Rethinking School Improvement: The Case for Networked Improvement Communities

The question of why school improvement efforts have not been as effective as we would hope is a complicated one that could be addressed from a number of perspectives. The purpose of this paper is to explore some of the underlying problems that prevent current school reform effort from achieving sustained impact, and to describe a promising model of school improvement, called the Networked Improvement Community (NIC). The NIC model – which has just started gaining traction in the world of K-12 school reform – establishes small inquiry groups within organizations to engage in cycles of improvement that involve implementing strategies designed to improve outcomes, collecting data on the effects of the strategies, reflecting on the data, and then planning next actions (Bryk, Gomez & Gunrow, 2010). In addition, the NIC model Rethinking School Improvement 4 supports the sharing of information about the effects of initiatives across networks (e.g. schools, school districts), and uses this shared learning to thoughtfully scale up successful practices. While the NIC model shares some principles and strategies with other popular school reform efforts, in its fully-realized form it represents a significant departure from the way that school improvement efforts have traditionally been approached. To some extent it is model that seems to have developed out of an understanding of both the strengths and the weaknesses of prior organizational improvement efforts. This paper will be guided by three questions: (1) What are the qualities of current school improvement efforts that have prevented them from achieving broad and sustained success across the system? (2) What is the Networked Improvement Community model and how does it respond to the weaknesses of prior reform efforts? (3) What are the key recommendations for integrating the Networked Improvement Community model into K-12 school improvement efforts

Middle Grades Math: Assessing the Debate Over the When and How of Algebra

Within discussions of K-12 math, the middle grades are framed as a critical period of transition between the foundational concepts presented in elementary math classes and the more abstract upper-level math classes that are traditionally associated with the high school level (i.e. Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, and Calculus). Over the past two decades important debates have occurred among educational researchers, math educators, and education policy makers as to the proper approach to middle grades math policy. At the center of this debate is the question of how and when to integrate algebra into the math course sequence. This focus on algebra has to do with its position as the first of the higher-level math classes, leading many to frame it as a “gatekeeper” course to future academic progress and opportunity (Adelman, 1999; Horn & Nunez, 2000; National Mathematics Advisory Panel, 2008; Spielhagen, 2011)

Cell Phones and Schools: A MERC Research Brief

This MERC research brief explores the following questions: What are examples of district-level cell phone policies? What are the arguments and evidence for and against restrictive cell phone policies? What are the legal issues connected to student cell phone use

Virginia College Access Resource Study: Region One Report

This research brief shares the results of a MERC study commissioned by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV) and supported by Virginia 529 about college access in central Virginia. The purpose of college access providers is discussed as well the current areas of need. A list of access providers in Virginia are listed at the end of the brief

Using Social Emotional Data for School Improvement: A Case Study of Goochland County\u27s Use of the Gallup Student Poll

This case study presents a profile of a school division, Goochland County Public Schools in Virginia, that has not only recognized the value of measuring student social emotional development, but has become a regional leader in the effective use of student social emotional measures for guiding practice as well as broader school improvement processes. The case study, which focuses on Goochland County\u27s use of data from the Gallup Student Poll (GSP) over the past several years, is based on a series of interviews with principals and school leaders conducted during the spring of 2015. The case study includes an overview of the GSP, information about the initiation of the GSP in Goochland county,and then explores how this survey has impacted the county\u27s work with students, how it has supported their 2014-2020 strategic plan, and what future directions they see for use of this data. The purpose of this case study is to share Goochland\u27s story as a way of exploring how social emotional measures can be used in meaningful ways to impact educational processes and ultimately student learning and success

Capturing the Social/Emotional World of Students

The goal of this report is to explore the possibilities using student social emotional measures withing K-12 schools. This will include (1) a discussion of what constitutes a social emotional measure, (2) an overview of commonly used measures, and (3) a discussion of how these measures may inform school improvement processes and promote the success of students at the classroom, school, school system, and community level

