpful in providing teachers what they need.
  • Examples currently in use are:
  • The Resources for Educational Achievement and Leadership (REAL) web site
  • Professional development activities by ODE
  • Educational Enterprise Steering Committee (EESE) provision of ESD-based professional development in the use of data, standards-driven instruction, and high quality improvement planning. The Teaching Learning Connection (TLC) combines professional development on core standards, effective teaching practices and data-driven decision making.
  • What we hear as additional needs:
  • Translation services and materials
  • Formative assessments that link to state standards assessments
  • Creating more learning communities
  • Strategies for engaging more parental and community engagement
  • Resources to expand the work of the Teaching Learning Connection

High Quality Data

  • The Oregon Data Project is working to bring comprehensive data and data training together in a package that builds capacity to apply correct strategies and to use the correct data at the correct time.
  • We are in the process of creating data warehouses that will provide districts, ESDs and research partners easier access to information.
  • We need to provide additional support for creating formative assessments and other assistance that focus on improvement of instruction in an ongoing, systematic way in every classroom. This goes beyond improving use of our existing summative data in the OAKS system and would add a local dimension of routine analysis of the progress of each student toward meeting state standards.

II. High-Quality Content

More for Everyone

  • For students to achieve the Oregon Diploma Requirements, they will need to be exposed to more rigorous content throughout the K-12 system.
  • A key target is the transition from 8th to 9th grade and to have all students fully prepared to engage in high school level work successfully, including Algebra I-level mathematics, inquiry based science and high quality writing.
  • Course content must be analyzed to ensure that sufficient rigor is in place.
  • Additional support to teachers and administrators is needed to give them the analytical tools needed to do such work.
  • Current Administrative Rules require that course syllabi be available for every course in high school. The state could provide more guidance on the content needed in these courses to align with the diploma requirements and college entry expectations from OUS.

Course-Taking Patterns

  • According to our most recent ACT analysis of Oregon students taking the ACT exam (30% of graduating seniors), dramatic differences exist between students who took the minimum Core of courses and those that did not. Yet, only 50% of these Oregon seniors reported taking the minimum Core and only 40% of students of color reported doing so.
  • According to SAT data on Oregon students for 2007, the number of students with a score on the PSAT exam that would predict successfully completing an Advanced Placement Course was much larger than the number of students actually taking an AP course. For example, out of 20,351 PSAT test takers, 7,540 students had a score that predicts a score of 3+ in AP Calculus. However, only 1,422 students took the AP Calculus exam in May 2007 and 889 received a score of 3+.
  • These measures still lack precision and a more detailed analysis of the rigor of course content, the number of students being exposed to rigorous content and the best practices around the state being utilized to assist students in mastering that content would provide valuable information.
  • The results on this year’s administration of the PSAT to all 10th grade students will be a very useful measure of where we stand on rigorous course content.

Standards-Based/Proficiency-Based

  • Historically, course content has been defined as a unit of time, i.e., a unit of credit is defined as “classroom or equivalent work in a course of at least 130 clock hours.” OAR 581-022-0102
  • The Oregon Diploma makes a significant departure from this basic definition by requiring that all students be afforded the opportunity to earn credit on the basis of proficiency.
  • This will require that the definitions of “sufficient” evidence of proficiency and a clear definition of “proficiency” be developed for such units of credit.
  • In addition, the Diploma requires evidence of proficiency of essential skills beginning with reading, writing, applied mathematics and speaking. It is significant that the board has committed to a policy of multiple pathways through which proficiency can be measured making the diploma more flexible and personal.
  • Such instruction requires an instructional program that is standards-based, i.e., the curriculum design and course content are clearly targeted to the appropriate standards for the grade level.
  • Teachers and administrators will, more than ever, need to understand the nature of Oregon standards, what performance measures apply to those standards, and how to embed the standards in instruction.
  • Traditional notions of “Passing” a course are giving way to understanding credit in terms of what students can demonstrate and how well they know it.
  • Time in this type of environment becomes a variable, not the definition. Some students may be able to demonstrate in more or less time than 130 clock hours, and they may be able to demonstrate a level of proficiency through performance that is equivalent to the course requirements without taking the course.

