BEYOND THE TALK: TAKING ACTION
to EDUCATE EVERYCHILD NOW
“The San Francisco Unified School District sees the achievement
gap as the greatest social justice/civil rights issue facing our
coun-try today; there cannot be justice for all without closing this gap.”
Carlos A. Garcia
Superintendent, SFUSD
BEYOND THE TALK: TAKING ACTION
to EDUCATE EVERYCHILD NOW
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I.
Introduction ... 5
II. Strategic Plan Summary ... 6
III. Process Overview ... 10
IV. Board of Education Scorecard ... 15
V. Milestones... 27
VI. Glossary ofTerms ... 33
SF BOARD OF EDUCATION
Mark Sanchez, President
Kim-Shree Maufas,Vice President
Jane Kim
Eric Mar, Esq.
Hydra Mendoza
Jill Wynns
NormanYee
SFUSD SUPERINTENDENT
Carlos A. Garcia
SFUSD DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT
FOR INSTRUCTION, INNOVATION AND SOCIAL JUSTICE
Tony Smith
SFUSD DEPUTY SUPERINTENDENT
FOR POLICY AND OPERATIONS
Myong Leigh
Version 1 of the 2008-2012 Strategic Plan was adopted by the SF Board of Education on May 27, 2008. The Strategic Plan is a dynamic document that will be revisited, updated and revised periodically.
SFUSD MISSION
The mission of the San Francisco Unified School District is to provide each student
with an equal opportunity to succeed by promoting intellectual growth, creativity,
self-discipline, cultural and linguistic sensitivity, democratic responsibility, economic
competence, and physical and mental health so that each student can achieve his or
her maximum potential.
SFUSD GOALS
Access and Equity
Make social justice a reality.
Student Achievement
Engage high achieving and joyful learners.I. INTRODUCTION
The mission of the San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD) is to provide each student with an equal opportunity to succeed by promoting intellectual growth, creativity, self-discipline, cultural and linguistic sensitivity, democratic responsibility, economic competence, and physical and mental health so that each student can achieve his or her maximum potential.
As described in our mission, we are committed to helping every student maximize her or his potential while increasing the achievement of already high performing students and dramatically accelerating the achievement of those who are currently less academically successful. The ideas and actions described in this plan are focused on one main idea: every child has the right to be well-educated. Currently, no urban education system in the United States fulfills this fundamental right. The political, emotional, technical and strategic work necessary to create a system of high quality schools that prepare every stu-dent for full and meaningful community participation in our 21st century global world is one of our country’s greatest challenges. In San Francisco, a progressive city that holds itself in high regard as a political and intellectual leader, we exhibit some of the deepest racial, socio-economic and linguistic in-equities in the United States.
For seven consecutive years San Francisco public schools have delivered a greater percentage of stu-dents to academic proficiency levels than any other large urban district in California. At the same time, the district’s achievement gap, the discrepancy between the academic proficiency of students by race, ethnicity, class and language, has continued to widen. For far too long demographics, specifically the socio-economic, linguistic and racial backgrounds of our children, have often closely correlated to their success in school. We refer to this historical trend as
the “predictive power of demographics.”
Closing this unacceptable achievement gap will re-quire significant changes in our capacity to teach culturally and linguistically diverse students effec-tively. These changes demand that we relinquish pretense and embrace the simple truth that we all have to learn how to do this work better: from the Board Room to the classroom. The actions de-scribed in our plan require each one of us in the SFUSD to recognize our strengths, identify our areas of growth, and take full responsibility for di-minishing the predictive power of demographics on academic and social outcomes.
In the process of creating the District Scorecard, our
The ideas and actions
described in this plan
are focused on one
main idea: every child
has the right to be
income and wealth inequality with a consequent increase in disparities in educational outcomes. Almost one fourth of children live in poverty in the United Sates. Without honestly and effectively addressing the need to educate EVERY child well, we will create a permanent underclass in the United States. The effects of persistent racism, classism, and language bias are exacerbated by growing educational in-equalities leading to worsening economic conditions for some families and poorer family health. We know being well-educated makes a real difference in the life chances of our children. Therefore, the SFUSD is committed to working on these root issues as we strive to create an organization that works for all students and families.
There are no immediate or simple solutions to remedy the historic injustices described above. However, by incorporating years of community input, taking an honest look at where we now stand, holding on-going conversations with key partners, and building partnerships to share the work, we believe we have a plan of action that immediately begins to address the root causes of the existing achievement gap. To increase the achievement of ALL groups of students and dramatically accelerate the achievement of targeted groups of students (African-American, English Learner, Latino, Pacific Islander, Samoan, and Special Education students) we are focused on three areas: Access and Equity, Achievement, and Ac-countability.
Access & Equity
We believe access and equity are at the heart of making social justice a reality. The politics and ideol-ogy of social justice are empty without daily actions that improve the living and learning conditions for the children of San Francisco. Do our teachers have a broad range of teaching styles and skills to draw on; are they fully aware of current research on human development; do they know their content deeply; and are they able to know all groups of students, including our target groups (African-American, Eng-lish Learner, Latino, Pacific Islander, Samoan, and Special Education students) while also knowing the unique gifts and talents of the individual? For some the answer is no. Our answer has to be YES, YES, YES, YES! We must create an organization that ensures every student has access to these capable teachers, and we must be an organization that knows and supports teachers. Authentic access and equity will exist when our families, students and teachers report that they are clear about what is expected and have the support they need to meet those expectations.
Achievement
Without a district of highly engaged and joyful learners we will have failed to live our mission. Our picture of achievement is every student graduating ready and fully prepared for college and careers with the skills/capacities required for successful 21st century citizenship. We must create learning environ-ments in our schools, and throughout our city, that foster caring and innovation so that our students are prepared to transform our world, rather than accept the status quo and existing inequities.
Accountability
We believe accountability for the work described in our plan requires personal commitment. We will keep our promises to students and families and enlist everyone in the community to join us in doing so. years of community input and analyzed a wide range of data. In a recent series of community
conversa-tions around the Student Enrollment, Recruitment and Retention Plan (SERR) co-led by SFUSD, the San Francisco Education Fund, Parents for Public Schools, the Parent Advisory Council, and other com-munity leaders, we heard from almost one thousand parents and students from all parts of the city. They told us that quality schools are defined by engaging and challenging material, caring and committed teachers, strong and visible leaders, and instruction modified to meet each child’s needs. They told us that the district needed to share a proactive, clear and long-term plan for how we will ensure that every school is a quality school. We agree.
