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Explore Eight Years of Data in Interactive Restart Dashboard, Progress Report

written by Paola Gilliam and Sharon Kebschull Barrett on October 13, 2020

When a school struggles to support student learning year after year, schools need dramatic changes, but for too long the choice seemed to be to close the school or attempt an internal turnaround. How has the third option—restarting a school with the same students but with a new operator and flexibilities—made a difference to student success?

Read our new study analyzing the progress of restarts that began between 2010 and 2016, and visit the new, interactive, national database dashboard to see eight years of data on the country’s restarted schools.

In Restart as a School Improvement Strategy, the Public Impact team, including Lyria Boast and Preston Faulk, define a restart as a new organization—most often a charter school operator—taking responsibility for managing a chronically low-performing school.

The study’s main takeaways include:

  1. Restarts Positively Affected School Performance: On average, restarts have a positive and statistically significant impact on both English language arts (ELA) and math after six years, and those gains were larger than the average gains their surrounding districts made. The gains were also larger than in schools using the “turnaround” and “transformation” methods under the federal School Improvement Grant (SIG).
  2. Restarts Remain Relatively Low-Performing. But restarted schools still did not, on average, become high-performing; the average restarted school remained in the bottom quintile after six years.
  3. Restarts Made Largest Gains in First Years After Implementation: On average, restarts made their largest gains in ELA in the first three years after restarting and their largest gains in math in the first two years, based on the adjusted statewide percentile ranking of their schoolwide proficiency rates (SPR). Gains slowed after that, with school performance actually declining on average in the fifth year after restarting. These results suggest that the first three years provide a reasonable window for gauging initial restart success, and that more is needed to maintain success.
  4. Top Restarts and SIG Schools Offer Reason for Optimism: On average, top-quartile restarts made three to four times more growth by year 5 than the average restart, causing schools to jump to the 26th and 34th percentiles in ELA and math, respectively. Top-quartile SIG turnaround and transformation schools made similarly large gains, suggesting a large opportunity for success if school leaders implement these strategies well.

See the report for more, and use the database dashboard to see where restarts are located and results by city, both created with support from the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation.

“We’re pleased to be able to offer the field this comprehensive database, with interactive tools that allow users to delve into the details,” said Lyria Boast, Public Impact’s vice president for data analytics.

What’s next?

The field needs more research into why restarts seem to outperform other intervention methods, and what sets top-quartile restarts and other SIG schools apart from their peers. And as more operators run a city’s schools, and the lines between district and charter blur, research should look at how those efforts affect one another—and student learning—throughout a city.

Read the report and view the database dashboard.

Will Learning Pods Be Only for the Rich?

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett and Bryan C. Hassel on August 25, 2020

Education Week, August 25, 2020, by Bryan C. Hassel and Sharon Kebschull Barrett

To exhausted or worried parents deciding whether to send their children into school buildings this fall, “pandemic pods” may look like an appealing way out. Keeping their boys and girls at home learning alone may be better for physical health but not for mental health, and the arrangement is difficult or impossible for many employed parents. Equally undesirable is the greater risk of children catching and spreading a potentially deadly disease from a larger number of people at school.

Some parents are creating home-based, closed groups of a few families’ children to learn together under the rotating supervision of parents or a paid supervisor. Pods could keep students’ learning and social-emotional development on track while helping protect their and their teachers’ health.

But if pods are exclusively organized by parents and those parents are disproportionately well-off, this approach will inevitably further widen economic and racial gaps in learning opportunity.

Lower-income families are in fact more likely to need pods because the parents are more likely to have to go off to work. According to a study from the Becker Friedman Institute at the University of Chicago, 63 percent of jobs cannot be done from home, and these jobs are disproportionately lower paid.

