a strong voice for kids 2nd Congressional District

SUCKLA: Telluride was very welcoming and beautiful for our August meeting, and we had a wonderful discussion with school board members from the area. The Montezuma-Cortez school district recently had a Native American Culture Day, with a typical Native American breakfast at the beginning, teaching some Navaho and Ute works. Navaho is a very difficult language to learn and even to pronounce. There was some Native American dancing at the event. Had an interesting meeting in a very interesting place – Jo O’Brien, Assistant Commissioner, came to the Suckla ranch, and they went horseback riding. Came up with some ideas for improving education, which will be shared with us in the future. Thanked all SBE members for their continued hard work.

LITTLETON: Attended some Back-to-School Nights. It’s never a boring time in her part of the state. Had a good time discussing concerns.

HUDAK: I was part of the committee to select the Teacher of the Year. The applicants were very inspiring, and we should consider asking them to be part of an advisory group on improving teacher preparation and accountability; they have good ideas. The most recent issue of Insights from CASB has a lot of good information about early childhood care and education; I hope everyone read it. I reported previously that a task force on governance of the early childhood system would be making a decision that could impact CDE; I am glad to report that the consensus of the group was not to remove all the parts of state departments dealing with early childhood and put them into one new state department; rather, the group feels that there should be a board that coordinates the work already being done. I had the opportunity to serve on an advisory group for Jefferson County Schools on the issue of the district policy regarding military recruiters. NCLB says that military recruiters should have the "same access" as college recruiters, but parents and students can opt out of having their information be given to military recruiters. Jeffco is looking closely at Boulder Valley’s policy, which is a good model. I have been attending meetings of the Alliance for Quality Teachers, as they explore the concept of having unique identification numbers for teachers. I urged them to speak with the SBE, since CDE would be the place where any work for this would be done. Finally, Polis, Schaffer, and I visited recently with the school board of the St. Vrain Valley district. One very interesting question they raised was how much the public really gleans from all the NCLB reports that districts are required to produce and send out. They said that they are focusing on early childhood, because that’s where a difference can really be made. They pointed out the need for better collaboration in early childhood. They also said they hope we will support the P-16 initiative, because it is vital for students to develop 21^st century skills and compete in a global economy.

POLIS: Had a number of meetings recently with different school boards, such as St. Vrain Valley with Schaffer and Hudak and Thompson with Schaffer. Another was Brighton, which he did with Middleton. Many districts are concerned about capital expenditures. There are some commonalities and some differences in the concerns that districts have expressed. They’re not entirely happy with the accountability measures and want more support from CDE in different areas. Testified to the U.S. Congress at a hearing held in Greeley on the DREAM Act, something he personally supports, a bipartisan bill that would give a path to citizenship for students who are brought here as children and go to our schools. Spoke to Leaders Challenge, a group that was in several Colorado high schools. Was in a baseball tournament to benefit the Academy of Urban Learning, a charter school serving homeless and transitional kids.

MIDDLETON: Met with the Brighton school board with Polis, and was at their new teacher luncheon. Last night met with Westminster 50, which has a new Superintendent. Aurora’s new superintendent has a new plan and challenge for the community, involving all stakeholders in the community. Went with Ed Steinberg, Assistant Commissioner, to be on a panel about special education with the Aurora and Cherry Creek school districts. Parents would like to see the creation of some kind of advisory board to air their concerns. Attended the Back-to-School Night at Jefferson High School, when they gave away 100 computers from the Polis Foundation.

SCHAFFER: As was said, went to the St.Vrain Valley school district with Hudak and Polis. Went to a Back-to-School Night in the Liberty School District, which is west of Joes, Colorado.

DEHOFF: [No report.]

MUNN: [Absent, because his wife had a baby 3 days ago.

NCLB & ACCOUNTABILITY

Welcomed Phil Fox, who is assisting Gerry Difford as a liaison to the state’s superintendents. Phil Fox said that he never would have imagined that he would be here at CDE, after all his years working for CASE (Colorado Association of School Executives). He will be working with superintendents on improving the communication in key areas, including data, the shortage of special education teachers, and declining enrollment. There will be a Colorado Superintendents Advisory Council formed as the mechanism for doing this. CSAC membership will be comprised of the chairs of the 5 superintendents’ groups around the state, which includes the Denver Area School Superintendents Council (DASSC), the South Superintendents, and the West Slope Superintendents. CSAC should provide Commissioner Moloney a way to have better communication with district leaders and more direct, timely, problem-solving communication. It will utilize a satellite system so that people don’t have to drive to Denver for all the meetings.

