A r c h i v e d  I n f o r m a t i o n

Introduction

Promising Practices in Schoolwide Programs:
A Summary

VISION, LEADERSHIP, AND DECISION MAKING

For schoolwide programs, the central mission is to ensure that students will achieve high levels of academic proficiency. This is a challenge that educators in schoolwide programs do not meet alone. They turn for support to a diverse community of colleagues, parents, and civic leaders—all collaborating to put students' interests first.

In schoolwide programs, high-quality professionals together with parents and community leaders collaborate to develop a learning environment in which students are first.

A schoolwide team collaborated to create the multicultural mural that greets everyone who enters Barnes Elementary School. It boldly commits to "educate all of our students with a challenging world-class curriculum in a safe, culturally diverse setting." Similarly, because students learn in different ways, the Worcester Arts schoolwide plan integrates its core curriculum and the arts to respond to each student's learning style: "Our mission is to provide a balanced education for the whole child, intellectually, aesthetically, and linguistically." At Gompers Secondary School Center for Science, Mathematics, and Computer Technology, a school serving seventh- through twelfth-graders from 19 cultural groups, "strength through diversity" is the organizing theme. Its rigorous academic program affirms "the dignity and worth of each student" with the expectation that all students will attain challenging state and local standards and be prepared to continue their education beyond high school.

Although schoolwide programs rely on the talents of many leaders, principals play a key role. They set the tone, facilitate the flow of information, monitor student progress, and promote a vision in which all students achieve high proficiency levels on a standards-based curriculum. Under principals' skillful direction, site councils, governance teams, advisory committees, and task groups oversee school planning and budgeting, monitor day-to-day activities, and coordinate operations. With colleagues, parents, and community members working collaboratively, principals design and lead the implementation of a student-centered educational program.

Schoolwide programs reflect the "shift of mind" about how modern organizations work productively. Under the principal's knowledgeable direction, participatory management responds to the school's varied constituencies.

At P.S. 172, teachers' active participation in school operations contributes to their ownership of schoolwide reform. Assistant principal Tina Volpe reports that, "the pyramid has been reversed and the principal is no longer at the top telling teachers what to do, but at the bottom supporting them." At Barnes Elementary, open-agenda bimonthly staff meetings, which are facilitated by a rotating staff member, ensure broad-based staff participation and consensus building. Fienberg Fisher's Educational Excellence Council (EEC) invites representatives from the local police department, housing authority, health care clinic, mayor's office, and two area universities to join parents and staff in schoolwide planning.

Because schoolwide programs serve increasingly diverse populations, school leaders try to preserve a cultural and ethnic balance on decision-making bodies. At Lincoln WorldLab Magnet Elementary School, a spot on the School Advisory Committee is reserved specifically for a member of the school's Haitian community. At Worcester Arts, a fluid faculty and staff steering committee, working with the School Governance Council, keeps a check on "the pulse of the community" by meeting frequently with parents and community partners—at informal gatherings, community events, open-forums on special topics, and parent-teacher conferences—to determine whether the school is meeting community expectations.

STUDENT PERFORMANCE RESULTS

With careful planning, a comprehensive schoolwide instructional strategy can yield positive results in only a short time. Results from the eight schoolwide programs described in this report include:

• In 1997, more than 85 percent of the Barnes third- and fifth-graders achieved the ambitious proficiency goals its site council set for students on Oregon's demanding statewide assessment.

• Fienberg Fisher uses continuous-progress testing to periodically update reading and mathematics learning profiles for each student. As students move from level to level throughout the year, they take standardized, skills-based tests that identify the areas in which they are weakest. Student progress has been confirmed by continuous gains in mathematics and reading on nationally standardized achievement tests.

  Evaluation tool kits include myriad informal and formal assessments, such as: Student self-evaluations Teachers' observations of students Curriculum-embedded tests Essays and open-response tests Demonstrations and performances Portfolios of drafts and final products Multiweek projects and academic "expeditions" Standards-based state assessments Traditional norm-referenced tests Criterion-based standardized tests

• Many students at Gompers Secondary Center for Science, Mathematics, and Computer Technology Magnet begin the seventh-grade ranking well below nationally standardized norms. By their senior year, however, more than half of the students score at or above the 50th percentile in reading, language arts, and mathematics. Significantly, 95 percent of Gompers' graduating seniors pursued postsecondary education in 1996 and 1997, and more than 50 percent enrolled in four-year colleges or universities or two-year education programs.

• Students' scores at King Middle School, both on the school's rubric-based evaluation of culminating project work and on the statewide open-ended assessment, have climbed steadily since King became a schoolwide program in 1995.