Middle Level Learning: Compendium of Research and Best Practice

Young adolescence is a time of important transition. It is a time when youth strive to define themselves as individuals while at the same time establishing their relationship within social groups. It is a developmental period characterized by curiosity and exploration. From a certain perspective, these qualities of young adolescents seem to be a good match for school settings. Schools might offer the social spaces for establishing individual and group identity and the academic space that harnesses curiosity and allows youth to find direction as they move toward high school, college and career. And yet, middle grades education – that is education for students between the ages of 10 and 15 – has consistently emerged within the K-12 educational reform debates as a problem that needs to be solved. Since the early 20th century, the idea has persisted that the structure and the philosophy of schools for young adolescents are grossly mismatched with the needs of youth. Those making the case for the failure of middle grades schools point to declining outcomes in academic achievement and loss of student engagement. This perceived problem has spurred an on-going effort to reform both the philosophy and the design of middle grades education. Junior high schools were originally proposed in the early 20th century to solve problems related to retention of upper grade students in the traditional K-8 schools. The middle school movement of the 1960s and 1970s was a response to the problem of junior high schools that many considered inattentive to the developmental needs of young adolescents. In the late 1990s, a push to return to the K-8 grade configuration emerged as a solution to the problem of the middle school model, which came under attack for their over-emphasis on the socialemotional dimensions of education and lack of attention to academic rigor. In certain ways, this series of solutions offered by the reform community have come full circle, yet the problems and possibilities of middle grades education persists. This paper is designed to serve as a resource for practitioners, administrators, policy makers, and community members from the Richmond-area who are interested in developing a better understanding of the history and core themes of the middle level learning space and grounding their work and decision-making in the national research and literature on best practice for middle level learning

The Idea of the Charter: One Community\u27s Perspectives on the Shifting Nature of Public Education

This study considers the contested meaning of public education through a qualitative investigation of Patrick Henry School of Science and Arts, a charter elementary school in Richmond, Virginia. The central research question that guides this study is “How do parents construct the idea of public schools as they explain their choice of Patrick Henry Charter School?” To answer this question I conducted a constructivist inquiry that involved a series of 16 semi-structured interviews with a maximum variation sample of Patrick Henry parents concerning their ideas about the school and about public education. The analysis of these interviews led to a grounded theory of the parents’ ideas as well as a case report constructed from the categorized units of data that explores the core themes of the theory. This study also addresses two sub-questions: (1) “How do the parents’ ideas about public schools reflect the logics embedded in the larger policy discourses concerning charters and the reinvention of public education?” and (2) “How do the parents’ ideas about public schools reflect the local public discourse around the public-ness of the school?” To answer the first sub-question I use my review of literature to develop an understanding of the reform debates around charter schools and their relationship to the contested ideas of public education. To answer sub question two, I present an adapted constructivist qualitative analysis of the public discourse that surrounded the school from April 2007 – when the idea of the school was first proposed at a school board meeting – until December 2011 – a year and a half after the school opened its doors. To capture the public discourse I collected and analyzed articles, editorials and letters from six local print publications (newspapers, weekly magazines) as well as the public comment portion of the minutes from Richmond School Board meetings. This analysis resulted in the construction of two competing narratives about the school, the juxtaposition of which shed light on the how idea of public-ness was constructed in the public discourse

Contexts of Cultural Diversity Professional Development in Schools

This report is part of a larger MERC study on Professional Development for Success in Culturally Diverse Schools.The goals of the larger study are (1) to understand the landscape of diversity within the schools in the MERC region, (2) to consider the implications for school policy and professional practice, (3) to review the current models of professional development that support teachers and other school professionals in regards to issues of cultural diversity, and (4) to develop and test models of professional development that have positive impacts on teacher practice, student outcomes and overall school success. With these goals in mind, this report contains three parts. Part 1 discusses demographic changes in the MERC region and provides historical, political, social, and economic contexts for understanding these changes. Part 2 describes the federal, state, and local policy contexts relevant to cultural diversity within schools, and professional development (PD) related to this topic. This section also reviews research on how policy contexts shape teachers’ decisions to participate in PD. Part 3 reviews existing studies of cultural diversity PD and describes the types of PD programs currently available in the MERC region. In the conclusion to the report, we present a list of recommendations for policy and and for future development and implementation of PD related to cultural diversity. The final section of the report also describes gaps in the existing body of knowledge and the research needed to better understand PD related to cultural diversity