We invite you to consider this plan, the District Scorecard, and we hope that it reflects your greatest as-pirations. In addition, we are relying on our whole community to stay involved in, bring your assets to, and take leadership for, the work described in this plan. The deep change called for and described in this plan requires our whole community to re-think and learn what authentic partnerships that lead to the aca-demic and social success of every student look like. As called for by a unanimous vote of the School Board on April 22, 2008, with fantastic community support, in Resolution no.82-26A1, “Closing the Achievement Gap in SFUSD,” our District Scorecard is transparent, measurable, and rooted in a deep understanding of where we are and where we must go – THIS IS OUR CALL TO ACTION. From this point forward you will see our progress every step of the way as we strive to keep our promises to stu-dents and families to engage high achieving and joyful learners, and make social justice a reality.
II. STRATEGIC PLAN SUMMARY
Problem Statement – Two Competing Truths
San Francisco has the highest average student performance of the large urban districts in California and the widest gap between the district average and the lowest performing students.
Solution – Addressing the Root Causes
The deep disparities in the daily lives of our students and families in the SFUSD mirror a pattern that has developed in the United States in the last 50 years. The United States has emerged as the industrial-ized society with the greatest
support and manage staff and to ensure the high quality implementation of the site, department and dis-trict level scorecards.
Equity-Centered Professional Learning Initiative
Creating and sustaining professional learning communities is essential to the pursuit of equity in our classrooms, our schools and our district. Board members, staff, students, families and our partners need to ask hard questions, look honestly at inequitable practices and policies, hold ourselves accountable like we would with those we care most about, and embrace the uncertainties and tensions inevitably in-volved in equity-centered change. This initiative will increase equity-centered conditions and structures within SFUSD so that we can deliberately and explicitly challenge all forms of inequity, learn from each other, and celebrate our accomplishments.
21st Century Curriculum Initiative
From straight-A students to students who are pushed out of the education system, what we’re teaching is not keeping pace with our kids' aspirations. We are educating children to a world that doesn’t exist any-more. Learning a second or third language is required in other countries like China, where students often begin language study in elementary school. Will all of our students be prepared to address the deepest social and political issues facing our country if we don’t change what we are teaching our schools? Will all of our students be prepared to work with people from other countries or to open businesses abroad? San Francisco and the American public recognize the urgency to move our education system into the 21st century. We must better prepare all of our students to succeed in and shape an increasingly compet-itive world, one already divided by socio-economics, language, and race. Our district cannot accomplish this work with a 20th century education model that uses a one-size-fits-all approach to learning, offers a diluted and narrow curriculum, and tests students using limited assessment systems like those found under No Child Left Behind.
The Board and staff of the SFUSD promise to create the adequate conditions for every student to reach her or his potential in each school and district-wide. In the words of Superintendent Carlos Garcia, “We will do whatever it takes to ensure that we have adequate funding and support for every student to meet the high expectations we’ve described in our plan.” To foster the accountability we’re calling for in this plan, district staff and community will need to work closely together to describe what those “high expec-tations” are in every part of SFUSD.
In an age of testing, measuring, and mandating, San Francisco Unified School District is calling for rela-tional accountability. While we will continue to lead the country in our use and development of thought-ful metrics, we are equally committed to developing new relationships that put students, families and community at the center and ask us to keep pretense, personal agendas and egos to the side. We are striving for the genuine accountability you feel when you promise someone you love, or care deeply about, that you will do something that is important to her or him.
Implementation - Everyone taking initiative
To begin the mammoth undertaking of school, district, and community transformation we have three dis-crete initiatives to organize our efforts. We know we need to increase the personal and professional ca-pacity of every employee in SFUSD. We believe all our work must be equity-centered. And we are determined to transform our curriculum in order to truly prepare our students for today and tomorrow.
Performance Management Initiative
Building on the idea that everyone, from students to the superintendent, must have sufficient resources, information, and support to have efficacy in their endeavors, SFUSD is designing and implementing a comprehensive system of performance management. We believe this system is necessary to create the culture of leadership for equity in support of the objectives described in our District Scorecard. The per-formance management initiative will focus our conversations on District Scorecard data – so that all staff know and understand their role in supporting student achievement, are provided the support and professional development required for success in their roles, and have voice and power in adjusting the
Academic Performance Index (2006) by subgroups in California’s largest urban districts. Color codes highlight highest and second-highest performing subgroups and lowest and second-lowest performing subgroups.
for creating new, and improving existing, sec-ondary schools:
• Personalization. Schools need to create learning communities in which students are known
by all adults.
• Academic Rigor. All students need access to a rigorous academic curriculum and high quality instruction, based on content and per-formance standards.
• Opportunities to Apply Learning. All stu-dents need to have learning in context and to have academic learning linked with prepara-tion for post-secondary educaprepara-tion and for a high-skill economy.
• Access to Powerful Teaching. Schools must create environments that allow well-prepared teachers to continually reflect on and im-prove their practice.
The SSRI sought to create schools characterized by these elements of success, in order to meet five goals:
• Increase choices for families and provide effective schools where students need them • Improve student achievement: raise the bar and close the gap
• Increase student engagement
• Increase community and stakeholder support • Transform central office to be a service center
We are continuing these efforts and building on this strong foundation with our District Scorecard. In March of 2006, during interim superintendent Gwen Chan’s tenure, the Board of Education called for a new long range planning process called the Student Enrollment Recruitment and Retention (SERR) Initiative to support closing the achievement gap, provide all students equitable access to high-quality education in integrated learning environments, and sustain and build student enrollment to strengthen the district’s fiscal condition.
The district, in partnership with the San Francisco Education Fund, the Parent Advisory Committee to the Board of Education and Parents for Public Schools, led a community engagement initiative to un-derstand the values, hopes and goals of the San Francisco community in relation to public schools. SFUSD believes a 21st century education should build on a foundation of personalized, relevant
learn-ing that is meanlearn-ingful and engaglearn-ing for each student. We know our students must learn from and collab-orate with diverse peers of different races, religions and origins. For truly socially conscious and
globally competitive students, we must also embed 21st century learning, such as technological literacy and critical and creative thinking skills, in all the subjects that compose this broader, more rigorous cur-riculum.
III. PROCESS OVERVIEW
Community Input & Key Data that informed this plan
The goals and objectives of “Beyond the Talk” build on a seven-year legacy of strong planning that re-sulted in steady academic performance growth for all groups of students. Former superintendent Arlene Ackerman instituted the five year “Excellence for All” plan in 2000, which made important improve-ments to the ways that school site budgets were developed, using Weighted Student Formula site-based budgeting. “Excellence for All” also spearheaded the creation of the Dream and STAR schools initia-tives for closing the achievement gap at low-performing schools. These initiainitia-tives yielded improved ac-ademic performance in the aggregate though seldom at the rate of acceleration needed to raise overall performance and close the wide gap in achievement.