• Lincoln has been tracking the percentage of its students scoring above the 50th percentile on nationally standardized tests and, in three years, has almost doubled the number of achievers at that level in both language arts and reading.

• Montview students exceed national grade-level norms in the second and fourth grades, the two grades tested on the state assessment. Disaggregated results on both the nationally normed tests and integrated writing and language arts assessments suggest that Hispanic and African American students are making academic gains on par with their Asian and white peers.

• The P.S. 172 staff create portfolios that reflect student performance on teacher-made tests, writing samples, and standardized achievement scores. On standardized tests in grades three through six, students consistently exceed districtwide and city averages, and teachers' assessments of extended written work in student portfolios mark steady progress.

• Worcester Arts Magnet students achieved the state's sixth-highest relative gain on the 1996 Massachusetts assessment, and since that time, students have continued to maintain that level of success. In addition, students' quarterly and interim report cards record progress in creative writing, dance, drama, and a teacher-designed behavioral and academic progress checklist.

Schools' grade-level and schoolwide teams scrutinize individual student and program progress reports using disaggregated information whenever it is available. Portfolios of student work, projects, and regular writing assignments and performance tasks are often assessed against rigorous, teacher-designed rubrics. These multiple indicators reach beyond the surface evidence to point out where additional curriculum adjustments are most needed.

Schoolwide programs are publicly accountable. Through parent-teacher conferences, a school profile or report card, and progress reports, school officials inform parents about individual student progress and the school accountability status. For example, Gompers issues an annual School Accountability Report Card and also informs parents about ways to monitor their children's progress. Worcester provides parents with district-developed assessment information in the Comprehensive Policies and Programs Handbook, and then asks parents to verify in writing that they have received it. Through periodic meetings on assessment, Worcester's curriculum specialist and teachers help parents understand the implications of teacher-designed and state assessments for their children. Clear presentation and, when appropriate, translation into languages other than English make this valuable information accessible to all parents.

RESEARCH-BASED REFORM STRATEGIES

Literacy, a priority for most schoolwide programs, is taught using more than a dozen research-based, "balanced" literacy models. Balanced literacy teaches language and literature in context and, simultaneously,strengthens students' ability to analyze phonetic, semantic, syntactic, and visual cues as they learn to read. Schools tailor literacy instruction to grade-level expectations and students' prior experiences and achievements by involving teachers in extensive retraining. The Barnes schoolwide literacy program, emphasizing four strands—reading, writing, spelling, and oral language—taught teachers in on-site courses to use existing resources differently by strengthening the cognitive underpinnings of students' literacy development. Montview teachers also adopted a combination of professional development models following their extensive research into what makes a successful reading program.

Reading and language arts is a focus in secondary schools as well. King tracks students' literacy development using "working" portfolios of drafts, students' self-evaluations of works-in-progress, and "finished" portfolios of their final products. Students at King work in teams and study groups and can receive individualized assistance in the school's Student Learning Center. At Gompers, double language arts blocks and daily 20-minute "sustained silent reading" periods combine literature, reading for pleasure, and basic skill building. Gompers' teachers also monitor seventh-graders' developing skills in note-taking and record-keeping to ensure they acquire the study habits they need to be successful in the demanding upper-grade academic programs.

It's not an 'anything goes' sort of culture here. We abandoned approaches that didn't work and designed our program around students'—not teachers'—needs. Debbie Backus, Principal Montview Elementary School Aurora, CO

In extended language arts blocks, students connect reading with literature and writing skill development. Reading specialists, resource teachers, ESL staff, and special education staff join regular classroom teachers during the longer classes, making individualized teaching feasible. Several schools have adopted Reading Recovery in combination with other concentrated programs to help the most at-risk students. For example, Worcester targets both Reading Recovery and Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) to the most underachieving students. Through Success For All (SFA), Lincoln teaches reading and language arts in 120-minute blocks, using the SFA curriculum that teaches comprehension, listening, speaking, and vocabulary skills as students read multicultural stories that reflect their backgrounds and experience. Lincoln also provides 20 minutes of individual tutoring each day for students who score in the lowest quartile of the CTBS test.

Many schoolwides serve large populations of students with limited-English proficiency (LEP), and they provide assistance to ensure LEP students acquire language skills in English. Program approaches vary depending on the schools' philosophy of language instruction. Some schools favor immersion into English-only classrooms, using pull-out assistance only when necessary; others prefer intensive and transitional ESL services or dual-language immersion. Barnes, for example, offers nine Spanish-English bilingual classrooms for native speakers of both languages, and ESL services in mainstream classes for LEP students, most of whom are of Asian descent. To ensure that LEP students keep up in all subjects, P.S. 172 introduces them to social studies and language arts through a multicultural, literature-based program called "Making Connections."

