What is School Improvement?

School improvement is an ongoing process in each building that involves analyzing achievement data, finding strengths and weaknesses, setting an improvement goal, and implementing a plan to improve student learning. The plan depends upon the improvement of instruction and professional development for teachers.

The goal of school improvement is to improve learning.

How does the school improvement process work?

The professional staff in each building conducts an analysis of national, state and district assessments. The analysis reveals strengths and weaknesses in student performance, which provides the basis for the building-wide school improvement goals. In turn, teachers work with their colleagues to improve teaching and learning in each classroom. At the heart of the school improvement process is learning for each and every student. Until we have reached each student in each classroom we are not done!

How are schools held accountable for their goals?

All schools are accountable for improving learning every year. Learning data and instructional strategies are monitored throughout the process to determine whether learning has improved. Every 5 years, a visitation team comprised of experts from outside of the District, meet with the school improvement teams at each school. The visitation team reviews the school’s goals and improvement plans in order to provide feedback on strengths and weaknesses. The purpose of their visit is to evaluate the progress of the improvement plan and offer support and suggestions.

School Improvement Goals

Each building uses the school improvement process to set a building-wide goal for improving student learning. The school improvement plan is developed to focus the entire school on the goal using research-based strategies for curriculum, instruction and assessment.