Also during this time, the district began a Secondary School Redesign Initiative (SSRI). In 2001, the District convened task forces to address the fact that San Francisco’s middle schools and high schools fail to adequately serve a large proportion of our students. Identifying significant concerns with
achievement, attendance, dropout rates, graduation rates, college going rates and other indicators of stu-dent success, these broad-based task forces developed research-based guiding principles for change and articulated four key elements of success for secondary students.
The four key elements that grew out of the Secondary School Redesign Initiative established the basis
10 BEYONDTHETALK:TAKING ACTION to EDUCATE EVERY CHILD NOW BEYONDTHETALK:TAKING ACTION to EDUCATE EVERY CHILD NOW 11
From this point forward you will
see our progress every step of the
way as we strive to keep our
promises to students and families
to engage high achieving and
joyful learners, and make social
justice a reality.
has the same measures as the BOE Scorecard plus additional measures that will serve as a day to day guide.
These two scorecards are just the first step. The most important scorecards are at the school site level. The School Site Scorecards are where each school community will describe their goals, objectives and initiatives. Over the next year, the district will work with staff, students, families and community to cre-ate shared understanding of our efforts and to develop the systems necessary to support each school community. This work is at the heart of the central office becoming a true service organization.
The School Quality, Equity and Access Matrix – how does it work, why have one, and what will it tell us?
Across the nation and especially in San Francisco, there is a trend for some groups of students to per-form better on standardized tests and to graduate from high school more prepared to pursue college and careers of choice than other groups of students. The San Francisco Unified School District believes our success should be determined by our ability to increase the current achievement of all groups of students and to dramatically accelerate the achievement of targeted groups of students who are currently less aca-demically successful.
Therefore, with the implementation of our strategic plan, we will measure school quality, and overall district performance, in a new way: how well each school serves each and every student based on that school’s ability to disrupt the historically predictive power of racial, ethnic, linguistic and socio-eco-nomic student attributes.
The School Quality, Equity and Access Matrix provides a simple visual model of complex data to assist families, school sites and district policy-makers in exploring important differences among the district’s schools. The matrix reveals trends and practices worth celebrating and will direct intervention with greater accuracy on behalf of its lowest performers. The more precisely an intervention addresses a school’s individual needs and builds on its strengths, the more effectively available resources are uti-lized and the greater the chances of creating sustained improvement in student outcomes.
To date, the assessment of student performance is anchored in the absolute performance of schools and districts on the California STAR tests, known as the Academic Performance Index (API). While setting and monitoring the state’s standards and goals, the API offers only limited intelligence on how to reach higher performance levels through targeted interventions and supports.
A second dimension of school performance is measured through the School Quality, Equity and Access Matrix – relative peer-to-peer performance –and provides a much needed complementary perspective. This dimension is captured by benchmark analytics that adjust statistically for each school’s demo-graphic context and other starting conditions. In doing so, benchmarks level the playing field for mean-ingful school-to-school comparisons.
These conversations about public schools happened in a different way than most previous community input sessions; they took place in small intimate groups of 8 to 15 people in every corner of the city with racially and linguistically diverse participants reflective of both the diversity of our schools and our city. The input of the 900 parents, students and community members who took part in the SERR community conversations has also been an important foundation for the development of “Beyond the Talk.”
In August 2007, at the beginning of Superintendent Carlos Garcia’s tenure, the superintendent and Board of Education convened to set shared priorities for the district. At these retreats the Board and superin-tendent unanimously agreed that student achievement, and specifically, closing the achievement gap while continuing to elevate the performance of all students, was the most important focus for the district for the next five years.
Community recommendations gathered over the last seven years, current district metrics on student achievement and retention, and the bold vision of the current Board of Education have all played an im-portant role in shaping the goals, objectives and initiatives of the District Scorecard.
The Balanced Scorecard (cascading, specific, measurable, assigned to goal owners)
When the district set out to create the framework that will guide our future work over the next five years, we chose a different strategy than was used in the past. We wanted to ensure that we didn’t create a plan that was only read once and then placed on a shelf to collect dust. We wanted a plan that was visionary enough that we could stay focused on our goals over the long haul while still having enough flexibility to incorporate ongoing feedback.
“The Balanced Scorecard,” is a strategic management system that translates vision into specific metrics developed by Robert Norton and David Kaplan (1996). In order to create and sustain a district of high quality schools we needed a plan to guide our strategic investment in our people, our systems and our procedures. Our aspiration is to develop the self-sufficiency and optimism in SFUSD that will ensure that we continue to meet new challenges as our schools and our city change and grow. We wanted to de-velop a clear plan that uses multiple measures of our progress that is easily updated and accessible to the whole community.
Finally, and most importantly, we wanted a plan that would hold each and every individual in our schools and community accountable for creating the best outcomes for children. That is why we chose the Balanced Scorecard, a framework for translating strategy into action. The district is in the first phase of a multi-year effort to create new systems centered on Access and Equity, Achievement, and Accounta-bility, the three primary goals of this plan. Within the year, each district stakeholder group, from the Board of Education to individual school sites, will have a scorecard. We are calling this the cascading process; every part of the organization creating a scorecard that describes its share of the work to achieve our desired outcomes. The Board of Education Scorecard (BSC 1) is the compass for the dis-trict; it sets the overall direction. The District Scorecard (BSC 2) is the map for district administrators; it
BEYONDTHETALK:TAKING ACTION to EDUCATE EVERY CHILD NOW 15
Truly meaningful school-to-school comparisons distinguish those low performers that have least managed to disrupt the historically predictive power of socio-economic student attributes – and, on the upside, to pinpoint even among low performers the emerging lighthouses that are beating the district trend by a wide margin. The matrix illustrates two dimensions of absolute performance and relative benchmarks. Each data point in this chart represents a SFUSD school. The top-to-bottom benchmark gaps represent the school’s performance on California Standards Tests (CSTs). The left-to-right benchmark gaps represent the degree to which a school has man-aged to positively disrupt the predictive power of its starting conditions.
Imagine being able to “play a movie,” in which progress can be measured over time, from dis-trict-wide performance, right down to individual schools. Trends will become more visible, and practices that are having a positive effect will be-come more evident. As we learn what’s working well we’ll share it broadly with our whole com-munity.
That is what we at SFUSD intend to do: shed light on and multiply the best practices in our midst – the schools that are beating the odds for every student regardless of race, ethnicity, eco-nomic status, disability, English language status, parental education, migrant status or gender.
14 BEYONDTHETALK:TAKING ACTION to EDUCATE EVERY CHILD NOW
IV. BOARD OF EDUCATION SCORECARD
The Board of Education Scorecard (BSC 1) is the compass for the district, it sets the overall direction. The BSC 1 has been approved and adopted by the Board of Education and will guide the develop-ment of district level, departdevelop-ment and school site scorecards.
