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The Consolidated Programs Office seeks to support the district goals by improving the quality of instruction, parent involvement and program management.
Specific Goals
All of the district goals are important. Some are more pertitnent to English Learners than others. These are presented here. The full set of district goals can be downloaded below.
Download the complete list of RJUHSD Goals
See Appendix 21 for a list of goals and supportive actions.
The Consolidated Programs Office seeks to support the district goals by improving the quality of instruction, parent involvement and program management, Download the Roseville High Goals
Well defined plans for improving instruction, and goals of improving state testing scores were highly correlated with improved performance on state tests (Williams 2007). It is therefore imperative that the department carefully delineate our improvement plans.
The staff of the Consolidated Programs Office and the ELD/SDAIE teachers recognize that the improving student performance is a multifaceted endeavor. We support the district goals as a magnet program housed at Roseville High School, we support the Roseville High goals.
Our efforts at improving instruction include the following:
In our efforts to improve instruction, the following proposals have been made:
Creating Systems for Student Support
The ELD Department at Roseville High wishes to develop systems of support for the students. The initiative for improvement includes:
Improving Program Management
The English Learner Coordinator is taking steps to improve program management using the following sources:
Data Collection and Analysis
In line with the challenges outlined in chapters 8 and 9, the district will improve its data collection and analysis capabilities in the following ways:
a) Improve the collection of data from the clientele students and families to better assess the students educational background and L1 literacy.b) Improve the database query capabilities to create 1:1 download records of student data. For example, a query of a student's CELDT scores could be downloaded in a way to determine each students year-over-year progress as measured by the CELDT. The current query and database capabilities do not provide this measure.
c) The district will improve its internal and external customer service orientation and delivery to eliminate the perceived bias against English Language Learners. Specifically this includes (1) responding to pertinent emails concerning English Learners, and (2) providing services to students and personnel concerning English Learners regardless of any biological, statutory or perceptually-based classification of students.
Role of Language Aides
The department is actively reviewing and redefining the role of the language aides. The traditional model has been to place the aides in ELD and SDAIE classrooms. We are reviewing the effectiveness of this role, and are taking the following improvement measures:
Communication
The department seeks to improve its communication with other district entities. It proposes a district-wide expectation of responsive two-way communication.
The department also requests the district establish effective upward channels of communication that can be accessed without fear of retribution.
The department welcomes performance reviews, and has established an annual performance review by its clientele and colleagues which seeks realistic feedback and provides for honest, anonymous feedback.
Research
Research literature affirms the importance of training to promote success in administrators, teachers and staff (Howard 2007). Program effectiveness is tied to how well the faculty's professional development needs are aligned to the strategies and goals of the instructional program (Howard 2007).
The staff development initiatives we seek to promote will adhere to the following research-based features:
Features of Effective Professional
Development Professional development is aligned with
goals and strategies of the program, specifically focusing
on Language education
pedagogy and curriculum Materials and
resources Assessment Development of professional
language skills in the partner language Educational equity
(particularly with regard to high expectations for
all students) Dual language theory and
models Second language acquisition and
biliteracy development Staff are encouraged to Examine their own beliefs
and practices in light of theory and the school's
vision and goals Conduct teacher research to
reflect on instructional strengths and
shortcomings and to consider how
strategies work in some contexts but not
others A variety of types of professional
development are provided, including Partnerships with university
teacher training institutions to align
coursework and provide
internships Teacher study groups Retreats to make decisions
about the model or curriculum Training for non-teaching
staff Professional development
collaborations with district middle and high
schools
Mentoring and teacher
trainers
The range of possible targeted outcomes
they identify are: knowledge or awareness of
educational theories and practices, new curricula or
academic content positive attitude changes, for
example towards their own role, different groups of
children and aspects of the curriculum the development of skill, for
example in designing and delivering questions transfer of training and
'executive control' - generating consistent and
appropriate use of the new skills and strategies in
classroom practice. This, the authors stress, is the
critical point at which staff development impacts on
student achievement
The coaching component of staff development can result in up to 95% transfer of new skills into practice (Hord 1994) All staff development supported by the department will be designed in alignment with the research on effective staff development (Hord, 1994).
References
California Department of Education. English Learner Instrument (Including NCLB). 2011. Accessed at www.cde.ca.gov/ta/cr/documents/el201011c.doc on 14 October 2011
Gawande, Atul. The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right. Metropolitan/Holt (2009)
Hord, Shirley M. Staff Development and Change Process: Cut from the Same Cloth. Issues about Change. Volume 4 Number 2. Southwest Educational Development Laboratory (SEDL). http://www.sedl.org/change/issues/issues42.html (accessed January 6, 2010).
Howard, E. R., Sugarman, J., Christian, D., Lindholm-Leary, K. J., & Rogers, D. (2007). Guiding principles for dual language education (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: Center for Applied Linguistics. http://www.cal.org/twi/guidingprinciples.htm (accessed October 21, 2009).