Even if they can arrange adult supervision for a group of children, lower-income families may struggle to provide spaces conducive to learning in their homes. The KidsCount Data Center found that as of 2018, 14 percent of children live in overcrowded households. [Read more…]

As COVID-19 Forces Shutdowns, Resources for Teaching and Learning at Home

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on March 16, 2020

As many schools close and turn to online learning due to COVID-19, multi-classroom leaders (MCLs) can help smooth and lead the way for their teaching teams and students. Students need their teachers’ steadying hand even more when the world feels chaotic and parents face extra stress.

Public Impact published initial guidance on Friday, with more to come for schools using Opportunity Culture and those who have not yet used it. See here for that guidance and more resources–all free, as always.

Multi-classroom leaders, we encourage you to join the private Facebook group just for MCLs, to share resources, concerns, and questions.

What other resources do you wish we had for you? Let me know, using our contact form here.

Public Impact Welcomes Fifth Cohort of Opportunity Culture Fellows

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on June 4, 2019

Public Impact announces with pleasure our fifth cohort of Opportunity Culture Fellows. This year’s 15 fellows are Opportunity Culture multi-classroom leaders and principals who have achieved strong results and been leaders in their schools and districts.

Fellows provide support to their cohort, take one another’s ideas back to their schools, write columns about their experiences, and speak locally and nationally about their Opportunity Culture roles. Their feedback and leadership are invaluable in helping to improve the Opportunity Culture initiative, and all materials related to it.

This year’s fellows come from Arizona, Illinois, and four North Carolina school districts. We welcome and congratulate:

Multi-Classroom Leaders:

  • James Cerasani, Randolph Elementary, Chicago Public Schools, Illinois
  • Casandra Cherry, Phillips Middle, Edgecombe County Public Schools, North Carolina
  • Cherie Dixon, LB Yancey Elementary, Vance County Schools, North Carolina
  • Frederick Hoffman, Ferndale Middle, Guilford County Schools, North Carolina
  • Casey Jackson, Aycock Elementary, Vance County Schools, North Carolina
  • Steven Kennedy, Wilson Middle School, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, North Carolina
  • Amy Pearce, North Edgecombe High, Edgecombe County Public Schools, North Carolina
  • Angela Porter, Hairston Middle, Guilford County Schools, North Carolina
  • Christina Ross, Desert Oasis Elementary, Nadaburg Unified School District No. 81, Arizona
  • Keisha Wheat, Randolph Elementary, Chicago Public Schools, Illinois
Principals:
  • Kristen Boyd, Aycock Elementary, Vance County Schools, North Carolina
  • Elizabeth Meyers, Randolph Elementary, Chicago Public Schools, Illinois
  • Jenny O’Meara, Phillips Middle, Edgecombe County Public Schools, North Carolina
  • Merrie Conaway, Foust Elementary, Guilford County Schools, North Carolina
  • Eric Ward, Harding University High School, Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools, North Carolina
Fellows-1 2
Past Opportunity Culture Fellows (above) look forward to welcoming the new Fellows at a September convening.

 

As this cohort begins the fellowship over the summer, the 2018–19 cohort will be wrapping up their year, culminating in a convening for all past and current fellows in September. We thank all fellows for their participation, Opportunity Culture advocacy, and feedback to improve the initiative.“Every year, fellows lead in their classrooms and schools; the fellowship gives them an opportunity to lead and advocate for a stronger profession at a national level,” said Sharon Kebschull Barrett, vice president for editorial services and communications at Public Impact, who oversees the fellowship and works closely with fellows to learn from their experiences through interviews and column writing. “They lead us as well, pointing the way for Public Impact to continually improve Opportunity Culture for other educators.”

The national Opportunity Culture initiative, founded by Public Impact and now in 28 sites in nine states, extends the reach of excellent teachers and their teams to more students, for more pay, within schools’ recurring budgets.

Opportunity Culture News: New Opportunity Culture Site, Multi-Classroom Leaders Share Impact

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on April 8, 2019

Opportunity Culture schools and educators continue to attract attention…check out these posts from new sites, multi-classroom leader columns, and an exciting award for a multi-classroom leader.