Benchmark Gap -20 -10 0 10 20 CS T (% Co rre ct An sw er s) 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 10 0 School B: SFUSD Challenge Free/Reduced: 80% EL Learner: 23% School A: SFUSD Lighthouse Free/Reduced: 81% EL Learner: 25%
SFUSD Matrix: Shown are all SFUSD Ele-mentary Schools in a preliminary illustra-tion. The top-to-bottom scale represents the schools’ performance on California State standards tests at a given grade level. The left-to-right benchmark gaps represent the degree to which a school has managed to positively disrupt the pre-dictive power of the demographic vari-ables that are monitored in the School Quality, Equity and Access Matrix. High-lighted is the performance of two schools with similar proportions of English Learn-ers and students with Free or Reduced Lunch – two highly predictive variables – but with drastically different relative as well as absolute outcomes.
BEYONDTHETALK:TAKING ACTION to EDUCATE EVERY CHILD NOW 27
V. Strategic Plan Milestones
One, three, and five year work targets are essential components to any high quality strategic plan. It is imperative that we both know where we’re going and how we will get there. Through doing the work described here, we will create the public schools that all San Francisco’s children, families, and communities deserve.
Central Office Milestones for Years One, Three and Five YEAR ONE
Publish working draft of Strategic Plan & working draft of BSC 2 and glossary. Finalize School Quality, Equity, and Access Matrix.
Host one-to-ones with BOE members and Union leadership (preview implications for bargaining) about Strategic Plan and Matrix.
Host key “Allies” (City, CBO, Community groups) to review and discuss the Strategic Plan draft. Use feedback from the BOE and other key stakeholders to prepare final Strategic Plan for
Board Adoption.
Work with departmental and cross-departmental teams to identify challenges and opportunities in collec-tive bargaining agreements.
Create targeted Professional Development on creating a School Site Scorecard tied to BSC 1 for school site leaders that models an authentic learning and creating process (principal, teacher leaders, union building reps, family reps, student).
Produce and publish employee and community information about the Matrix and the strategic plan (web-site, print, etc.).
Translate board approved strategic plan documents.
Develop the technology platform required to support the new data and communication standard de-scribed in the BSC.
Develop the student and staff information system to analyze impact of BSC on students and schools; allow for correlations between student achievement and staff action.
Develop Professional Development for central office staff that fosters the skills, dispositions and knowl-edge required to use the Matrix.
Develop Interest-Based bargaining Professional Development for central office staff.
Convene core site leadership group to design differentiated Professional Development for administrators and sites for ’08 –’09 school year.
Begin Central Office Professional Development using the Matrix and BSC 2 to guide departmental and cross-departmental work.
Conduct Administrators’ Professional Development: Leadership for Equity, Creating School Site Scorecards.
Seek Foundation support to strengthen and support the SFUSD strategic plan. Create a partnership review Matrix and MOU process based on the BSC. Draft School Site Scorecard tuning and support meetings.
Design and implement staff evaluation protocols aligned to BSC.
Develop employee induction to orient them to the BSC and to provide support during their first two years as employees.
Initiate a process for aligning all existing and new master plans to the BSC.
V. Strategic Plan Milestones
Board of Education Milestones for Years One, Three and Five YEAR ONE
Adopt an equity-centered Strategic Plan to provide direction and strategic leadership.
Provide clear and unified message to full district and community that the BSC is the foundation for all SFUSD work.
Begin using the BSC as a decision making and agenda creation tool; planning sessions to create shared meaning and processes for BSC.
Align policies and practices to strategic goals.
Create a set of guiding agreements for the Board that ensures a safe, affirming and enriched environment for each Board member.
Induct new Board members using the BSC.
Conduct Board Retreat to review and refine implementation. Evaluate the Superintendent using the BSC.
Direct the superintendent to base staff evaluations on the BSC.
Base end of the year evaluation on percentage of Board agenda items and time spent directly related to BSC 1.
YEAR THREE
Review annually the percentage of BSC 1 targets met and use as the foundation for Board Retreat. Create year-long course of action, review and study based on the BSC.
YEAR FIVE
Assess board effectiveness and leadership locally and nationally based on pursuit of BSC goals, objec-tives and measures.
School Site Milestones for Years One, Three and Five YEAR ONE
Review outline of a plan to create a School Site Scorecard & convene school groups to draft site plan to create Scorecard.
Hold school-wide Professional Development and discussion on creating a School Site Scorecard. Create, develop and review draft of School Site Scorecard, then a complete Scorecard.
Develop school-wide assessment tool to measure progress based on measures identified in the School Site Scorecard.
Assess school-wide progress based on measures named in the School Site Scorecard. Develop final draft of School Site Scorecard tuning and support.
YEAR THREE
Utilize School Site Scorecards as the primary tool for new staff induction, leadership team work, profes-sional development, school site council and student leadership groups.
Report data in measures that are widely known and deeply understood in each school community.
YEAR FIVE
Identify and share practices that are getting positive results.
Post, discuss and use Matrix performance trends to guide growth plans at each school site.
YEAR THREE
Make available fully cascaded Balanced Scorecards that are accessible and well-understood by SFUSD and SF community.
Ensure that school site Scorecards demonstrate significant increases overall and dramatic acceleration of sub-groups in academic performance.
Ensure that the SFUSD School Quality, Equity and Access Matrix shows a significant positive trend in positive school effect.
Embed BSC and District Matrix in SFUSD communications (regular updates on the web, in publications etc.).
Design EPC to balance choice with the Matrix and BSC framework for student assignment (a predictable system with high quality choices for everyone).
Integrate the information and assessment system (technology and research) into decision making at all levels of the organization.
Use the District Matrix internally and externally to determine progress and to organize site-based needs & support.
Design central office based on community feedback in order to best serve students, families and schools. Ensure that SFUSD curriculum has a new framework and a two year plan for total conversion.
Ensure that all district partners operate with clear agreements and performance metrics connected di-rectly to the BSC.
Align resources (money, people and materials) to support the work described in the BSC.
Create demonstration sites, Professional Development sites and shared materials through use of the Ma-trix – standards for use of successful sites/classrooms.
Ensure that SFUSD has a network of high functioning, well-integrated community schools that are con-sidered community assets and anchors of positive civic development.
YEAR FIVE
Ensure that SFUSD is recognized as a leading district in closing the achievement gap and preparing stu-dents for success in the 21st century.
Produce five year evaluation of the Performance Management, Equity Centered Professional Learning and the 21st Century Curriculum Initiatives.
Prepare updates and expansions of BSC 1 for School Board review. Adopt five year strategic plan.
Ensure that the San Francisco community feels that SFUSD is transparent and accountable.