The U. S. Department of Education has issued new flexibility for LEP (Limited English Proficient) students. It allows states to exempt recently arrived LEP students (those arriving in the U.S. within the last year) from the state’s Reading assessment, from counting in the AYP determinations, and from having their scores reported to the public if they do take the assessments. Also, former LEP students may be included in AYP calculations up to two additional years. NCLB has appropriated additional money in Title I and Title III for LEP students. The USDE has initiated an "LEP Partnership" to provide states with technical assistance and resources to help make assessments more accessible and appropriate for LEP students and to develop English and native-language assessments in Reading and Math.

CDE received a letter from the USDE saying that states must do away with HOUSSE provisions, except for certain teachers (HOUSSE is the "Highly Objective, Uniform State System of Evaluation," which allows veteran teachers to comply with the Highly Qualified Teachers provision of NCLB without necessarily having a license and endorsement in every subject they teach). The exceptions are for newly hired secondary school teachers teaching multiple subjects in eligible rural districts who met the HOUSSE provisions at the time of hire; special education teachers teaching multiple subjects who met the HOUSSE provisions in language arts, math, or science at the time of hire; and teachers from other countries teaching here on a temporary basis. There were only 9 states (not Colorado) that submitted acceptable plans to meet the HQT provision of NCLB this year. The USDE "intends to pursue the further phaseout of HOUSSE procedures through the reauthorization of NLCB."

The USDE is encouraging Colorado to submit a plan for longitudinal growth, since we were rejected for the growth pilot but had "several strengths" and unique ideas in our proposal. They sent us a letter "clarifying" why we were rejected. It says that our growth targets would never have reached 100%, as required, and it did not "truly measure individual student growth" and was "not significantly different" from the already existing Safe Harbor or "status" approaches to AYP, since it just measured the percentage of students who moved from non-proficient to proficient. USDE proposed that Colorado incorporate is proposed use of longitudinal data in its plan for implementing NCLB under Section 1111(b)(3)(B). We also have the option of revising our growth proposal and re-submitting it, but the deadline is November 1. That’s not a lot of time to develop an entirely new proposal, so it seems that taking advantage of Section 1111 is our best option. To do so, we will have to create a data system that links student test scores, length of enrollment, and graduation rates over time. CDE believes it is possible to do so by January or February, giving us enough time to include it in the plan due April 1.

CDE is doing more district visits with support teams, and many districts have put together their own teams to do the same, such as Jeffco and Montezuma-Cortez. CDE has designed a Corrective Action plan that differentiates among districts in regard to the percentage of targets met and not net. Technical assistance will be focused on districts that had below 85% of targets met (categorized as "Low"). CDE will have a web-linked number of resources for districts to access for each target for which they didn’t make AYP. Districts at the High, Good, or Fair levels may forgo the CDE Corrective Action plan and satisfy requirements by developing a plan for Program Improvement that includes several options. Peggy Littleton asked that Corrective Action plans be "run through" the Reading Directorate to ensure that they comply with the Colorado Basic Literacy Act.

Gerry Difford and Gary Sibigtroth from CDE have been preparing for the next rounds of Accreditation contracts. They will have a proposal for the Board to consider by December for changes in the rules for Accreditation. They have been meeting with various education stakeholders and gathering suggestions; CASE, CASB, CEA, and CSAN have all been part of the discussions, as well as the superintendent groups. The plan is for the SBE to pass the new rules early in 2007; districts would then have until June 30, 2007, to create their new Accreditation Contract for our approval. Starting in October, CDE will have a PowerPoint presentation on the process.

BUDGET. Decision items were due to the Joint Budget Committee by September 1. CDE submitted the ones that they knew about; there is time to add items from the SBE’s priorities. There is some flexibility for the new Governor to set some priorities, but most of CDE’s budget is in statute, in the School Finance Act. CDE’s increase requested is $156 million to fund the 8,000 new kids at the 2.5% inflation rate and the 1% required increase. Some Read-to-Achieve increases and other items were "placeholder" items we submitted, pending the SBE’s legislative priorities being determined.

LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES:

• Support legislation and/or practices that enforce the federal government to fulfill its obligation of the original grant of in-lieu lands. (This item is added because there are still about 7,000 acres of in lieu lands, which are lands owed to the Land Trust that the State Land Board has not incorporated.)
• Change the property signage of "State Trust Land"s to "School Trust Lands" throughout the state.

• Support efforts to fund identified capital construction needs across the state, including the Giardino lawsuit settlement.

• (We will come up with some wording on funding high-needs special education students.)
• Provide state funding for eligible facilities and educational orphans in a way that minimizes the impact on districts.

• Support funding that would help districts with the excess expenditures they are experiencing for special education, gifted and talented education, transportation, English language learners, and vocational education.

• Support the expansion of the PSEO statute so that advanced students can take advantage of college coursework before the 11^th grade, as agreed by school and parent.

• Expand support for online programs across the state by authorizing a staff position as a liaison for these programs.
• Continue funding for coordination of supplemental online courses.
• Ensure accessibility to online schools for all Colorado students. [This is accompanied by an agreement, brought to the Board by DeHoff and me, to improve accreditation requirements regarding the supervision of satellite "learning centers" provided by online schools.]

