Help offered for Program Improvement

With more than 2,200 schools now in Program Improvement status under the state Department of Education’s implementation of federal requirements for “adequate yearly progress,” CSBA’s Single District Governance Services division is stepping up its outreach efforts.

Dan Walden, CSBA’s director of Single District Governance Services and a member of the Walnut Creek Elementary School District governing board, is aided in his efforts by Christopher Maricle, a former school teacher and administrator with 20 years of experience who came to CSBA last spring. They were joined late last year by Kirk Berger, a former board member of the St. Helena Unified School District and retired human resources professional who has previously worked with the Oregon School Boards Association. Maricle and Berger join long-time consultants Leslie DeMersseman and Babs Kavanaugh, who have conducted effective governance workshops for CSBA for several years.

Single District Services offers an interactive presentation over the Internet, “Program Improvement: A Primer for Board Success.” The Webinar, or online seminar, explains what PI status means, how schools (along with whole districts and county offices of education) can find themselves in that status and how to escape it. The online presentation was first offered in January and will be presented again March 21 at 6 p.m.

All schools and district or county offices receiving federal Title I funding are subject to PI when they fail to meet AYP criteria for two consecutive years. Those criteria include the number of students taking California’s rigorous standards-based tests in reading and math and the number of students meeting the state’s proficiency requirements on those tests; also factored in as appropriate are students’ Academic Performance Index scores for K-8 schools and high school graduation rates. The minimum AYP threshold rises higher through the 2013-14 school year, when every student must test at the proficient level.

More than 160 districts and county offices were designated as PI in 2006, according to Walden, and 100 more are expected to enter that status this year. Schools and districts or county education offices that remain in PI fall under increasing oversight and sanctions, culminating in the possibility of a takeover by the state after five years.

“You could lose your districts,” Walden warned during the January Webinar. Fortunately, he added, “there is help available.”

The governance team is the key, according to Walden.

“Doing what we need to do to strengthen student achievement is at the heart of our boards,” Walden said. The approach outlined in his Webinar stresses cooperation between the elected board and the superintendent and staff, and it helps the board understand how it can exercise leadership within its role to focus district priorities, resources and energies on raising student achievement.

“Speak with one voice. Stay together” as a board, Walden counseled. “Once the plan is there, support and sustain your staff.”