2/21/13
In Attendance: Shane
Ogden, Jim Peacock, Jill Lowe, Joyce Smart, Mike Mudrow, Gordon Geddes, Jayne
Hamblin, Lisa Hopkins, Paul Wagner, Kristie Cooley, Donna Starley Student
(Diana)
Shane: We don’t have
the representation that we need, but we need to move forward. However, we still have much work to do. This process was started months ago. Our purpose is not to go back and discuss the
schedule, it’s been approved by the board.
Our goal here is not to bring up 800+ problems and reasons why it won’t
work, but to find the solutions we need to make this work.
Next week we have the opportunity to go on a field trip to
look at schools on Tuesday the 26th.
Viewmont and Granger High Schools.
So, please invite our team and others to come. We will provide a substitute and lunch. We have also thought about MC and SV having
representatives come to present their interventions. Please let Mrs. Lowe know if you are going to
come.
We want to be done by April 15th and get this
submitted to the board by May 1st.
We have three main areas: Intervention Specifics, Scheduling Logistics,
and Stakeholder communication. I
received an email that USDA put forth recommendations for next year and that
basically gets rid of our vending machines unless we sell fruit and veggies
only in it. Between now and April 15th,
we have planned on having two open meetings for the public. We need to get those dates set. Maybe the 2nd week of April or the
10th and 15th.
Jim and I had the opportunity to visit with Father Fransico
who is a Catholic pastor. He has a
Latino congregation and also a Caucasian student. There is a former LHS student who went to USU
and is excited to be a parted of this.
Father Fransico and Sister Marilyn are excited to be a part of
this. I also got to have lunch with a
few business owners who might be able to contribute to our work. They are excited to get a clear picture of
what is going on here at LHS. We are
starting to make some good connections.
Please look at the groups and see where you would like to work. The intervention group is going to be bigger
than the others probably naturally.
There doesn’t need to be equal representation. We also would like the group to nominate a
leader of the group that can speak for them each meeting time to catch everyone
up when get together. If there is an
“aha” moment and one group needs more time to present back what they have come
up with, they are welcome to take more time.
I see most of the time needed to be about 3 or 4 minutes each meeting
time.
Jim: I see the
intervention team being bigger than the other teams.
Mike: Is the
logistics team looking at Attendance?
Jim: They
should. Attendance should be tied to
this team as well. We will have the
chance to see what other high schools are doing and working.
Student: Will we pick
different days to meet as a group?
Jim: No, we will
continue to meet on the assigned days.
We will all come together to begin with, and then get to work. My biggest concern is that if we have an
intervention that is tied to lunch, students are going to want to have the hour
lunch. How are we going to make this
work? We decided to make this incentive
giving not punitive. If our freshman
come into LHS and set their expectations high, with assigning them a class.
Jayne: I think we are
going to still have the same problem that we always have had-how do we get them
to go?
Jim: I hear what you
are saying and I can tell you we need to look at SIS systems that can hold the
student accountable.
Jayne: We are not
going to be able to get the kids there.
We need to have the schedule set for them that they know and will want
to go. I am not saying that it’s not a
good idea, it’s just going to be hard.
Joyce: Why can’t we
give them credit? Like a skills class or
an advisory class.
Student: Middle
school doesn’t get near as much homework as we do now at LHS.
Andrew: We have kids
now that are in the hallways that don’t have anywhere to go.
Jim: We don’t have
anyone that has shown them where to go, or how to behave.
Student: A lot of
students that don’t come or don’t want to come are not connected to any teacher
or adult. They need to feel wanted.
Andrew: I have 30
kids that I can’t be stopping everything for one student that doesn’t ever
come. I have a certain amount of time to
cover my curriculum.
Mike: I have the same
problem, but if we can slow down for them and allow them to find some success
in learning, I can see what our students are saying.
Jayne: Our number 1
issue is getting the kids that are the D’s and F’s to the intervention. They aren’t at school to begin with.
Student: I fell behind because my teachers couldn’t meet
before school, I had practice after and during the day was the only time I
could meet. More kids can use that time.
Jayne: We are going
to get the higher end kids that are going to want to go, we might get some at
the lower end, but what about all the kids that don’t come?
Mike: Let’s get our
kids to make some good choices and allowing our kids to get a taste of success.
Jayne: We are going
to hear about two preps, and our PLC time on Wednesday mornings.
Shane: We did run the
numbers, and if we reduced the preps to one and class sizes will go down by
only 3 students.
Jayne: Parents also don’t like the late start on Wednesday.
Student: My parents
love the late start. We can all have a
little more time together.
Jayne: My one big
concern is that after sitting through all the meetings. My biggest concern is getting the teachers to
do it. I hear comments from our meetings
and other places is that we have 2 preps, and half of the teachers aren’t doing
anything anyway.
Mike: Most teachers are doing their jobs, and the ones that
don’t ruin it for the rest of us. That’s
not ok to be 6 weeks into the semester and there are no grades in.
Lisa: having the grades updated and available to students
and parents is a huge part of this conversation. It was a big problem last year. We can’t help our kids if we know where they
are at.
Andrew: what should I
anticipate during intervention? Will
there be 1 kid or 30 kids there?
Mike: You will have
the say as the teacher with grades for who needs to be there.
Jayne: We talked
about all teachers in each department being on the same page with what they are
teaching.
Shane: This has to do with PLC’s. It goes along with a shared vision and common
assessments. They are doing well with
working together to make that happen.
Jim: I can see
departments working together to make decisions on what their department
intervention would look like of Math 1 or Biology.
Andrew: I can teach
an extra after school class with USTAR.
They can remediate them or add to their skills. I have something prepared for them to do when
they come in. I imagine intervention
being the same sort of thing. They come
in on their own, it’s regular, and they receive extra credit. Let’s have every kid put down a deposit…
Jim: Our kids need to
learn how to work. That’s what we are
missing.
Joyce: What I see is
that we have Freshman and sophomore that have to do this. For math we would have our math department,
some can do enrichment and the others can work with the rest of the students
that aren’t ninth and tenth graders. We
do also have other teachers in other departments that could help out.
Shane: We also have
other kids in Math 1 that can’t read a number line. A very basic skill, kids that are going to
need a lot of foundation work, is the next level of the Tier. If we can provide that, it’s great, but this
is Tier 1 level only. Research tells us
that we need to teach 90 minutes a day to remediate two years. This intervention is certainly not a cure all
for our students, it’s a building block.
Mike: One Tier 2
intervention could include peer tutors.
My students love to work with each other and are more comfortable to
work with each other.
Shane: I love Palmer
High School’s intervention. They include
their peer tutors and training time for them to be in assisting students. It took a lot of growing pains and training
to get it to where it is now.
Jill: I spoke with a teacher at SV who absolutely loves
their intervention time and can’t imagine the time without it anymore.
Shane: As a parent, I
absolutely am excited to have my 9th grader who must attend the
class, not as an option. I can see USU
students coming to tutor during the lunch hour.
We have fantastic teachers and students here that are
working hard and trying hard to do their extra work or overcome the big class
sizes. I know it’s not an ideal world,
but coming from Wyoming where class sizes cannot be over 25, our kids are out
performing them.
To come full circle, we all need to bring 2 more people with
us. Bring everyone, so that each
department has one person on each group.
My lunch date today was with my old college friends, they
brought up a good point when they told me that they had never seen me as
excited as I was (except when I was going to marry my wife) and I was talking
about our students and all of the good things happening. We have fabulous teachers and students. The school culture is the most important part
of the students life. We need to tell
the story, don’t allow someone else tell this story. Thanks so much for coming.
