Leadscape Year 5 Quarter 2 Report

Year 5 Quarter 2 Report APRIL, MAY, JUNE, 2011

TABLE OF CONTENTS LEADERSHIP......................................................................................................................................................................... 1 BACKGROUND & PROJECT OVERVIEW..........................................................................................................................2 Performance Criteria. ............................................................................................................................................................................................3 CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT............................................................................................................................................4 Goal 1 Evidence.......................................................................................................................................................................................................4 1.1 Refining the LeadScape Platform.........................................................................................................................................................................4 1.2 Engaging Principals in Data analysis and School Improvement............................................................................................................................4 1.3 Tracking changes over time...................................................................................................................................................................................5 Goal 1 Accomplishments........................................................................................................................................................................................6 RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT.............................................................................................................................................8 Goal 2 Evidence.......................................................................................................................................................................................................8 2.1 Synthesizing research............................................................................................................................................................................................8 2.2 Creating and reviewing new products....................................................................................................................................................................8 2.3 Designing Dialog Guides....................................................................................................................................................................................10 Goal 2 Accomplishments......................................................................................................................................................................................10 PROFESSIONAL LEARNING................................................................................................................................................ 10 Goal 3 Evidence.....................................................................................................................................................................................................10 3.1 Recruiting, Selecting and Convening Principals...................................................................................................................................................10 3.2 Leadership modules............................................................................................................................................................................................11 3.3 Refining the coaching process...............................................................................................................................................................................11 Goal 3 Accomplishments......................................................................................................................................................................................12 NETWORKING & DISSEMINATION................................................................................................................................... 12 Goal 4 Evidence.....................................................................................................................................................................................................12 4.1 Expanding the network.....................................................................................................................................................................................12 4.2 Increase usage of LeadScape web site resources...................................................................................................................................................13 Goal 4 Accomplishments......................................................................................................................................................................................14 CONCLUSION ........................................................................................................................................................................ 14 STUDENT’S EXPERIENCES SURVEY ................................................................................................................................ 15 SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT SURVEY: TEACHER PRACTICES......................................................................................... 16 SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT SURVEY: SCHOOL PRACTICES........................................................................................... 17

Leadership PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR Elizabeth B. Kozleski Director and Principal Investigator Arizona State University

PROJECT ASSISTANT DIRECTOR

STAFF

ADVISORY BOARD

David Gibson Continuous Improvement & Evaluation, Arizona State University

Alfredo Artiles Arizona State University

Anna George, Evaluation Assistant Arizona State University Kristi Jackson, External Evaluation Consultant, Queri

Cynthia Mruczek Assistant Director Arizona State University

Beverly Cross University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Paula Goldberg PACER Center Charlene Green Clark County School District Joe Johnson National Center for Urban School Transformation Richard Barbacane National Association of Elementary School Principals

PROJECT OFFICER Grace Zamora Durรกn Project Officer Office of Special Education Programs U.S. Department of Education, Washington, D.C.

John Radloff Guideworks, LLC Paul Teske University of Colorado at Denver and Health Sciences Center

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The National Institute for Urban School Improvement (NIUSI) established a principal leadership professional development center, LeadScape, which supports school improvement to ensure access to and participation and progress in the general education curriculum in the least restrictive environment. Originally titled the NIUSI Principal Leadership Academies Initiative (NIUSI-PLAN), the center’s name was changed to LeadScape in order to increase its marketability. NIUSI was an OSEP-funded technical assistance and dissemination project with over 10 years of national experience in supporting the development of networks of schools as they develop robust practices for ensuring that students with disabilities have access to and participate successfully in the general education environment.

Funded at $268,000 per year, the project had a small budget to reach all 110,000 principals in the US with its message, tools, and strategies to support the ways in which students with disabilities would have opportunities to learn and succeed in general education classrooms and curricula. Therefore, LeadScape’s resources were carefully stewarded with a large investment in technology infrastructure development with limited face to face technical assistance.

LeadScape is designed to directly assist at least 400 principals across the country to develop, implement, and sustain inclusive schools ensuring that ALL students with and without disabilities meet or exceed academic standards set and measured by state assessment systems. Based on the tools and products developed and field tested by NIUSI, LeadScape developed an electronic platform to bring principals from around the country together, in sustained professional communities, focused on leadership for inclusive schools. The platform makes it possible to incorporate effective research-based strategies and methods for professional learning as well as effective research-based content and tools focused on information that principals need to know and do to achieve and sustain effective, inclusive schools. An important part of this work is the direct technical assistance, coaching, and mentoring that the project provides to principals both online and in-person. The importance of the digital outreach cannot be over emphasized.