Central Office Milestones for Years One, Three and Five (con’t)
VI. Glossary ofTerms
The District Scorecard is a school district tool to assist in our re-design efforts. The contents were developed by education profes-sionals in partnership with community stakeholders. Some of the language in the plan is specific to education and may be difficult for people who have not studied or worked in the field of education to understand. This glossary attempts to define some of the terms con-tained in this document to make the work more accessible to the whole community.
City and Community Milestones for Years One, Three and Five YEAR ONE
Work with SFUSD to use the BSC to review planned work and assess degree of shared purpose and work.
Describe the support parents, families, community groups need to participate in “Beyond the Talk.” Name specific areas of concern and action.
Orient school site participation and work around the creation of a School Site Scorecard. Discuss schools as community assets in community meetings.
Meet with the Mayor and department heads re: BSC and Matrix.
Review citywide efforts to serve youth and families using the BSC as a filter. Encourage public conversation on education: “It Takes a City.”
Share in the responsibility of drop out prevention.
YEAR THREE
Ensure full service community schools are neighborhood and community anchors for positive civic engagement.
YEAR FIVE
Ensure community based organizations use a Balanced Scorecard approach to assess their effectiveness.
Advancement Via Individual Determination (AVID)
An in-school academic support program for grades 4-12 that prepares students for college eligibility and success.
Balanced Scorecard (BSC)
The balanced scorecard (BSC) is a strategic planning and management system used to align business ac-tivities to the vision and strategy of the organization, improve internal and external communications, and monitor organizational performance against strategic goals.
Baseline Data
Baseline data is basic information gathered before a program begins. It’s our starting point. We use this data as a comparison for assessing the impact of a program over time.
Baseline Technology Standards
The technology infrastructure and support needed to support learning and decision-making in SFUSD schools. This includes, but is not limited to, standards for high-speed network connectivity, adequate bandwidth, network hardware, servers, computers, software, peripheral tools, training, and technical support. The baseline technology standards are defined in the current Education Technology Master Plan and will be updated in the December 2008 Technology Master Plan.
Basic
Referring to an achievement level on the California Standards Tests, BASIC refers to the middle level, below PROFICIENT and above BELOW BASIC.
Below Basic
Referring to an achievement level on the California Standards Tests, BELOW BASIC is the second low-est level, above FAR BELOW BASIC and below BASIC.
A-G Course Requirements
These are the courses that students must pass in order to be eligible for admittance to any of the Univer-sity of California campuses or any of the California State Universities:
a. History/Social Science – 2 years b. English – 4 years
c. Mathematics – 3 years d. Laboratory Science – 2 years e. World Languages – 2 years
f. Visual and Performing Arts – 1 year g. Other College Preparatory – 1 year
Advanced Placement (AP)
The Advanced Placement (AP) program offers college-level courses in high school. The courses are de-signed to prepare students for annual AP Exams. Through AP Exams, students have the opportunity to earn credit or advanced standing at most of the nation's colleges and universities.
Many high schools in the United States offer AP courses, but any student is allowed to take the exami-nation without participating in an AP course. Home-schooled students and students from schools that do not offer AP courses have an equal opportunity to take the examination.
The AP program is run by the College Board, a non-profit organization that develops and maintains 37 college-level courses and exams across 22 subject areas. The College Board supports teachers of AP courses, supports universities as they define their policies regarding AP grades, and develops and coor-dinates the administration of annual AP examinations.
AP tests are scored differently from the A-F grading scale common in the United States. They are scored on a numeric scale, 1 to 5, with a score of 3 considered passing and the following general meanings: • 5: Extremely well-qualified
• 4: Well-qualified • 3: Qualified
• 2: Possibly qualified • 1: No recommendation
These scores are graded on a curve; students are scored relative to other test-takers rather than on a set standard. These scorings are used by some colleges to exempt students from introductory coursework. Each college's policy is different, but most accept scores of 4 or 5, and some accept scores of 3.
Colleges and universities vary in their approach to indicating AP credit on college transcripts. AP activi-ties are funded through fees charged to students taking AP Exams. As of the 2008 testing season, exams cost $84 each, though the cost may be subsidized by local or state programs.
environment that allows the students to establish different perspectives that relate back to their own world views.
Communities of Practice (CoP)
A community of practice is a group of individuals participating in communal activity, and experienc-ing/continuously creating their shared identity through engaging in and contributing to the practices of their communities. The concept of the community of practice comes from the understanding that learn-ing can be conceptualized as social participation – the individual as an active participant in the practices of social communities, and in the construction of his/her identity through these communities.
Community-Based Organization (CBO)
An organization operated by a non-profit agency, community coalition, local city, or other public organi-zation which has as its mission services to people within the community.
Community Service
A service that a person performs for the benefit of his or her local community, usually without compen-sation.
Core Curriculum
In education, a core curriculum is a curriculum, or course of study, which is deemed central and usually made mandatory for all students of a school or school system. Core curricula are often instituted, at the primary and secondary levels, by school boards, Departments of Education, or other administrative agencies charged with overseeing education. In California, core curriculum includes language arts, mathematics, science, history/social science, visual and performing arts, and world languages.
Benchmark
A standard used for comparison.
California English Language Development Test (CELDT)
This test is California’s formal assessment of a student’s proficiency of English status across several do-mains. The performance of English Learners on this test determines a district’s status in meeting lan-guage proficiency targets for its students.
California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE)
The CAHSEE is a test created by the California Department of Education. All California high school students are required to pass the exam in order graduate. The exam tests students in the areas of read-ing, writread-ing, and mathematics.
California Standards Tests (CSTs)
The state of California has adopted academic standards which describe what students should know and be able to do in each grade and subject. CSTs measure how much progress a student is making towards those standards. Results of these tests are used to determine if a school/district has met state and federal accountability requirements.
Career Pathways
A coherent sequence of rigorous academic and technical courses that prepare students for successful completion of state academic standards, while supporting their transition to more advanced post second-ary coursework related to a career area of interest
Caring and Supportive Relationships
Fostering caring and supportive relationships in school is a way of relating to youth, their families, and each other that conveys compassion, understanding, respect and interest. It includes seeing possibilities in each child and using one’s wisdom of the heart. Truly listening to a youth’s story is a powerful signal that an adult believes and accepts and cares about the youth. Creating a school wide climate of caring means staff, too, must have collegial support networks. One of the most critical factors of fostering a positive school culture is the approach and tone of the teacher. Students who believe their teachers care about them perform better academically.
