Legislature(2007 - 2008)BUTROVICH 205
03/12/2008 08:00 AM Senate SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
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| School Success Project- a Success Plan for Alaska Schools | |
| Adjourn |
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ALASKA STATE LEGISLATURE
SENATE SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION
March 12, 2008
8:03 a.m.
MEMBERS PRESENT
Senator Gary Stevens, Chair
Senator Charlie Huggins, Vice Chair
Senator Bettye Davis
Senator Donald Olson
Senator Gary Wilken
MEMBERS ABSENT
All members present
COMMITTEE CALENDAR
Presentation by the Yukon-Koyukuk School District: Success
Project - A Success Plan for Alaska Schools
PREVIOUS COMMITTEE ACTION
No previous action to consider
WITNESS REGISTER
DENNIS DEWITT
Communities in Schools
Juneau AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Introduced himself and was present for the
meeting.
CARL KNUDSON
Consultant for the Yukon-Koyukuk (YK) School District
Galena AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Presented and overview of the YK School
District Success Project.
CARL ROSE
Association of Alaska School Boards
Anchorage AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on the Success Project
BARBARA THOMPSON, Commissioner
Department of Education and Early Development (DEED)
Juneau AK
POSITION STATEMENT: Commented on how the Success Plan aligned
with the state improvement plan.
ACTION NARRATIVE
CHAIR GARY STEVENS called the Senate Special Committee on
Education meeting to order at 8:03:53 AM. Present at the call to
order were Senators Wilken, Olson, Davis, Huggins and Stevens.
^School Success Project- A Success Plan for Alaska Schools
8:04:30 AM
CHAIR STEVENS asked people to introduce themselves for the
presentation on the school success project.
DENNIS DEWITT, Communities in Schools, introduced himself.
CARL KNUDSON, Consultant for the Yukon-Koyukuk (YK) School
District, apologized for the new superintendent, Karey Boyd, who
couldn't attend the meeting due to a previous engagement. He
said the district was at the legislature two years ago trying to
do the same thing they are doing now. At that time they tried to
do a school success plan in YK that would have modeled the
program he started in Galena as a superintendent in 1995-2003.
Today they are looking at the results of those years. He said
the outline had a typo that said 56 school districts, but there
are only 53. He said the outline described the focus of the
school success model and presented the fact that 16 of the
state's districts had been identified for corrective action and
6 have corrective action being implemented. Two years ago when
he presented this plan to the legislature, he said he was unable
to get funding.
He related that during this time the YK school board and the
superintendent had watched Galena flourish and raise its student
test scores. Galena sits in the middle of the YK school district
and had been a member before pulling out and becoming its own
district. The test scores when he first got there were quite
similar in all the villages up and down the Yukon - bad.
8:07:00 AM
Before coming to Galena, Mr. Knudson said he had been a
superintendent for 28 years in Montana and had never seen such
low scores and he was somewhat frustrated about what to do. But
he developed a plan and presented it to the Department of
Education and Early Development (DEED) and since they were not
able to secure funding he went to Washington D.C. to look for
money. The Voluntary Public School Choice (VPSC) people had a
lot, but they were giving it for kids to leave failing schools
to go to better schools. So, he creatively approached them with
the idea that the more kids you pay to leave a school the worse
the school is; so why not put money into trying to fix the poor
school so the kids don't have to leave. And they bought into
that; so he became one of eight schools in the nation that the
VPSC funded and the only rural one.
8:08:52 AM
MR. KNUDSON said the VPSC bought into the success model he would
show them today. It changes the way teachers teach, the way
students learn and improves instruction so that the school
becomes a school of choice and the kids don't have to leave. The
benefits to the district are that it revitalizes schools, raises
student achievement, increases graduation rates, puts new
technology in the hands of students and meets the requirements
of "No Child Left Behind," creates jobs and provides continuity
and sustainability for students.
The benefits to students are that it improved schools, raised
test scores, lowered the drop out rate, increased college
attendance, lowered use of drugs and alcohol and increased
community support.