Schoolwide program planners recognize that the arts are essential to the core curriculum.

Cutting-edge technology helps organize and manage schoolwide program schedules, strengthens academic content, and connects home and school. Principals and management teams use computers to communicate with one another, maintain progress reports, and schedule their academic programs. Word processing and graphics software programs can produce handbooks, announcements, newsletters, invitations, plans, and certificates of appreciation to involve parents fully in students' academic program.

At Montview, computers in each classroom and in the media center give students the opportunity to research, write, edit, and "publish" the results of their learning. Access both to the Internet and to e-mail enables Gompers' students to conduct online experiments with astronauts from the Student Mission Control Center at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. High school students at Gompers may also take advanced courses in computer science, science, and mathematics using sophisticated science equipment, telescopes, and state-of-the art computer networks.

By becoming a schoolwide program, we do not target a specific group of children; instead we assist the struggling students by strengthening the entire school. Jack Spatola, Principal P.S. 172 Brooklyn, NY

Many schoolwide programs incorporate preschool programs to ease the transition of children into elementary school. At Lincoln, the preschool program and kindergarten classrooms use some of the Success for All instructional strategies that traditionally begin in the first grade. Barnes sponsors outreach activities to make the transition between preschool and kindergarten easier for children and their families. The Barnes staff invite children under five and their parents to story times in the school's library to sing songs, read stories, and do "finger plays" in both English and Spanish. They also visit neighboring apartment complexes and homes of day-care providers to model how reading aloud can stimulate language development and encourage children's early involvement with books. Most of the schoolwide programs in this volume also host Head Start or preschool classes in their schools.

Schoolwide programs add instructional support:

• All-day preschools prepare young children to make a smooth transition to kindergarten. At Lincoln, preschool and kindergarten teachers participate in the Success for All training with the rest of the staff to learn to incorporate SFA strategies in the early childhood years. Worcester's preschoolers participate fully in the same integrated arts program designed for all students.

• As part of the Comer School Development Program, Fienberg Fisher orients its curriculum around six developmental pathways—cognitive, social, psychological, moral, speech and language, and physical.

• The Expeditionary Learning Outward Bound (ELOB) program at King strengthens students' self-confidence by assigning them to the same teacher for at least two years. Students also participate in rigorous, interdisciplinary learning expeditions, which are conducted by collaborating student teams.

• Gompers extends the school year for entering seventh-graders through a summer camp program consisting of mini-courses on homework expectations, note taking, and strategies for keeping up with daily assignments.

Many schoolwide programs arrange for assistance teams to provide counseling and psychological support to students. Cross-disciplinary teams, including teachers, counselors, social workers and psychologists, monitor students' academic and behavioral development and recommend appropriate interventions. The Barnes Teacher Assistance Team includes a child development specialist, a social worker, the principal, and representatives from the Safe and Drug-Free Schools program. The team meets with teachers, listens to their concerns, and suggests appropriate program accommodations. At Fienberg Fisher, a similar multidisciplinary team devises developmentally appropriate plans for each student who is at risk of failing to meet the school's standards. Montview provides a temporary, alternative setting where students with behavioral or emotional problems can receive one-on-one instruction and get personalized attention to help them get back on track. Family Support Teams at several schools give students access to neighborhood mental health services.

Extended learning opportunities before and after school offer students reinforcement, tutoring, and enrichment.

Most schoolwide programs also provide extended learning opportunities to enhance students' interpersonal and extracurricular growth. Before- and after-school tutoring, enrichment, and summer school pro- grams stave off problems and offer safety nets to struggling students. King keeps four well-equipped project rooms open before, during, and after school so that students, parents, teachers, and community members can meet there to collaborate on projects. Lincoln offers its high-achieving students a chance to participate in the Structures of Intellect curriculum, which prepares them for the district's gifted and talented program. At Barnes, community college and high school students tutor younger students in an after-school program in which ESL staff also offer supplementary language instruction. The P.S. 172 after-school program is designed to strengthen students' reading development through creative dramatics, music, and puppetry.

THE PROFESSIONAL LEARNING COMMUNITY

In schoolwide programs, adult learning is as important as student learning. Professional development, most of which is organized around the schools' research-based reform models, occurs during the school day or through summer institutes. Long-term staff development, rather than "one-shot" programs, is the standing policy. At Worcester Arts Magnet, teachers use grants, tuition waivers, and state- or district-funded release time to participate in numerous courses and workshops, which they, in turn, share with their colleagues. Professional development at other schools includes the following activities:

• Fienberg Fisher hosts four coaches who mentor teachers in language arts, technology, bilingual education, and science; previously, the staff had also spent a year learning to implement the Comer School Development Program through mini-retreats, workshops, and seminars.

