Mon Jan 22 2018, 5:30pm
WHS Room 2203
Regular Meeting

REPORTS TO THE BOARD

Teaching and Learning Report

To: Michael Green

From: Asha Riley

Date: January 16, 2018

Re: Teaching and Learning

 

College Ready Math Initiative Grant: 

I am pleased to share we have been awarded the College Ready Math Initiative Grant! A special thanks to Heidi Rhodes and Dan Uhlenkott for their work on the competitive grant application.

For the College-Ready Math Initiative (CRMI), the College Spark Washington education foundation is investing significant funding over seven years to help students graduate career and college ready, and succeed in college without needing remedial courses. The CRMI includes evidence-based strategies designed to ensure students develop the math knowledge and skills they need to improve their scores on the Smarter Balanced Assessment, which measures achievement relative to the Common Core State Standards, and graduate career and college ready.

Too many of Washington’s high school graduates are required to take remedial math in college. This increases the time it takes students to earn a college degree, requires students to pay for taking coursework that does not earn college credit, and dramatically reduces the chance that a student will earn a degree. Fewer than half of the students who take remedial math graduate from college.

School-Year Academic Youth Development (SY-AYD) is a program designed to improve student performance by helping them develop a growth mindset and become more engaged and motivated in their overall learning. SY-AYD curriculum from Agile Mind can be delivered during an 8th, 9th, or 10th grade advisory, or within a designated class.  Intensified Algebra (IA) is a CCSS Algebra I course designed for students 1-3 years behind in mathematics. Using an extended period and a variety of strategies and resources (including those to develop a growth mindset), IA helps students catch up to grade-level in one year. IA is enacted in 8th, 9th, or 10th grade. Students receive one credit of Algebra I and the remaining credit would be elective credit. Schools must use the State Course Code for Intensified Algebra = 02059.

The Educator’s Course in Academic Youth Development (E-AYD) is a professional development experience designed for educators interested in learning about the research and strategies that are most critical to student learning and achievement.

In Woodland, we will have up to 50 students per year in Intensified Algebra every year in two classes. Students will be selected based on their spring 8th grade iReady and SBAC assessment results. We will use the iReady data to determine the students who are scoring in grades 7 and 6. Students who score in this range on iReady but meet mastery on SBAC, or who score in early eighth grade on iReady but do not meet mastery on SBAC, will be carefully considered as well. Should there be additional spaces in the course, we will work from the sixth grade cut score down into the group of students scoring at the fifth grade level.

We will offer two sections of a joint IA/SY-AYD class in a two period, 110-minute block on Tuesdays through Fridays, with only IA being taught 86 minutes on Mondays.  IA will be taught during the first 80 minutes of the 110-minute block on Tuesdays through Fridays, and SY-AYD will be taught the last 30 minutes. Classes on Monday are 46 minutes each, so we will teach only 86 minutes of IA on Mondays.

As grant recipients, funding will be provided to cover the cost of services for SY-AYD program license/curriculum through Agile Mind and related Professional Development including:

  1. a 2.5 day annual training for instructors (Advisory teachers) teaching SY-AYD, which takes place in August;
  1. a 15-hour Educator’s Course in AYD (6 hours in person, 9 hours online) training for math faculty who teach math to students who are participating in AYD (this training will be provided on location at your school or district, or may be made available at another host site and does not need to be limited to math faculty); and
  1. 2 full days leadership training in Spring 2018 (March and April).

Additionally, we will receive $10,000 during the first grant-funded implementation to help cover the costs of technology, travel, supplies, and collaboration for the first two years. The duration of the grant is four years with the expectation of submitting an updated iGrant application, including a revised budget, for years 3 and 4.