8:09:19 AM
MR. KNUDSON said the project goals are: meeting the requirements
of "Leave No Child Behind" and meeting the requirements and
needs of the students in the villages.
He said the district team's anticipated partners were the staff
in the DEED that had placed the YK school district in corrective
action. When the department saw the grant and what he was doing,
they asked to have the school improvement plan resubmitted and
that has now been approved. So, next year the grant will
actually take over many of the areas that the state had already
required improvement in.
MR. KNUDSON said he had approached the School Board Association
for the project goals because they know from experience that
unless you improve the situations from which the children are
coming - the community and the family - the kids won't do well
in school. Galena's experience proved that unless you address
the other side of the report card, the kids wouldn't be
successful no matter how much money was poured into the effort.
8:10:47 AM
Classroom solutions include the software he developed to make it
easy for teachers to manipulate the Alaska grade level
expectations (GLE). The state already requires Ames Webb
assessment software for the schools in corrective action.
MR. KNUDSON said the commissioner of DEED asked him to provide
supportive information that the project was successful, which
was done. He was also asked to do that for the VPSC grant; so he
used one of the things he used in Galena where Spencer Rogers
was hired to implement this success model at their main campus.
They brought in kids in to a boarding school who were in the 20-
50 percentiles from failing schools or schools that had no high
school program. The result was that in 2005, no student that
stayed with Galena's boarding school for four years scored less
than 90 percent on the qualifying exam, proving the success
model worked in a boarding situation as well as it works in the
others.
8:12:00 AM
MR. KNUDSON said he used Kaltag, another YK school that is 50
miles downriver from Galena, for a reference in his handout of
Benchmark scores. It indicated that in 1995 when he first came
to Galena its scores were the same as Kaltag's were in 2003. Now
Galena has no "not proficient" marks in any of the categories.
This shows the model does work.
8:14:44 AM
MR. KNUDSON said the core of the program is in the professional
training. Teachers need to be retrained and students are trained
to accept the training in a better way. He said the student
success plan also developed software over the years and the
commissioner had asked for supporting information on it. So he
had obtained letters of endorsement; one was from a virtual
school in Idaho that served 1,250 kids. It had a 10-percent gain
in standardized test scores in its first year and an 18 percent
gain in the second year. He said other districts were becoming
aware of this training and this year another one has already
requested involvement in the program.
He said that the National Staff Development Council (NSDC) had
identified context, content and process as being necessary in
order to have effective instruction. Of the 33 Native schools in
Montana on seven reservations, all 33 did not make KYP. The one
Native school that used this program showed great gains this
year.
MR. KNUDSON explained that aides need to be trained as well,
because they do a lot of work with individuals and can quickly
see how families are related to learning in students.
MR. KNUDSON said the software database makes it easier for
teachers to find the GLEs and identify they have been taught and
mastered. He said the neat thing about a corrective action
school is that department people who are supervising them can on
any day see how many standards any student or class has
mastered. "It's totally state-of-the-art."
8:17:00 AM
He said the state requires a formative assessment of GLEs in the
corrective action schools. So under the model, learning gaps are
identified and standards are targeted for grade levels. The
curriculum is aligned electronically to the state expectations.
All the students have an individual lesson plan created by the
teacher from an electronic database.
MR. KNUDSON said one of the hardest parts about change is
recognizing and admitting that the current process is not
successful. When he came to the state in 1995, many schools were
th
in the 20-40 percentile and they still are today. Efforts and
finances have been raised, but these schools still have to
determine where to put their resources and it has to be on
student education. He said one of the good things about the
electronic database is that it has a curricula map and teachers
must enter every GLE in a month that they are going to teach
that curriculum. The database is easier to supervise, because
when the door closes and nobody knows what's going on, the
principal can look electronically at curricula map; parents can
print it out and students can see what they are expected to
learn over the course of a year.