Lexington City Schools’ Superintendent on Working with Us to Implement Opportunity Culture: Dr. Anitra Wells, superintendent of Lexington City Schools, discusses the district’s plans to work with Public Impact to implement Opportunity Culture in the 2019-20 school year. Opportunity Culture will extend the reach of excellent teachers and their teams to more students, provide teachers with more leadership opportunities, and provide more support for teachers.

Multi-Classroom Leader on Impact and Joy: In a short video from Guilford County Schools, Multi-Classroom Leader Fred Hoffman of Ferndale Middle School explains the impact he can make in his role on more students and teachers.

Multi-classroom leader awarded $175K grant: Multi-Classroom Leader Cassandra Cherry received a Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Award for Science and Mathematics. The $175,000 grant will go to Cherry, Phillips Middle School, and Edgecombe County Schools. Cherry plans to use the award to create a makerspace STEM lab first at Phillips, and then in every other district school over the next five years.

Opportunity Culture could help Arizona teacher shortage: Arizona schools currently have a teacher shortage, with nearly one in four classrooms without a permanent teacher. This column includes Opportunity Culture as one way to increase collaboration and retain teachers.

How technology can encourage student engagement and growth: Multi-Classroom Leader Amber Hines uses technology, such as QR codes and two-way recording, in her elementary school classrooms for self-study and assessments. This allows for personalizing instruction and feedback, student growth, accountability, and more.

Multi-Classroom Leadership helped this teacher prepare to lead a school: Hadley Moore left her teaching position at an elite prep school to be a multi-classroom leader at an inner city public school. The experience helped her grow as the leader of a small teaching team in ways she never expected.

Arkansas Opportunity Culture Pilot Adds 3 Districts and 8 North Little Rock Schools

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on March 14, 2019

Ark DOE circle

Opportunity Culture continues to grow: After an initial year at North Little Rock Middle School, the Arkansas Department of Education has expanded its Opportunity Culture pilot to three more districts.

The school districts of Forrest City, Lead Hill, and Lincoln are joining the Opportunity Culture initiative—to which the state committed in its Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) plan—with plans to begin using Opportunity Culture roles in the 2019–20 school year. North Little Rock, now in its second year of Opportunity Culture at the middle school’s two campuses, will expand to six elementary schools and two high schools in the 2019–20 school year.

Opportunity Culture schools use new roles—based on the cornerstone role of Multi-Classroom Leadership—to reach many more students with excellent, personalized instruction. These roles, which have produced outstanding student growth elsewhere, provide intensive support to all teachers, paid career advancement, and a stronger teacher pipeline.

“We are on a mission in our state to recruit and retain effective teachers,” said Sandra Hurst, director of educator support and development in the Arkansas Department of Education’s educator effectiveness division. “We believe the implementation of Opportunity Culture schools can provide our districts with an innovative approach to extend the reach of excellent teachers to more students.”

The work in North Little Rock sets an example for this expansion.

NLR logo“North Little Rock’s continued hard work, reflection on lessons learned, and willingness to try something new for its students and teachers has set the stage for others in Arkansas who can learn from the district’s early experiences,” said Troy Smith of Public Impact, which founded the Opportunity Culture initiative. Smith provides guidance to each school’s Opportunity Culture design and implementation teams, made up of teachers and administrators.

“We have experienced growth in student achievement as a result of the implementation of Opportunity Culture,” North Little Rock Superintendent Bobby Acklin said. “Students are engaged in their learning environment, and there are more opportunities for our best teachers to share their expertise with other teachers. It’s a great model for student-focused learning.”

Lead Hill School District will use Opportunity Culture in its two schools, which have about 365 students and 35 teachers.