Cognitive Engagement
Students are cognitively engaged when they give sustained, engaged attention to a task requiring mental effort. The highest form of cognitive engagement is self-regulated learning (Corno & Mandinach, 1983), where learners plan and manage their own learning and have a high degree of personal control and autonomy. A learner’s cognitive engagement and her or his motivation are inextricably linked to-gether. The amount of cognitive effort expended by the learner is an appropriate measure of her or his motivation as it relies on the learner focusing on mastering the learning task and maintaining a high
SFUSD has six Dream Schools: Dr. Charles R. Drew Elementary (Pre-K to 3), Willie Brown Academy (grades 4-8), Sanchez Elementary, Everett Middle School, John O’Connell High School of Technology and Paul Revere K-8. In addition, Thurgood Marshall High School offers a Dream Academy for 9-10th graders.
Dropout
Various ways of calculating the dropout rate reveal different ways of thinking about the issue. Event rate indicates the number of students who leave high school each year and is compared with previous years. Status rate, a cumulative rate much higher than the event rate, denotes the proportion of all individuals in the population who have not completed high school and were not enrolled at a given point in time. Cohort rate describes the number of dropouts from a single age group or specific grade (or cohort) of students over a period of time. The high school completion rate indicates the percentage of all persons ages 21 and 22 who have completed high school by receiving a high school diploma or equivalency certificate.
The following factors lead to unreliable aggregated national dropout figures: • different definitions of dropouts
• different time periods during the school year when dropout data are collected • different data collection methods
• different ways of tracking youth no longer in school different methods used by school districts and states to calculate the dropout rate, result in unreliable aggregated national dropout figures
Effort Optimism
Effort optimism refers to how strongly a student believes that hard work/effort in school will pay off with academic/school success. A strong conviction generally results in greater success, and can become a self-fulfilling prophecy, reinforcing that belief. When the conviction is weak or nonexistent, generally students experience less success, and this reinforces the belief that effort doesn’t matter.
English Learners
English Learners are students who are speakers of another language and are in the process of learning English. The goal of SFUSD is for English Learners to learn both English and their home language to high levels, to meet grade level content standards for promotion, graduation, and college entrance, and to develop the skills, competencies, and dispositions necessary for suc-cess in the 21st century.
Equity-Centered Professional Development
Professional development that incorporates social justice issues in teaching and education, in-cluding attention to fairness and equity with regard to gender, race, class, disability, sexual orien-tation, etc.
Culturally & Linguistically Responsive
A culturally and linguistically responsive classroom is one that recognizes the impact students’ home language and culture has on their education and, thus, provides a culturally and linguistically supported learning environment to enable all students to succeed. Culturally and linguistically responsive teaching is student-centered: the strengths students bring to school are identified, nurtured, and utilized to pro-mote student achievement.
Culturally and linguistically responsive pedagogy comprises three dimensions: (a) institutional, (b) per-sonal, and (c) instructional. The institutional dimension reflects the administration and its policies and values. The personal dimension refers to the cognitive and emotional processes teachers must engage in to become culturally and linguistically responsive. The instructional dimension includes materials, strategies, and activities that form the basis of instruction. All three dimensions significantly interact in the teaching and learning process and are critical to understanding the effectiveness of culturally and linguistically responsive pedagogy.
Desegregation
In the desegregation of the district, San Francisco was ordered by a federal court to eliminate racial and ethnic identifiability in schools, programs, and classrooms. The goal was to prevent, reduce, or elimi-nate racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic segregation of students and to promote academic achievement and educational opportunity for all students.
Digital Divide
The term digital divide refers to the gap between those people with effective access to digital and infor-mation technology and those without access to it. It includes the imbalances in physical access to tech-nology as well as the imbalances in resources and skills needed to effectively participate as a digital citizen.
Digital Resources
Digital resources include books and other materials available in digital formats (as opposed to print, mi-croform, or other media) and accessible by computers. The digital content may be stored locally, or ac-cessed remotely via computer networks. A digital library is a type of information retrieval system.
DREAM Schools
Dream Schools, initiated under the SFUSD Improvement Plan Excellence for All, include a vision of student success and opportunity that focus on college connections, academic achievement, engaging in-structional models, student support system, varied learning experiences and parents empowerment. The program includes a longer instructional day for students and other targeted resources, including those described in the STAR Initiative, with expanded library, visual and performing arts, and student support staff (a nurse and learning support professional).
Leadership Development
Traditionally, leadership development has focused on devel-oping the leadership abilities and attitudes of a small group of individuals. SFUSD intends to develop staff, student, and par-ent/community leadership that is sufficiently broad and deep both to successfully respond to the complex challenges and opportunities of the 21st century.
Level
With relation to the California Standards Tests, level is used to denote a student’s performance. There are five levels: Far Below Basic, Below Basic, Basic, Proficient, and Advanced.
Lived Experiences
Lived experience refers to what an individual, group, or community experiences for itself, rather than a reality that may be determined by those outside of that individual, group, or community. It involves not only the actual experiences themselves, but the meaning that the individual, group, or community makes of those experiences or realities.
Measure
The quantity, size, weight, distance or capacity of a substance compared to designated standard
Parent Conferences
In SFUSD, teachers meet with parents at least two times a year, teachers to discuss their child’s
progress. These parent conferences often prove a valuable strategy for improving student classroom be-havior as well as enhancing learning.
Parent Engagement
Parent engagement requires two-way communication between school and home. Specifically, schools can clearly articulate their expectations of parents and regularly communicate with parents about what children are learning, suggesting what parents can do to help. School-home compacts, reading school-home links, and explicit school-homework policies are examples of communication about expectations and support for children’s learning. Schools can also provide opportunities for parents to talk with school personnel about parents’ role in their children’s education through home visits, family nights, and well-planned parent-teacher conferences and open houses. Schools can provide parent education based on the role of parents in helping their children meet state learning standards. An ongoing conversation between parents and teachers about the role of each in children’s learning is key to building the relationship and understanding that enhances school performance. Finally, schools can engage parents and families in de-cision-making and leadership development, helping them develop the skills they need to be powerful advocates their children.
Gifted & Talented Education
The mission of Gifted and Talented Education Programs is to provide challenging and engaging learning experiences and opportunities for growth that enable children with high potential, talent, and excep-tional capacity to develop to their potential. In SFUSD, we believe that every student possesses visible and invisible talents, and we see our role as supporting the full development of those talents.
Grade Level Standards
A criterion is set up for standards of what every student or child is expected to know, and a score is com-pared to these benchmarks rather than a ranking comcom-pared to a norm. It is fully expected that every child will become proficient in all areas of academic skills by the end of a period, typically 10 years but sometimes longer, after the passing of education reform bill by a state legislature. The federal govern-ment, under No Child Left Behind can further require that all schools must demonstrate improvement among all students, even if they are already all over proficient.
Graphic Resources
Graphic resources include photos, illustrations, clipart, images, icons, maps, charts, tables, and other vi-sual resources.
