OSPI School Improvement Grant Opportunities: School and Classroom Practices Study FAQ

WORKING WITH YOU

District Level Data Collection

Interviews and Focus Groups

Although the report will focus on the school, there is some district level information that will be collected. Interviews and focus groups with district personnel will be conducted to review policies, procedures, and contracts that may influence readiness or capacity for implementing the School Improvement Models. For example, hiring and retention strategies, dismissal policies and procedures, and negotiated agreements may be reviewed. During this time, we would like to meet with the superintendent, head of human resources, union leadership, and additional support staff as appropriate. We can schedule these at the beginning of the day or the end of the day. Please plan on approximately 3-4 hours. We may need some additional time to collect data and documents. Below is a sample schedule:

District Interviews and Focus Group Sample Schedule
Time (Please Complete this Section)	Participants
Before School	School Leadership Team (45 Minutes)
Before School	Instructional Staff (45 Minutes)
8:00 – 9:00	Superintendent
9:00-10:00	Human Resources Personnel
10:00-11:00	Union Leadership
11:00 – 12:00	Additional District Support Staff
12:00-12:30	Document Collection

**These meetings can be scheduled in the morning or the afternoon from 1:00 to 5:00.

School Level Data Collection

To be eligible to receive OSPI grant funding, your school must first complete a School and Classroom Practices Study (SCPS).

The BERC Group will be conducting this study during the month of February 2010.

These one-day school review visits are designed to accomplish four things:

To help inform your district of the most appropriate federal intervention model for Tier I and Tier II schools
To help inform the district application on behalf of the school(s)
To identify focus areas for improvement
To examine how closely your school is aligned with OSPI’s research-based Nine Characteristics of High Performing Schools

Having The BERC Group conduct this study does not obligate you to apply for the grant. However, the SCPS is a pre-requisite in the event you do decide to apply for the grant.

On the day of the visit, a team of BERC researchers (two to eight people depending on the size of your school) will conduct interviews, focus groups, and classroom observations concurrently throughout the day. Researchers will also collect school documents.

Interviews and Focus Groups

Throughout the day of the visit, BERC researchers will conduct formal and informal interviews and focus groups with building administrators, the school leadership team, counselors, teachers, students, parents and community members, and classified staff. Staff members will be asked questions about their school practices and policies, which are most pertinent to that specific stakeholder group. To limit the impact on the classroom, we will not be pulling teachers out of their classrooms but instead, suggest that we meet with teachers during prep periods, at lunch, and/or before and after school.

Document Collection

To ensure a greater understanding of your school, and to help organize time most efficiently and effectively, BERC researchers will collect school documents. On the day of the visit, please have a copy of your master schedule, bell schedule, school/campus map, school improvement plan, parent/student handbook, and course catalog if available. Please feel free to include additional artifacts that will help us learn more about your school such as newsletters, activity schedules, or examples of Student Learning Plans and High School and Beyond Plans. We may ask for additional documents as they are referenced in the interviews and focus groups. In addition to the above documents, we will work with your school district to access additional data such as district climate surveys, school effectiveness surveys, and other school level information.

How will the data be reported?

The results of the school practices study will be made available to participants only in descriptive form at the aggregate school level. Triangulating data collected through the School and Classroom Practices Study, team members will reach consensus, assessing the school on a rubric organized around the Nine Characteristics of High Performing Schools. A short narrative will highlight strengths and weaknesses around each rubric rating.

Classroom Level Data Collection

The purpose of the observation study is to determine the nature of the classroom instruction that is taking place throughout the school. Typically, every classroom is observed with the exception of physical education, music, and high impact special education classes. Classes that are testing are not generally observed.

What is involved in the classroom observations?

A BERC researcher will visit each classroom in your school for 25 to 30 minutes. Researchers want to observe “typical” lessons, so teachers should not do any special preparation for the observations. Because we schedule the observations after we arrive at the school, teachers will not necessarily know what time of the day the observations will occur in any given classroom. You and your staff are not responsible for scheduling the classroom observations.

What kind of data will be collected?

Observers will be using the STAR Classroom Observation Protocol that focuses on measuring the extent to which Powerful Teaching and Learning™ is present during the observation period. The Protocol will be made available to participants after the visit.

How will the data be reported?

The results of the classroom practices study will be made available to participants only in descriptive form at the aggregate school level. Individual teacher results will NOT be shared. If there are questions from teachers about how these findings will be reported and used, please assure them of the following:

No individual classroom observation results will be reported or available to anyone within the school, within the district, or external to the district. All data is anonymous.

Reporting the Study Results

Within a week of the visit, the school (or district) will receive a SCPS report on the school and classroom practices, detailing findings and highlighting the school’s capacity to improve in each of the Nine Characteristics of High Performing Schools. The report will discuss barriers to implementing improvement plans at your school and offer suggestions.

BERC Group researchers will review data with district personnel and assist you in thinking about how you will use this data to move forward with your school improvement grant application. This report will include information about district policies and procedures that may support or hinder schools around the intervention models. Information from the report can be used to inform the district application on behalf of the schools.

Whether or not your school applies for the School Improvement Grant, the information from this study can also be used to move the school forward in school improvement planning. Because information in the report is aligned with district and state goals for improving student achievement and with research on best practices, the school review data for each school can be very useful in setting expectations for what kinds of structures, policies, and practices should be in place in order to improve student achievement for all students. The data shows schools very clearly where they are falling short. Because the process is based on a rubric, school personnel can see that there is a continuum and a path they can follow toward improvement. To use the school review data well, it needs to be incorporated into the school’s systems and become part of an accountability structure. School and district personnel will have access to the rubrics and the Facilitator’s Handbook, which can be used for ongoing internal self-assessment and reflection.

What happens next?

Once the date for the school review visit is confirmed, please work with your school staff to arrange interviews and focus groups with staff and stakeholders according to the sample schedule found below. It is not necessary for your team to arrange a schedule for the classroom observations. Please send us a finalized schedule, indentifying the times for the interviews and focus groups. The schedule should be sent to Ellie Whitehill (ellie@bercgroup.com) and Candace Gratama (candace@bercgroup.com).

Thank you for your help in scheduling this study! Please contact us if you have any questions about the project:

e: Candace Gratama (service@bercgroup.com)
o: (206) 229-8530

Sample Schedules

Baseline interviews/focus groups will need to be conducted with each of the following school stakeholders:

Building Administrators
Leadership Team
Counselors
Classified Staff
Instructional Staff
Students
Parents/Community members

Interviews and Focus Group Sample Schedule*
Time	Participants
Before School	School Leadership Team (45 Minutes)
Before School	Instructional Staff (45 Minutes)
8:00 – 9:00	Principal and Assistant Principals (1 hour)
9:00-9:45	Parents (45 Minutes)
10:00-10:45	Counselors (45 minutes)
During Lunch	Student Volunteers, representing grades 4 or above (approximately 6 to 8 students) (45 minutes)
1:00 – 1:45	Classified Staff (45 minutes)
2:00 – 2:45	Instructional Staff (45 minutes)
After School	Instructional Staff (45 minutes)

*If it is easier or more efficient to arrange the day in a different way, please do so. The length of time for each interview/focus group listed here is preferred but can be adjusted.
*It is important that reviewers talk to each of the stakeholder groups. It is especially important to speak with at least two groups of instructional staff.

NOTE: Classroom observations will occur concurrently with interviews/focus groups.