• At P.S. 172, visiting master teachers conduct demonstration math and science classes, facilitate teacher workshops, and consult with teachers regarding strategies for incorporating the arts into instruction.

• Different New American Schools design teams trained the King staff in the Expeditionary Learning Model and supported Lincoln teachers in adopting the Success For All models. A team of Comer School Development specialists continues to offer support to the Fienberg Fisher faculty.

• Three Worcester Arts Magnet faculty members took one-year sabbaticals to attend Harvard University and study specialized areas of interest; once they rejoined the faculty, they shared their research with colleagues and integrated much of what they learned into Worcester's renewal plans.

• Mentoring programs at Lincoln and at Gompers enable new teachers to observe their colleagues, attend professional-growth classes, participate in dialogues with seasoned colleagues, and receive assistance from mentor observers.

• Preschool and kindergarten teachers from Worcester Arts Magnet participated in an accreditation program sponsored by the National Association for the Education of Young Children and, in doing so, obtained national accreditation for their own early childhood program.

PARENT AND COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS

One of the keys to our success is the fact that we've involved parents. They are our greatest advocates. Margaret Venditti, Principal Worcester Arts Magnet Elementary School Worcester, MA

Parent and community partnerships sustain schoolwide programs and services by encouraging widespread parent and community participation. Schoolwide programs keep parents well informed about school activities and student progress, and they reach out in various other ways. King issues newsletters and videos of students pursuing expeditionary work; Lincoln provides families with "student agendas" and daily calendars for keeping track of student assignments and events. Montview's full-time parent coordinator and community liaison helps families access resources, obtain employment information, and locate housing. Also at Montview, parents are hired for school positions whenever possible.

Because all these schoolwide programs emphasize the need to include parents on decisionmaking bodies, parents serve on site councils, planning, and accreditation committees. Other examples of parent involvement include the following:

• "Story ladies" at Barnes Elementary go into homes to read and share books with parents and their preschool children. Barnes also sponsors "Reading is a Shared Affair" to promote reading at home. Families come to evening meetings where they receive free books and learn how reading with young children can support literacy development.

• Parents at three schools—Fienberg Fisher, Gompers, and Montview—can visit permanent parent centers, where they register for parenting and GED classes and check out educational materials throughout the day.

• At the P.S. 172 biannual Education Fair, parents receive advice on the best strategies for them to promote their children's academic progress at home.

• Lincoln offers numerous opportunities for parents to learn along with their children,including the Parent Power and Parent Power Kids programs, adult education/GED preparation, and MegaSkills classes.

• Gompers, Lincoln, and Worcester Arts Magnet outline expectations for parents—both in booklets sent to parents and through parent compacts—to encourage parents to understand and meet their obligations in promoting their children's education.

Parents are also urged to participate in schoolwide professional development programs. Involving the entire school community—professionals as well as parents and community members—in learning together promotes understanding about why and how schools are changing and strengthens the unity of communities' visions for the future. Gompers sets aside a portion of its budget to encourage parents to attend conferences, staff development activities, and faculty meetings. The Worcester Arts Magnet's accreditation team involved subcommittees of parents, teachers, administrators, and community members in a school accreditation process that received high praise for its successful self-study and resulting long-range plan.

SUSTAINING CHANGE

Schools take a major step toward sustaining change when they cast a wide net during the needs assessment and planning phases of schoolwide implementation. If a representative schoolwide planning team—including teachers, parents, and community leaders—really "owns" the process, they invest in its success. Teacher-led initiatives, full participant involvement in making final decisions, and collegial mentoring and support unite communities in a common mission that grounds the schoolwide program. "So much evolves from our teachers," says Gompers' Marie Thornton, pointing out that the faculty-community partnership inspires a tireless investment to ensure that students excel academically.

Teachers, parents, and community leaders really own the process and they invest in its success.

Keeping up with the research on teaching and learning is another challenge to sustaining change. Worcester's Margaret Venditti points out how important it is "to make sure you don't just hop on the bandwagon because something is in vogue, but because you know that it works...and that it is based on a solid foundation of research...." Schoolwide programs draw support from the expertise of their district administrators and of collaborating reform organizations, networks, and state and federal regional assistance centers.

There is never enough time, although being able to combine programs and services increases the focus on learning. Expectations are high and there is considerable work to be done, so schoolwide programs "create time" with flexible schedules, extended school days, and by turning to parents and community members for help.

Finally, "you have to model it—walk the talk," says Fienberg Fisher's Grace Nebb, "we are constantly modeling, training, preaching, transforming, and developing." In the end, schoolwide programs work, as the Worcester Arts Magnet self-study accreditation team reported, because "the whole is much larger than the sum of the parts."

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