High and Equitable Student Achievement
High and equitable student achievement requires dramatically improved educational experiences, out-comes, and life options for students and families who have been historically underserved by their schools and districts. It involves providing students that chance to succeed, either by having more quali-fied teachers or smaller classes, or both.
Identity Investment
A student’s sense of self-identity is greatly shaped by her or his school environment. She or he is much more likely to be engaged in school when that environment reinforces a positive self-image.
Societal power relations influence the ways in which educators define their roles (teacher identity) and the structures of schooling (curriculum, funding, assessment, etc.) which, in turn, influence the ways in which educators interact with linguistically- and culturally-diverse students. These interactions form an interpersonal space within which learning happens and identities are negotiated. These identity negotia-tions either reinforce coercive relanegotia-tions of power or promote collaborative relanegotia-tions of power. To the ex-tent that students are able to take ownership of school/community artifacts as a result of having invested their identities in them, they will be more or less engaged in those schools and communities. These arti-facts (written, spoken, visual, musical or combinations in multimodal form) hold a mirror up to the stu-dent in which his or her istu-dentity is reflected back in a positive light. These artifacts then become
ambassadors of students’ identities. When students share these artifacts with multiple audiences (peers, teachers, parents, grandparents, sister classes, the media, etc.) they are likely to receive positive feed-back and affirmation of self in interaction with these audiences.
Post-Secondary Education and Training
Post-secondary education includes many kinds of education and training programs, technical college de-gree and certification programs, apprenticeship experience, two and four year colleges, private trade schools, and on-the-job training.
Predictive Power
The predictive power of a theory refers to its ability to generate testable predictions. In SFUSD, we talk about the predictive power of demographics to explain the achievement gap that currently exists be-tween groups of students, based on race/ethnicity, language, and class.
Preliminary SAT
The Preliminary SAT Test measures the skills of students which have developed over the course of their education. These include:
• Critical reading skills • Math problem-solving skills • Writing skills
Print Resources
Print resources include books, magazines, journals, newspapers, posters, signs, and other environmental print.
Professional Development
Professional development focuses on the skills, capacities, and dispositions required for maintaining or improving staff’s ability to deliver, or support the delivery of, powerful teaching and learning. It can be seen as training to keep current with changing technology and practices in a profession or in the concept of lifelong learning. In SFUSD, developing and implementing a program of professional development is often a function shared by the Human Resources and the Academics and Professional Development Di-visions.
Professional Efficacy
Efficacy is the belief in one's capabilities to organize and execute the courses of action required to pro-duce given attainments. Efficacy plays a central role in motivation because people expend effort based on the effects they are expecting from their actions.
For example, people will be more inclined to take on a task if they believe they can succeed. What’s more, people with high self-efficacy in a task are more likely to expend more effort, and persist longer, than those with low efficacy. Low efficacy can lead people to believe tasks are harder than they actually are. This often results in poor task planning, as well as increased stress. People with high efficacy often take a wider picture of a task in order to take the best route of action. Efficacy also affects how people respond to failure. A person with a high efficacy will attribute the failure to external factors, where a person with low efficacy will attribute failure to low ability.
Participatory & Inclusive Learning
Schools have responsibilities to design and implement learning experiences where all students are full mem-bers of the school community and are entitled to the opportunities and responsibilities that are available to all students in the school, and that acknowledge and value difference, and enable students to demonstrate personal, group, and community responsibility. In these types of learning environments, students are actively engaged in the learning process. At times, that engagement is with themselves as part of reflection, with their peers, or with the teacher. Participatory learning involves higher order thinking, application, evaluation, synthesis, and creation. Essential skills of participatory and inclusive learning include inquiry, reflection, meta-thinking, facilitation, communi-cation, and coaching.
When participatory environments are also inclusive, diverse students are provided with instruction spe-cially designed to meet their strengths, needs, and interests.
Performance Assessments
Performance assessment is a measure of assessment based on authentic tasks such as activities, exer-cises, or problems that require students to show what they can do. Some performance tasks are designed to have students demonstrate their understanding by applying their knowledge to a particular situation.
Performance Management System
Performance management is a systematic process by which an agency involves its employees in improv-ing organizational effectiveness in the accomplishment of the Agency's mission and strategic goals. The performance management process is used to communicate organizational goals and objectives, rein-force individual accountability for meeting those goals, and track and evaluate individual and organiza-tional performance results. It reflects a partnership in which managers share responsibility for
developing their employees in such a way that enables employees to make contributions to the organiza-tion. It is a clearly defined process for managing people that will result in success for both the individual and the organization. SFUSD will be developing a Performance Management System as part of its strategic plan.
Personal Efficacy
Efficacy is the power to achieve a desired goal. Students with personal efficacy know that they have the individual agency to control what is learned based on a belief in their abilities to apply effort and
achieve a goal. Teachers with personal efficacy know that they as individuals control what students learn and achieve based on a belief in their abilities to successfully teach all students.
that all groups of students reach proficiency within 12 years. Assessment results are disaggregated by so-cioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, disability, and limited English proficiency to ensure that no group is left behind. Local educational agencies (LEAs) and schools that fail to make adequate yearly progress (AYP) toward statewide proficiency goals are subject to improvement and corrective action measures. In California, Program Improvement (PI) is the formal designation for Title I-funded schools and LEAs that fail to make AYP for two consecutive years.
Protocols
A protocol is the set of guidelines and conventions that defines HOW something is to happen. It allows for multiple individuals or groups to follow an agreed-upon process with some degree of fidelity. Proto-cols often include descriptors, indicators, and/or exemplars.
Racial, Ethnic, and Socioeconomic Integration
Brown v. Board of Education's promise of inclusive, integrated, high-quality schools for all of our na-tion's children has never been more important. Yet in the 53 years since Brown, the nation, and SFUSD specifically, has struggled to realize that promise. While real progress was made initially toward more integrated and equitable education, over the last two decades the nation has witnessed disturbing levels of resegregation across the country. This trend is evident in SFUSD, as well.
On June 28, 2007, the Supreme Court issued a sharply divided decision in Parents Involved in Commu-nity Schools v. Seattle School District, that limited the ability of school districts to take account of race to promote diversity and address racial isolation in their schools. While a majority of the Justices recog-nized the critical importance of community efforts to promote diverse local schools and provide oppor-tunities for children to learn, play and work together, the Court struck down particular aspects of the Seattle and Louisville student assignment plans because they were not, in its view, sufficiently well de-signed to achieve those goals. But the Court did not – as some reported – rule out any and all considera-tion of race in student assignment. In fact, a majority of Justices explicitly left the window open for school districts to take race-conscious measures to
promote diversity and avoid racial isolation in schools. This is significant import for SFUSD, given in historical Consent Decree.