• The SBE supports efforts to improve the funding and access to quality early childhood education and family literacy and to improve the transition from early childhood education and preschool to K-12.
• Kindergarten – Create incentives for districts to expand their full-day kindergarten opportunities.
• Early Childhood and Family Literacy – Support legislation that would increase access and funding for at-risk children to early childhood education and family literacy programs. Support efforts to improve the quality of early childhood settings.
• Colorado Preschool and Kindergarten Program – Level the "playing field"between public and private providers; support the 3-year implementation to full funding for CPKP; and continue to ensure that CPKP serves the most at-risk kids.

• (Something about restoration of funding.)

(The presentation was filmed by the district’s own television station.) Adams County School District 14 serves Commerce City and parts of Thornton and unincorporated Adams County. It has 80% of its students on free or reduced lunch (FRL), and 61% of its students have parents who have not earned a high school diploma or GED. The district’s demographics have been changing over the last 5 years, with an increasing number of students who are Hispanic, who are on FRL, and whose parents have not completed a high school education. Enrollment is about 7,000. It has a "tremendously large" preschool program. Before John Lange became superintendent, the district went through 3 superintendents in a short period of time.

Adams 14 has brought in national experts on how to create a high-performing district with low "SES" (socio-economic status). There is an emphasis on educating the "whole child." Recently there was a significant decrease in behavior problems in the district, due in part to the Positive Behavior Support (PBS) program from CDE. The district’s G/T programs have blossomed recently. The district now gives bonus checks for teachers when the district makes improvements on test scores. Colorado doesn’t prepare enough teachers for our districts, so they have to recruit from out of state. They have incorporated the state standards more thoroughly. They use overtly teaching strategies. They encourage social interactions with students. The emphasis on music and art education appears to have benefited the district tremendously. Decided not to pull kids out of music and art classes to "double-dose" them in reading and math. The music program is mandated for all elementary students. The district is recruiting for musical instruments. Nearly half the kids in 5^th grade choose instrumental music. Students do not have to spend any of their own money for musical instruments, music books, or instruction. The Commerce City Youth Orchestra is an opportunity through SCFD to provide instrumental orchestra in the area. Visual arts are also mandatory for all elementary students. At the secondary level, neither music nor art is mandatory, but about one-fifth of students elect to participate in such as music electives and one-fifth in art. The district has received many grants to fund these programs, such as the VH-1 Save the Music Program. It has improved students’ attitude and "joy" of going to school.

Lynn Heintzman, principal of Alsup Elementary, spoke about her school in Commerce City. It has about 500 students, 67% of which are Hispanic, 82% on FRL, and 33% with parents who have high school diploma or GED. Since 2003, they have improved Reading in 3^rd grade from 63% to 93%, 4^th grade from 28% to 68% , 5^th grade from 40% to 65%. They attribute their improvements to frequently regrouping students using assessment data, professional learning communities for the teachers, and individualized intervention plans for all students who need them. The principal meets with all teachers individually on a regular basis, analyzing their students’ data and needs. Also, the principal meets with students individually to review their writing and literacy needs (she was an English teacher). The school adopted a common resource for teaching Writing (Write Source). They have used PBS very successfully. They use the "balanced literacy" approach. They assign homework. They have a strategic plan for giving CSAP and getting students to attend school to take the test. Students take ownership of their learning by setting their own goals.

The district has embraced the concept of literacy improvement through "lexiles." This has to do with matching a reader with a text, based on the number of words per sentence, the length and complexity of sentences, and the vocabulary. (Go to www.lexile.com to have a piece of writing analyzed.) Thus, the student can read something at a "reasonable" level of comprehension (76%). For example, John Grisham’s books are generally at lexile levels of 660-930, which might be at a 3^rd-5^th grade level (except for content). On the other hand, the New York Times has a lexile level of 1380, a post-high school level. USA Today 1200, a 10^th – 12^th grade level. The average workplace requires a 1260. A typical 8^th grader reads between 805 and 1100. As soon as you go 250 lexiles above a reader’s level, their comprehension is about 50%, and they get frustrated. The 8^th grade Science CSAP is 1060. A typical 8^th grader in Adams 14 is at 789. Therefore, about 50% of their students are at the frustration level on the Science CSAP. Only 12% of their students can read at a 1060 or above. Nationally, it’s about 75%. The district is using the Lindamood Bell program, Read 180, and LTRS to improve students’ reading. They piloted the Lindamood Bell at Monaco Elementary School and had a 23% improvement in Reading, 43% in Math, and 16% in Writing after one year.

Moloney mentioned that at the beginning of Colorado’s reform efforts, nobody thought we could improve student achievement with students of poverty and color. Adams 14’s successes show that it can be done.

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