RAPPS Management Team Teleconference

Al’s Notes

RAPPS Management Team Teleconference

11/9/09

• Participants: Cherie Lyons, Kathy Blanc, Ryan Landvoy, Al Bertani, Jon Paden, Les Morse, Carol Kane, Lexie Domaradski, Susan Garton, Kelly Tonsmiere, and Al Smith.

• Les expressed his pleasure with the recent District Leadership Team Teleconference we facilitated with RAPPS Superintendents… having so many participate was good.

• Susan also was pleased with the participation and results from our recent District Leadership Team Teleconference… the access it provided to these superintendents.

• Al Bertani too expressed his pleasure about the recent District Leadership Team Teleconference mentioning that these quarterly “check in” meetings with our RAPPS district’s superintendents provide us with (1) stable coordination across the 17 participating districts, (2) an ongoing communication outlet to “push out” i.e. market RAPPS ancillary and follow up services as they are rolled out, e.g. our webinar series, and (3) an evolving “coherence” across all RAPPS partner organizations in the context of a common set of project objectives.

• Al Smith commented that he is observing an evolving coherence across all participating partner organizations; along with increasing evidence of “cross fertization” among our partners, e.g. RAPPS partners assisting EED planners with the EED Winter 2010 conference program agenda.

• Kelly shared that the initial series of RAPPS follow up webinars are going very well… very good enrollments and attendance and participant feedback evaluations have so far been excellent.

• Al Bertani shared that he began his recent webinar series with “nuts and bolts” as an extension to the Summer 2009 Ed Leadership Institute, with an initial focus on structural components… beginning with a focus on current local structures in place at our RAPPS districts… what are some options for consideration? E.g. teacher empowerment? This week he will focus on Social and Human Relations Components… how to build trust.

• Cherie commented that she had participated with one of Al’s recent webinars… and that it was “fabulous.”

• Kelly shared that at the end of each webinar session, ASDN administers a quick participant feedback survey to participants (variation of survey monkey), and that one recent Al Bertani session produced the highest ratings ever recorded for an ASDN webinar session.

• Kathy shared that webinar enrollments are so far exceeding expectations:

• RtI webinar has 130 participants.
• Al Bertani’s PLC webinar has 63 participants.
• Lexie’s test data webinar has 25 participants.

• Kelly mentioned that Lexie’s webinar well address use of both AIMS web assessment data as well as MAPs data.

• Les shared that planning for the Summer 2010 Institute is underway and that we may be conducting a pre Institute orientation session on memorial day to kick the week off. This session will target new team members as well as new coaches.

• We have secured the Captain Cook Hotel/Conference Center in Anchorage; and have sufficient room there to run both summer Institutes simultaneously (i.e. EED Leadership Institute and UAA RAPPS Institute).

• Susan mentioned that UAA Cohort #2 will be participating as well.

• Les shared that the Summer 2010 RAPPS Institute planning is for now “tentative”… until we have had sufficient opportunities to engage our district stakeholders with the planning. He intends to begin circulating a draft of the tentative 2010 Institute structural framework to our stakeholders as the EED team initial planning continues.

• Les mentioned that we are seriously looking at the feasibility of bringing in new folks for a RAPPS Institute orientation that Monday… Memorial Day… with the objective of getting all new people quickly “up to speed”… so they can effectively collaborate with the RAPPS veteran team members through the week long Institute agenda (June 1-4, 2010).

• Susan and Kelly have a few monetary details to close on re: the UAA 2010 Summer Institute arrangements. She also sees the potential for hosting a session that Monday (i.e. Memorial Day) targeting new people… to get them sufficiently oriented to the project objectives and UAA related expectations so they are “settled in” when the rest of the UAA cohort members begin their four day Institute the following Tuesday. She has some scheduling ideas in mind and hopes to bring in Pam Robbins as a presenter.

• Kelly and Susan will finalize the UAA 2010 Summer Institute budget in the next week or so.

• Susan also reports that nominations are currently underway for new UAA RAPPS cohort candidates. Last year’s deadline for nominations from our 17 partner districts ways May 1. This coming year we will likely move this date up to April 1, to allow more time for Institute planning. UAA already has its first 2010 RAPPS cohort nominee officially admitted to the University. We’re much further along this year, compared to last year and are targeting up to 20 new cohort candidates. Once we hit our goal of 55 UAA cohort candidates… we’ll monitor progress and be prepared to either increase numbers (if allowed to) or replace any participants that drop out.

• Susan is keen on monitoring attrition levels among our RAPPS UAA cohorts and she mentioned that she and her colleagues are keeping in touch with any RAPPS cohort participants who drop out.

• Susan envisions the possibility of adding another UAA cohort during or after Year Three… in consideration of attrition rates we may be experiencing.

• Carol reported that the 2nd AACP training Institute is scheduled for November 12-14, and that focus areas include organizational literacy, teacher collaboration, instructional strategies… and she mentioned that MP’s Deb and Julia will be participating.

• Carol mentioned that during her recent site visits, she had some opportunities to interact with EED coaches and specialists in collaborative ways in the context of the RAPPS project… she saw the AIMs website being demonstrated and experienced good cross communication among EED Specialists and coaches with AACP coaches.

• EED planners are working now with their specialists and TA coaches to focus on the six domains of their audit tool.

• Jon shared that he has observed the AACP coaches in action and that he is very impressed with their interactions with RAPPS teams… and he sees good potential for collaboration between EED coaches and specialists with AACP coaches—in the context of their common RAPPS Institute agenda of providing TA to the RAPPS Institute Teams.

• Lexie mentioned that she is putting the final touches on her power point presentation and is coordinating her presentation with ASDN’s technology person.

• Al Smith mentioned that he is now drafting some interview questions to use in interviewing the four RAPPS Institute principals randomly selected during the Summer 2009 Institute to serve as a Key Informant Panel. The purpose of the interviews is to provide us with formative feedback from a RAPPS principal’s perspective. He will circulate his drafted questions to everybody next week for comment… and for any additional questions that RAPPS partners would like him to address during these interviews. Al anticipates conducting these phone interviews in early December.

• Ryan mentioned that the Annual Progress Report has been submitted, that it reflects significant progress has been made… and that we are in fact ahead of schedule (e.g. 55 UAA cohort candidates). RGI is also working closely with Kathy in accessing and documenting participant feedback being generated at the close of each RAPPS webinar session… and so far, these results are outstanding. He also mentioned that RGI is also collecting post assessment PIMRS.

• Cherie mentioned she is looking forward to the next RAPPS Instructional Team meeting scheduled for November 24… with a focus on determining how best McREL can contribute to the webinar series. She has some ideas in mind in the context of “coherence.” Note: Les and Jon are invited to participate with this teleconference as well. Jon says he plans to participate.

• Kelly concluded the meeting by sharing that he recently heard from our RAPPS Program Officer Beatrice Ceja that we are eligible to apply for another Ed Leadership grant… and that we’d have to expand and/or modify our current RAPPS SOW… and that everyone can now begin thinking about this possibility.

• Cherie shared that perhaps one idea might be to enhance our new District Leadership Team… providing incentives to aspiring new principals, stipends, staff development opportunities, and/or getting promising people from other fields to apply for principalships.

• Kelly concluded the teleconference mentioning that he’ll run our ideas by Beatrice Ceja (our P.O.) as we anticipate submitting a second grant application this Winter.