“Every student in the state of Arkansas deserves an opportunity to reach their potential. The partnership with Opportunity Culture will assist our district in extending the reach of our excellent teachers,” said Wanda Van Dyke, superintendent of the Lead Hill School District.

Lincoln Consolidated School District will implement Opportunity Culture at Lincoln Middle School.

“We are excited to implement Opportunity Culture in our district this fall,” said Mary Ann Spears, superintendent of the Lincoln Consolidated School District, whose 91 teachers serve 1,140 students. “Opportunity Culture will allow us to transform our teaching and learning in our middle school and ultimately the entire district. The development of future teacher-leaders and the impact on teacher retention is certainly a bonus!”

Forrest City School District will begin using Opportunity Culture in three schools.

“We feel that the Opportunity Culture program is an amazing opportunity for our district to provide greater reach and a larger impact on the students in our district,” said Tiffany Hardrick, superintendent of the Forrest City School District. “The program will allow our best and brightest teachers an opportunity to lead and become our future district leaders without leaving the classroom.”

In early 2018, researchers at the Brookings Institution and American Institutes for Research released a study showing the effect Opportunity Culture multi-classroom leaders can have: Teachers who were on average at the 50th percentile in student learning gains, and who then joined teams led by multi-classroom leaders, produced learning gains equivalent to those of teachers from the 75th to 85th percentile in math and from the 66th to 72nd percentile in reading in six of seven statistical models. Nearly three-fourths of the schools in the AIR-Brookings study were Title I.

And in the 2017–18 school year, Opportunity Culture schools in North Carolina—the largest implementation state so far, with about 80 schools—outpaced the state results in student growth. While only 27 percent of non-Opportunity Culture schools in North Carolina exceeded student learning growth targets, nearly double that—53 percent—of Opportunity Culture schools exceeded growth.

“Through its statewide Opportunity Culture pilot, the Arkansas Department of Education is paving the way for every Arkansas teacher and student to benefit from high-quality teacher leadership,” said Stephanie Dean, who as vice president of strategic policy advising at Public Impact provides guidance to the Arkansas Department of Education.

 

High-Growth Learning, 56K Students Reached: Opportunity Culture 2018–19

written by Sharon Kebschull Barrett on March 7, 2019

As student learning continues to benefit, teachers want to keep and grow Opportunity Culture: That’s just one of the many findings and stats to report from the 2018-19 update of the Opportunity Culture data dashboard.

Public Impact, which created and leads the national Opportunity Culture initiative, updates the dashboard annually.

Highlights from the dashboard include:

Schools—Opportunity Culture now has 302 schools committed. Opportunity Culture grew from seven schools implementing in 2013–14 to 151 schools in 2018–19. Seventy-three more schools have begun designing (planning for implementation) for 2019–20, and states and districts have committed to launch Opportunity Culture in an additional 78 schools in the next few years. Schools, cities, and states continue to join Opportunity Culture throughout each year.

Sites—Nine states now have a total of 28 Opportunity Culture sites covering a range of urban, suburban, and rural schools.

Students—More than 56,000 students were reached by one or more Opportunity Culture teachers. Nothing matters more for students than getting excellent teaching consistently: Excellent teachers help students learn more, and, as multi-classroom leaders, can help other teachers produce higher-growth student learning, too. Research also says that teachers producing high growth develop students’ higher-order thinking skills.

Teaching Roles—2018–19 saw 428 teachers in advanced roles and 1,393 teachers receiving on-the-job development on teacher-led teams. Advanced Opportunity Culture roles are reserved for teachers with a track record of high-growth student learning. Team teacher roles are held by teachers with a typical range of prior effectiveness. Before 2017–18, schools designing Opportunity Culture used a variety of roles to extend teachers’ reach. All schools designing Opportunity Culture implementation plans since 2018 use Multi-Classroom Leadership, embedding other roles within multi-classroom leaders’ small teams.