8:19:29 AM
Their focus is on measuring change and understanding Bloom's
Taxonomy because it has been found that knowing how verbs apply
to instructional strategies is essential. Training to recognize
or develop appropriate assessments to monitor mastery of
standards leads to development of a corrective loop that
addresses the 20 percent of students who just don't get it. The
traditional method for these students is for them to just go on
to the next step. This model, however, teaches these kids with
OdysseyWare that provides electronic instruction for every grade
and subject and has a corrective loop. Kids can check out
computers and work on them at home.
He said collaborative meetings are required by the state for
schools in corrective action. This is where teachers share both
their successful and their failed GLEs.
8:21:00 AM
MR. KNUDSON said it's important to realize that students need to
possess assets in order to learn and that is where addressing
the other side of report card comes in. Many communities don't
do that and it's critical for improvement. He said the School
Board Association puts out a book that is called "Education
Alaska Style" that lists 40 possible assets - 20 internal and 20
external. Some internal assets are as simple as self esteem,
five caring adults in a student's life; external assets are
things like church community and involvement. If a student has
less than 10 assets, they are 62 percent more inclined to be
violent and participate in illicit drug use.
The grant actually has asset building activities so that after
school and on weekends teachers can identify and work on
building kids' assets. It's important for teachers to be aware
of how to help students build assets. By the same token, if a
student has more assets, then the leadership and values go way
up.
8:24:35 AM
MR. KNUDSON said the program focuses on collecting data for a
thorough evaluation process. The VPSC grant evaluation process
would be replicated for this project. The proposed budget used
an $8 million five-year grant as a guide to plan the next four
years. Anticipated contracting services would be with the School
Board Association for the assets, resiliency and the Immigration
and Customs Enforcement (ICE) project and with people like
Spencer Rogers to do the training on the ground (like in
Galena). He understands that they are working in Copper River
now and that other districts are becoming interested. If the YK
project gets funded, he said they would look at putting
representatives from the department, the school board and from
different factions into a not-for-profit corporation for
infrastructure. Vehicles like SB 281 (from a few years ago)
would provide for a cooperative agreement with another district.
8:26:31 AM
CHAIR STEVENS commented that in listening to Mr. Knudson, he now
realizes how much a handful of teachers impacted his life. He
asked how teachers are retrained, especially if they have been
teaching for 15 years.
MR. KNUDSON replied that all the components of the success model
have a trainer trainer model and a 6-day training session.
Teachers are enticed with a $2,000 stipend and 3 credits as an
accepted college program. The 6-days of in-service training will
be followed up by 3 more credits for a total of 6 credits for
the year.
In the summer as many as 10 volunteers from the 60 teachers are
sent to Colorado for a week of training at the Spencer Rogers
Training Institute. Those people then are used as trainer
trainers for the 6-day workshops. One 6-day session is held in
May and another 6-day session is held in the first week of
August. They then have a couple of people who are hired as
educational specialists that go out to the villages and help
them get their arms around defining the GLEs and using the
components. They have also developed a very good video
conferencing system throughout the villages so that they can
have daily and weekly sessions to help motivate and answer
questions and keep people on track.
CHAIR STEVENS asked if that is where the computers are used on
each student.
MR. KNUDSON replied yes; they simply log into the software and
do a corrective loop. Students can do it with an aide in the
resource room or at home. The important thing to remember is
that kids have to be exposed to things 7 times in 28 days for
them to remember something forever.
8:31:44 AM
SENATOR HUGGINS asked if he could tell them anything else about
looping, for example, does it happen in the classroom or after.
MR. KNUDSEN replied that it can happen in both places. It starts
outside the classroom because the teacher is the one who knows
which students "didn't get it." If an aide is available, he
could work with the student. An effort is made to "loop" in the
classroom, because those students who don't get it will create
another learning gap by going on with everybody else if they are
not ready. They focus on having support from families and having
after-school and free-time sessions for corrective loops as well
as providing a laptop to take home. A student's corrective loop
is available to him somewhere 24/7.
SENATOR OLSON congratulated Mr. Knudson on developing this
program. He asked him what the seven factors were on the page he
was referencing.