III. Opportunity to Learn

Restructuring Aggressive Interventions & Support

  • Opportunity to learn is a simple concept to grasp: if we hold students accountable for a set of criteria upon which a decision is made to award or deny a diploma, we assume responsibility for providing that student an appropriate opportunity to learn the material for which they are responsible. Basically, we can’t deny them something based on something we did not teach them.
  • Some students have barriers to provision of opportunity, such as, limited English proficiency, poverty, historic discrimination, racial and ethnic bias, etc.
  • The state and local districts, therefore, face a moral and legal responsibility to provide an instructional program that assists all students in learning to the same standards and does not deny opportunity on the basis of race, language of origin, handicapping condition, poverty, gender or ethnicity.
  • Since proficiency is a requirement for the Oregon Diploma, it is critical that the entire K-12 system be aligned to provide such opportunity.
  • Rather than waiting until the end of high school for evidence of failure to appear, it is more instructionally effective and more cost effective to restructure early interventions and sustain interventions over time to assist students across the continuum of instruction.
  • How the state will work with districts and schools on interventions when students are not achieving at acceptable rates is currently under development as part of House Bill 2263 passed in the 2007 session that calls for development of a progressive system of intervention when districts or schools are not meeting performance objectives.

Early Learning

  • There is an abundant amount of research that emphasizes that strong early childhood education programs, especially for children from low-income families, have lasting positive impact on student achievement and other indicators, such as, dropout rates, high school completion rates, delinquency rates and so on.
  • If the target is to have all students meeting standard by 3rd grade and, as a result, reducing the need for more disruptive and more costly interventions later, research indicates that the best model is a strong early childhood program, full day kindergarten and supported instruction, e.g., Title I support, through 3rd grade.
  • We have made significant progress in meeting the early childhood objective for children of poverty. However, we need to do more to close that final gap.
  • We do not know how many children in general, regardless of income, are benefiting from early childhood education programs.
  • Full day kindergarten is a challenge for many in the state, either because of cost, space limitations or family preference. We believe that this choice should be made available for all Oregon families and mandatory in areas of high poverty.

High School Completion

  • Even though the Oregon High School one-year dropout rate was reported as 4.2% this year, it is still too high and more than double that rate for students of color.
  • Our current high school completer rate calculations do not fully identify disaggregated data over the four years of high school by cohort groups. We need to be able to accurately answer how many students of color are graduating from high school.
  • What we do know is that completer data for any given year indicates that African American, Native American and Latino students are more than twice as likely to not earn a diploma.
  • The Oregon Diploma gives us and our districts an opportunity to look deeply into our high school programs and make critical judgments about the arrangement of resources and practices that contribute to students completing high school.
  • We have seen promising best practices in various parts of the state that add additional time and multiple opportunities to learn to students in need of additional assistance.
  • There is a critical policy issue involved in making sure that students are given appropriate opportunity to learn and additional support to meet the high school diploma requirements. Should all students below diploma proficiency be provided additional opportunities to learn? We believe this could be a civil rights issue if we do not provide appropriate opportunities for students to achieve at standard level.

Closing the Achievement Gap

  • Closing the Gap requires being able to accelerate the rate of attainment of standards in different populations so that all students are able to attain state standards.
  • Doing so is not to be at the expense of slowing down the rate of achievement of students already performing at or above standard.
  • Accomplishing these objectives requires that teachers and administrators have the capacity, both in professional development and in available data and tools, to accurately identify students in need and to provide targeted, effective differentiated instruction.
  • State data cannot be silent about the achievement gap. Rather, by having clear accountability data and making improvement in closing the gap a component of accountability, we believe improvement will come. We have seen evidence of this at the elementary and middle level in Oregon.
  • High school gap data has been stubborn to improve over the last 10 years. Students of color are 20-30 percentage points below white and Asian rates of meeting state standards.
  • We must have the courage to raise issues of equity and race in our conversations.

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