ACME ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

Members Present:   Justina Bass, Jackie Ebert, John Mumma, Chris Murray (Sub for Jon), Alicia Scott & Ellyn Erickson 

Members Absent: Jon Anderson

In Process:

1.  School Improvement Plan – Writing Team’s Implementation Report

In our second year of CSI, Acme Elementary continues to focus on writing.  The 2007-2008 school year began with two days of professional development devoted to best practices in writing instruction.  Teachers engaged in deep alignment of GLE's, viewed video clips of master teachers teaching writing and collaboratively planned lessons using district adopted curriculum.

Teachers also celebrated the 2007 WASL data which revealed an increase in writing achievement of nearly 30%!  Based on the success of the initial year's work, teachers agreed to continue to work with the same plan, involving 3 formal writing prompts throughout the year, opportunities to score collaboratively and time to plan instruction based on student needs indicated by the assessment.  The prompts we use have anchor papers for every grade level, which has helped us gain consistency in our scoring.  Teachers have agreed to use a new protocol for looking at student work, known as the CASL (collaborative analysis of student work).  Three after school sessions throughout the year will be used to learn and practice the protocol, helping teachers deliver focused instruction that is directly linked to students' needs.

In addition, teachers at Acme Elementary agreed to take on one additional and important piece: this year we will intentionally review reading data in grade level groups every 8 weeks.  Using the Response to Intervention model, and supported by the learning support teachers and instructional coach, teachers will review reading achievement as measured by the MASI, DRA, and  CBA, (grades 2-6) and initial sound fluency tests and DRA (K-1).  During these data review team sessions, teachers will identify strengths in their classes as well as concerns, and work with grade level partners and support staff to address individual student needs.  Our goal is to identify struggling students early on and provide immediate services: additional instruction and support, frequent monitoring and flexibility in instruction. 

Teachers at Acme Elementary are committed to the success of every student and believe in working together to help every child reach their individual potential.

The document outlining all of the SIP Activities for the year was distributed (Attached to this document)

2.  Budget – EOM Reports

     Not available yet!!  Hopefully by next month.  The new business manager is getting her feet on the ground now.

3.  ALT Norms

    We reviewed the 0607 Norms and decided to continue using them.

4.  GLB Norms

      ALT Members will meet with their Grade Level Bands to review, revise and adopt as needed.  They will be completed by the next ALT Meeting

5.  Parent Involvement Night in 07-08?

    WASL, Writing, Reading, Math????  We talked about how this might be designed.  John Mumma volunteered to check with Dave Bishop at Kendall to see how they did these for their community.

New Topics:

1.  Class-load Compensation –

     We have been allocated $13,000 for the year.   How should we determine the use?

Class-load & FTE adjusted 10-22-07

MBEA Contract  Guidelines for Class-load

Level 1—Track.

Level 2—Check equity within school.  Check use of school resources.

Level 3—Track at district level.  Check equity with other classrooms in the district.

Level 4—Crisis.  Check use of district resources.

MBEA Process for Class-load Relief

A meeting shall be held for the purpose of reviewing any additional information, holding further discussion, and creating a recommendation to the school principal regarding the situation.  The group will make its recommendations having considered school wide class load information.   If the agreed upon solution exceeds school resources, the recommendation will be taken to the assistant superintendent to access district resources, which may include class load relief funds. (We already have our allocation of district resources.)

Options for resolving class load concerns may include, but are not limited to the following: Instructional assistant time, additional supplies and materials, additional certificated instructional staff time, reconfiguration of staff and students, additional compensation, no action.

Cost for some of the ideas presented to date:

            Document Camera and Projector: $2000 per set

            Extend hours for Cert. Teacher:  $298 to $391 per 7 hour day

            Additional Classified Time:  $15.00 – $28.00 per hour depending upon experience and benefits.

            Divide $13,000 by number of teachers affected and let each teacher determine use.  ($13,000 /5= $2600 per teacher.)

Process: 

            Determine teachers affected to be on the committee

            Facilitate the conversation about the students needs in each classroom.           

            Determine remedy that would be most appropriate for each classroom, given the resources currently available.

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ALT looked at the document above which includes the latest class-load numbers as well as the contract language that clarifies the use of class-load funds.  The group decided to meet with their Grade Level Bands and generate a list of ideas that they felt would be most useful to use this funding to support students and teachers.  The 5^th & 6^th Grade class-load numbers remained in the Level I & II.  John did not think that they were interested in accessing the funds.  He will check with his team.  The ALT members were to e-mail Ellyn their list of ideas and then the ALT would make a recommendation based upon that input.

     These are the ideas generated:

            Primary – Classified Support fro paperwork, monitoring student work, teaching

                           more Direct Instruction to small groups.

           3^rd & 4^th – Document Cameras & Projector set ups for both classrooms,

                           Certificated Teacher Time (Kaye? J)

            5^th & 6^th – No info yet

2.  Review School-wide Title I Plan

 The current document was distributed for us to review.  We will discuss it next meeting.

3.  Update Parent Procedures

 At the annual Curriculum Night we need to have a presentation for Title I to meet one of the requirements for receiving the funding.

4.  Select ALT Chairperson for 0708

TBD – We ran out of time.

Next Meeting:   November 7, 2007 – Room 7

                         4:30 – 5:30 pm

Agenda items may be added to the agenda posted in the staff room or through the use of an Issue Concern Form.

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