MR. KNUDSON replied those factors were developed from the Board
Association's factors that include a student having five
training adults in their lives providing the anchors that he
needs and the community engagement.
SENATOR OLSON asked if that was part of the asset evaluation on
the next page.
MR. KNUDSON replied yes.
SENATOR OLSON asked what Bloom Taxonomy is.
MR. KNUDSON answered that Bloom was an educator who wrote a lot
of books on how children learn and how teachers must teach in
order to be successful. He identified the fact that a teacher
could wonder around in curriculum all day and unless they
actually identified verbs what they were teaching couldn't be
assessed. The teachers have to identify action verbs, like may,
can and will, for the GLEs.
SENATOR OLSON asked if this model has worked in rural schools
and if it has been tested in urban schools.
MR. KNUDSEN replied that Woody Jensen, Director of Adult and
Community Services in Billings Montana, asked him to develop a
model for them that is now working. But they implemented it just
for the kids who have dropped out, dropped in and are in long
term suspension and are incarcerated. The Montana detention
center is in Billings and so it falls on that district to
provide education services for them. So, the University most
often provides a couple of teachers and most times the joke is
that they don't get assigned there, they get sentenced. The
worst teachers get put in the detention center and those kids
don't have a chance.
8:37:25 AM
So, a model was created that provides for the individual
learning plan; it gives the student a chance, because they can
take that learning plan home with them when they are released.
The student can demonstrate what he has done and work from there
rather than have a learning gap.
8:38:21 AM
CARL ROSE, Association of Alaska School Boards, said when Mr.
Knudson first came to Galena it was on the verge of bankruptcy.
The ideas he came up with to expand services to kids not only
helped the Galena School District get back on its feet, but they
created a boarding school and a distance learning opportunity as
well. He said the state needs more good ideas like these.
MR. ROSE said he wasn't prepared to endorse everything they had
just heard, because like the committee, he was just learning
about it. When the association talks about identifying schools
that need intervention, they have to look for the capacity to
provide them assistance to do it. Some of it comes from the
School Board Association because one of the things it does is
assist local school boards in providing a quality education with
a focus on student achievement through effective local
governance. That underwrites one of their key pillars which is
for a community to take the initiative in getting healthy and
taking responsibility for itself. The association has rewritten
a book called "Helping Kids Succeed Alaska Style" that shows the
role communities can play.
8:40:00 AM
On the performance issue, the association created the "Quality
Schools Quality Students Initiative" and went to three districts
a year to help them create a strategic plan that would describe
what the community wanted for itself and for its kids. With
that, the association provided leadership, program and staff,
community engagement and resources. Fifteen schools went through
this initiative and some had great success and some had less.
The association has started addressing the digital age by
defining the responsibility the state has to insure that digital
technology is available in the schools. It is addressing the
issue of effective local governance that is being questioned
right now. The association provides training to school boards
and leadership training to school districts. The average person
on the street doesn't know what a school board does; in general
the public doesn't understand how the district is governed,
financed or what elements impact local public policy. In
totality, what they do as a school board association is try to
help communities deal with their responsibilities at every
level.
MR. ROSE said that local control works in a large portion of
school districts, but some are struggling. So the idea is if the
state by court action is being asked to intervene, what kind of
tools does it have to insure a level of oversight is provided
that would actually result in student achievement and
communities becoming healthier. While it's not the department's
job to necessarily do all these things, it can act as a
coordinating body and it needs as much support as it can get
from wherever they can get it. If SB 285 talks about plans of
improvement and coaches, he said the question for the department
would be: "Does this satisfy the requirements of standards and
professional development and assessments in working with
communities."
So, Mr. Rose said, he is here to listen as well. In his career
the biggest thing the School Board Association has ever done is
engage in the communities. People from outside a community can't
provide the fix; the community has to be the group that decides
it wants the change. He said that kids observe a lot and when
you ask them the kinds of question that are in the "School
Connectedness and Climate Survey," it shows a lot. If this
program doesn't meet the standards laid out by the department,
they have to see how it can be modified and then it has to be
replicated around the state.
