IHS Site Council – Tues. 12/14/10
Convener: Chrisi Morrison
Review and approve Nov. minutes – no administrator present, so we took no vote on this
Reports:
Student government is working on fundraising for the spring dance. Perhaps a fundraiser will be held at Papa’s Pizza and/or Coldstone. Courtney suggested that we have students whose parents own restaurants (specifically, an Indian restaurant), and perhaps this idea can take an “international” focus. Students are also putting out information for the upcoming film festival and hoping that people will work on films over winter break.
Parent meeting for November was cancelled, so no report from parents.
Deon gave a report on the travel scholarship awarded this year to a Churchill junior who will travel to Egypt/Jordan with her IHS trip next summer. The student will report to the IHS assembly and perhaps work with classes in the fall.
Art sale report: Christine reported that the Art Sale proceeds of $236 went to Project Our Turn this year. There were maybe 10 art submissions and 15 students in attendance at the sale, so Christine and Rebecca are thinking that the idea has run its course, at least for now. Good while it lasted.
Special Guest: Brad New
Regarding Proficiency Based Learning, Brad handed out information labeled “Personalized and Proficiency-based Learning Guidelines” and stressed that his report has nothing to do with the current budget discussion, that CBOP discussions began in 2007, and this is about learning and assessment rather than teaching time based on Carnegie Units. He told us that this “opens up the playing field for educational experience.”
Courtney clarified that these guidelines apply only to our projects and that we have to go through the process of making a course qualify under these guidelines this school year for both classes currently being taught and those we expect to teach next year.
Site council had a number of questions. Courtney asked Brad about the back of the form he passed out, which requires administrator approval of courses. Brad stressed his opinion that this is simply a different procedure and an overview of our excellent offerings rather than a change of practice for the district, though he acknowledged that it looks and feels like a change of practice.
Wade asked a question regarding the need for approval when projects courses evolve and change; Brad had no definitive answer but felt that approval would need to be granted when courses had a “substantive” change.
Rebecca commented that this adds a whole new layer of work for both teachers and administrators and offered the observation that administrators have no real idea what is happening in her classes, most of them not having spent 15 minutes total in the last five years in her classrooms. Administrators do not seem qualified to approve or disapprove the content and rigor of the courses. Brad replied that “administrators are eager to do so” (referring to Proficiency-based Learning Guidelines). Rebecca stated her view that this is simply another layer of administrative control.
Kyle asked if this would apply to other courses besides project. Answer: No. His questions regarding how many credits a student can take with this method and how many students one teacher might potentially supervise weren’t able to be answered, as this entire idea is just getting put into place.
At this point, time for the topic was extended.
Courtney asked Brad what other Site Councils have done on this issue. He stated that Sheldon “got the form right out there”; Churchill was less concerned about the time line; North is a different challenge because of the small schools model. There may be no courses that are NCU (Non-Carnegie Units) at North.
We decided to move on to the next agenda item and thanked Brad for his attendance.
The Whatever Committee
Courtney reported on the discussion the committee and staff have had so far concerning a “super projects” model whereby perhaps two teachers would instruct for and grade projects while all others teach six courses rather than our current five plus projects. She stressed that conversations around this are in flux because the economic news is continually changing, but that we can expect an FTE reduction next year both because of the budget shortfall and because we have 35 fewer students than was projected for IHS this year.
Kyle opined that he hopes there will be no expectation that everyone grade senior projects next year, as he thinks that teaching six plus an increased student load would preclude this. Courtney said that the staff will have to talk about that.
Lydia asked if there would still be IB. Answer: Yes. She also stated that getting rid of freshman projects would set many students up for failure.
Chrissy expressed the view that, if something has to go, it could be freshman projects, as she didn’t personally find them essential.
Emily asked who would grade IB diploma papers. Answer: To Be Decided.
Rebecca and Wade reported the conversation from a sophomore team meeting wherein Jenelle Youngblood spoke up and reminded us that many of the steps for successful writing that are now taught through projects will still need to be taught and that doing so could further erode subject area class time. We must have thorough and comprehensive discussions about how and where and whether to replace the teaching of skills now taught in projects if the projects model is indeed dropped.
Running over time and not coming up with any solutions for a perfect world, we adjourned.
Respectfully submitted,
Rebecca Hammons