Teacher Satisfaction—In anonymous surveys, 97 percent of multi-classroom leaders (MCLs) and 87 percent of all those in Opportunity Culture roles said they want Opportunity Culture to continue in their schools. For MCLs, that’s a consistent survey response, while for all teachers and staff, it’s a substantial increase over prior years. Among educators in all Opportunity Culture roles, 94 percent agreed that teachers are held to high professional standards for delivering instruction. At least 90 percent of MCLs also reported a positive impact on staff collaboration and student achievement and agreed that they have new leadership opportunities, higher pay opportunities with Opportunity Culture, and the chance to reach more students. And 91 percent of MCLs and 88 percent of all Opportunity Culture teachers agree that they receive feedback that can help them improve teaching.

Pay—$4.7 million was reallocated to higher teacher pay in 2018–19; $14.7 million has been reallocated since Opportunity Culture began in 2013. The highest pay supplement was $23,000 (for MCLs). The average MCL supplement was $11,833, or 21 percent of the average teacher salary. (Calculated using state average salary in states implementing Opportunity Culture, weighted by the number of MCLs per state.) Opportunity Culture supplements for all teachers ranged from $1,000 to $23,000.

Student Results—A study from the American Institutes of Research and the Brookings Institution showed that students in classrooms of team teachers led by MCLs showed sizeable academic gains. The team teachers in the study were, on average, at the 50th percentile in the student learning gains they produced before joining a team led by an MCL. After joining the teams, they produced learning gains equivalent to those of teachers in the top quartile in math and nearly that in reading.

In early 2018, researchers at the Brookings Institution and American Institutes for Research released a study showing the effect Opportunity Culture multi-classroom leaders can have: Teachers who were on average at the 50th percentile in student learning gains, and who then joined teams led by multi-classroom leaders, produced learning gains equivalent to those of teachers from the 75th to 85th percentile in math and from the 66th to 72nd percentile in reading in six of seven statistical models. Nearly three-fourths of the schools in the AIR-Brookings study were Title I.

And in the 2017–18 school year, Opportunity Culture schools in North Carolina—the largest implementation state so far, with about 80 schools—outpaced the state results in student growth. While only 27 percent of non-Opportunity Culture schools in North Carolina exceeded student learning growth targets, nearly double that—53 percent—of Opportunity Culture schools exceeded growth.

The national Opportunity Culture initiative extends the reach of excellent teachers and their teams to more students, for more pay, within schools’ recurring budgets. Each school’s design and implementation team, which includes teachers, determines how to use Multi-Classroom Leadership and other roles to reach more of their students with high-standards, personalized instruction—one hallmark of great teachers.

Multi-classroom leaders (MCLs) lead a small teaching team, providing instructional guidance and frequent, on-the-job development, while continuing to teach part of the time. The schools redesign schedules to provide additional school-day time for teacher planning, coaching and collaboration. MCLs typically lead the introduction of more effective curricula, instructional methods, classroom management and schoolwide culture-building.

Accountable for the results of all students in the team, multi-classroom leaders earn substantially higher supplements averaging 20 percent (and up to 50 percent) of teacher pay, within the regular school budget. The school design teams reallocate school budgets to fund pay supplements permanently, in contrast to temporarily grant-funded programs.

Public Impact analyzes the dashboard results to continually improve Opportunity Culture materials and its work with schools and districts. Public Impact is eager to use these advanced teaching roles to meet or surpass its goal of:

  • Reaching at least 75 percent of students…
  • With at least 75th-percentile student learning growth*…
  • While at least 75 percent of educators are satisfied or highly satisfied.

“As Opportunity Culture continues to grow, we at Public Impact learn so much from the educators across the country who continue to implement these roles, achieving more for their students and creating welcoming, supportive workplaces for teachers,” said Lucy Steiner, senior vice president for educator excellence and implementation services. “We so appreciate all their feedback and data that help us continually improve Opportunity Culture.”

*On average, compared to 2010 standard growth levels

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