8:46:03 AM
CHAIR STEVENS said one of the charts is on promoting positive
behaviors and attitudes and it talks about assets that children
have. He asked if he agrees with that.
MR. ROSE replied that is the premise behind their assets
training program. It started out as a research project and the
data was turned into a "how to" book and data indicates that
children with more assets behave differently.
8:48:07 AM
BARBARA THOMPSON, Commissioner, Department of Education and
Early Development (DEED), said the department is intervening in
five districts, one of which is the Yukon Koyukuk (YK) district.
The department had already worked with the YK district on an
improvement plan related to corrective action this year and then
they got this grant. The department was surprised and excited to
hear about it.
They thought perhaps some of the elements in the grant
overlapped what the department was directing the district to do
and they don't want the district doing the same thing twice. So,
staff is looking at the plan and to see how it relates to the
district improvement plan and the school improvement plans for
the YK school district. In particular, they are looking at the
formative assessment system provided by the grant. The
department had already directed the district to use the Ames
Webb Formative Assessment System and the Alaska Computerized
Formative Assessment System, both of which can be monitored
online at the department as well as in the district office. So
that way they are making sure the system provided by the grant
aligns with state standards.
She said the grant is not replacing the district improvement
plan, but she is hoping it will work in concert to move
everything in that district forward. She said they are excited
to hear about the grant. If it is effective the department would
look at replicating it in other districts.
8:50:00 AM
CHAIR STEVENS asked when the department enters into a corrective
action with a district, doesn't it lay out steps they have to go
through to achieve success, and if she is saying this may be one
of the ways that will be accomplished. It may or may not
coordinate with what the department is already doing, but that
is yet to be seen.
MS. THOMPSON responded when the department intervenes in a
district, it provides very specific activities the district must
participate in. Three core foundation items have occurred in
each of the five intervened districts including focused weekly
collaborative meetings within each school lead by the principal
that focus on student achievement - their struggles, their
successes. They also focus on the use of and monitoring of the
formative assessments in each classroom so they can see which
teachers are using them and how the students in every classroom
in that district are doing and make needed adjustments. Third,
they are requiring the principals and district administration in
all those intervened districts to participate in leadership
training to help them know what good instruction really looks
like and how to walk through a classroom in five minutes and see
if grade level expectations are being taught. The department
helps arrange for any training that is needed in order to get
that done, she said.
CHAIR STEVENS said he assumed the department would support being
aware of the impact teachers have on students.
MS. THOMPSON replied, "Absolutely, we are supportive of the
resiliency work that the grant proposes as well as all of the
efforts that the School Board Association has put forth in this
area."
8:54:35 AM
SENATOR HUGGINS said he's assuming the department thinks the
grant is more or less within the general parameters of what they
want school districts to do.
MS. THOMPSON replied that the grant's plan has elements that are
similar to what the state is already asking districts to do; it
is a positive approach to making changes district-wide in the YK
school district.
SENATOR HUGGINS said he was impressed with what Mr. Rose was
saying, and if the state is intervening, it should look at
different techniques that have some track record.
MS. THOMPSON responded, "We are always looking for successful
techniques." The interventions the have done so far have seen
increased student proficiency across the district and have seen
additional schools meet adequate yearly progress that had not
met before. So what they're doing is on right track, but they
always need to look for other ways to get there. They are hoping
the YK grant works out well.
8:57:18 AM
MR. KNUDSEN concluded that the Yukon Koyukuk school district is
very excited; some board members have said this is like a prayer
come true. They live in these villages and know they need help.
They voted to have this implementation be the number one goal of
the district. They hired a new superintendent, Karey Boyd, the
director of this grant. They had the applicants write a two-page
essay on how they would carry out this project effectively. They
are very serious about it. He is here because the board asked
him if he could help them replicate what he did in Galena in the
YK villages.
CHAIR STEVENS thanked everyone for their comments today and
there being no further business to come before the committee, he
adjourned the meeting at 9:00:17 AM.
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