The San Francisco Consent Decree, or desegregation (integration) plan, was approved by the court in 1983. There were two primary goals: (1) To eliminate racial/ethnic segregation or identifiability in any SFUSD school, program, or classroom and to achieve the broadest practicable distribution throughout the system of students from the racial and ethnic groups which comprise the student enrollment of the SFUSD; and (2) to achieve academic excellence The term "teacher efficacy" has replaced the term of "teacher expectations." Eight dimensions to the
de-velopment of teacher efficacy have been identified:
1. A sense of personal accomplishment: The teacher must view the work as meaningful and important. 2. Positive expectations for student behavior and achievement: The teacher must expect students to
progress.
3. Personal responsibility for student learning: The teacher accepts accountability and shows a willing-ness to examine performance.
4. Strategies for achieving objectives: The teacher plans for student learning, sets goals for herself, and identifies strategies to achieve them.
5. Positive affect: The teacher feels good about teaching, about self, and about students. 6. Sense of control: The teacher believes he can influence student learning.
7. Sense of common teacher/student goals: The teacher develops a joint venture with students to accom-plish goals.
8. Democratic decision-making: The teacher involves students in making decisions regarding goals and strategies.
Professional Learning School Networks (PLSN)
The Professional Learning School Networks are a new vehicle through which SFUSD will promote and advocate for the serious redesign of schooling in San Francisco. Their fundamental goal is to assist in creating and sustaining excellent schools that—in collaboration with their communities—help all stu-dents reach high levels of learning. Believing that all stustu-dents can and must be successful, SFUSD lead-ership is committed to developing and supporting reform strategies that intentionally include schools serving urban, minority, and low-income youth.
We anticipate that these Networks will provide professional learning opportunities, research based re-sources, and other services dedicated to increasing the knowledge, understanding and practices of effec-tive equity-centered schools among all SFUSD educators. They will create centers of inquiry focused on transforming the existing system of rules, roles, and relationships that govern the way time, people, space, knowledge, and technology are used in schools so that schools are organized around students and the work students are expected to do, and so that families and communities provide children the support necessary to ensure student success for the 21st century.
Proficient
Referring to an achievement level on the California Standards Tests, PROFICIENT is the second highest level, above BASIC and below ADVANCED.
Program Improvement (PI)
All schools and local educational agencies (LEAs) that do not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) are identified for PI under the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001. The NCLB Act requires all states to
• classroom climate and curriculum that facilitate students exploring learning about, becoming comfort-able with, and building excitement about each other’s languages and cultures,;
• instructional strategies and pedagogy that emphasize cooperative and interactive learning.
Safe, Secure & Attractive Schools
Extensive research shows that in order to learn and be successful in school, children must be taught in a safe and healthy environment. This includes not only the school’s physical surroundings but also the emotional, mental and social dimensions of the school’s atmosphere.
SAT Reasoning Test
The SAT is a three-hour examination that measures verbal and mathematical reasoning. Many colleges and universities use SAT results as part of the data on which they base admissions decisions. The Col-lege Board, a non-profit association based in New York City, runs the SAT program.
School Improvement Plans
A framework for analyzing problems, identifying underlying causes, and addressing instructional issues in a school that has not made sufficient progress in student achievement.
A school is identified as a Program Improvement (PI) school after two consecutive years of not making adequate yearly progress (AYP) as defined by the federal government. Schools advance in PI status until they are able to meet AYP for two consecutive years. Schools in PI must write a School Improvement Plan to show how they will improve the quality of teaching and learning in the school.
School Quality, Equity and Access Matrix
In the future, SFUSD will measure school quality and overall district performance in a new way: how well each school serves each and every student based on that school’s ability to disrupt the historically predictive power of racial, ethnic, linguistic and socio-economic student attributes.
The School Quality, Equity and Access Matrix provides a simple visual model of complex data to assist families, school sites, and district policy-makers in exploring important differences among the district’s schools. The matrix reveals trends and practices worth celebrating and will direct intervention with greater accuracy on behalf of its lowest performers. The more precisely an intervention addresses a school’s individual needs and builds on its strengths, the more effectively available resources are utilized and the greater the chances of creating sustained improvement in student outcomes.
To date, the assessment of student performance is anchored in the absolute performance of schools and districts on the California STAR tests, known as the Academic Performance Index (API). While setting and monitoring the state’s standards and goals, the API offers only limited intelligence on how to reach higher performance levels through targeted interventions and supports.
was required that every school have at least four racial/ ethnic groups and that no racial or ethnic group exceed 45% of the enrollment of any regular school or 40% of the enrollment of any alternative school. Desegregation efforts did not yield sustainable change, though. The decline in enrollment of African American students, for example, caused resegregation to result. Academic results also continue to show wide disparities in achievement between ethnic groups. Only 31.8% of African American students who entered the ninth grade in 2003 in a San Francisco high school received a San Francisco high school diploma four years late in 2007. The percent of Latino students was 43.2 and the district performance was 62.8 percent. Black and Latino students represent 75% of the students suspended, 80% of the stu-dents in the juvenile justice system, 54% of stustu-dents in Special Education, 68% of truant stustu-dents, and 75% of the students enrolled in the lowest performing elementary schools.
In contrast they represent 8% of the students enrolled in the highest performing elementary schools, 9% of students taking Advanced Placement examinations, 10% of students attending Lowell High School, and 13% of students in the Gifted program.
Results-Oriented Cycles of Inquiry (ROCI)
Results-Oriented Cycle of Inquiry (ROCI) is a research-based, strategic, and integrated approach to teaching and learning comprised of knowing the standards; diagnosing focal student needs; setting and working toward long and short term learning goals; backward planning from standards and assessments; investing students in their goals; teaching effectively; and, throughout, continuously analyzing data to ensure learning goals are being met. SFUSD has identified this approach to professional learning and as one of its key strategies for engaging teachers, coaches and school leaders in its school reform work.
Safe, Affirming & Enriched Environment
One of our core principles asserts that we will create safe, affirming and enriched environments for par-ticipatory and inclusive learning for every group of students. Characteristics of this type of learning en-vironment include:
• staff who express a positive attitude about the diversity of the students and welcomes what students bring from their backgrounds and homes into the classroom and life of the school;
• intentional classroom and school-wide strategies in place so that students and teachers learn to under-stand and respect differences;
• policies, vision statements, activities, signs, and images on the walls that promote the value of diver-sity, multiple languages and multiculturalism;
• strong, enforced bottom-line policies of zero tolerance for anti-immigrant, anti-bilingual, and racist language and behavior;
• staff, and administration who are members of the major racial, language and cultural communities of the students;
• staff and administrators who intervene with positive messages about worth and respect for diversity whenever incidents occur where students devalue or express shame about their own culture & lan-guage;