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Background & Project Overview In spite of powerful federal legislation embodied in the IDEA reauthorization of 2004, schools and local educational agencies continue to serve students with disabilities in separate classrooms and schools. In 2010, the NIUSI-LeadScape analysis of 2010 data on Indicator 5 noted that across all states on average, 60% of students with IEPs are educated outside of regular classrooms up to 20% of the day and 13% are educated outside of regular classrooms greater than 60% of the day.

IDEA mandates that students with disabilities receive their education with nondisabled peers to the maximum extent appropriate. Evidence from two large national studies, the second National Longitudinal Transition Study and the Special Education Elementary Longitudinal Study, suggest that students with disabilities who spend more time in general education classrooms tend to be absent less, perform closer to grade level than their peers in pull-out settings, and have higher achievement test scores (Blackorby et al., 2005).

While NCLB has focused public and professional attention on the outcomes of education through annual measurement of student progress – by concentrating on annual yearly progress on a school by school basis and disaggregating test scores by race/ ethnicity, English language learners, and students in special education - special education services remain much as they were in the eighties and early nineties. Special education experiences a troublesome and persistent overrepresentation of students who are culturally and linguistically diverse, particularly in urban areas. Further, students who are African-American and Latino are more likely than White and Asian-American students to be in more segregated placements (Donovan & Cross, 2002).

Schools need to develop their capacity to teach students who are culturally and linguistically diverse within general education using research-based teaching and learning practices that produce high quality learning for all students. Further, special

education needs to become a proactive, preventative system that does not wait for students to fall behind before they get the educational supports needed to learn. This means that the roles of special educators and related service providers must be conceptualized to enhance whole school improvement.

Through collaborative professional learning opportunities, special and general educators must work together to support learning in the general education curriculum.

This kind of change requires local leadership. Principals must engage whole school improvement that binds special and general education in a seamless learning system for all students. To ensure that principals have the technical knowledge and skills to be instructional leaders for all students is a daunting task. Knowing that principals change positions frequently requires a response that grounds learning in present circumstances and bridges future changes by anchoring learning and development to web-based, e-learning solutions that provide multiple kinds of tools for knowledge development, diffusion, implementation, and continuous improvement.

Enter NIUSI-LeadScape.

LeadScape is developing powerful networks of principals that embrace and implement evidence-based, systemic school improvement approaches for inclusive practices. The initiative is organized into four action arenas, each of which has a core team that implements the goal, objectives and manages the timelines. These goals include (1) continuous improvement systems for classrooms, schools, and school systems; (2) ongoing participatory research and development to inform and improve outcomes for all students; (3) inclusive, culturally responsive professional learning that results in improved outcomes for all students; and (4) networking and dissemination that extends the reach of this project and impacts practice nationally.

P er for m ance C r iter i a LeadScape is known for its high-quality human, technical and content-rich resources, which it creates in the context of fieldwork at all levels of the complex educational system. The project also identifies, collects and disseminates high-quality resources from others’ research and development on equity matters.

The outcome measures of our goals focus on the assessment of products and services with six criteria (Figure 1) through the collection of data embedded within internal operations and through feedback from our clients and expert advisors: Q: Quality – Quality – Are our products and services rigorous and scientifically-based?

A: We measure quality through feedback from our participants on our web-based products, evaluation from meetings, the number of long-term relationships we develop with districts, feedback from experts, by comparing our work to other equity assistance centers, and participating in ongoing conversations with national leaders.

Q: Understanding – Do our products and services produce understanding?

A: We measure understanding by the degree to which our participants indicate they understand and can use information from our print, electronic, and face-to-face delivery of information. The measure of understanding comes primarily from our end user evaluations, which we conduct after conferences, consultations, online webinars and via random surveys of our mailing list.

Q: Authenticity – Do our products and services reflect the current and foreseeable realities of our audiences?

Figure 1. Performance criteria

A: We measure success in accessibility by the demographics of our end users, information that we collect through surveys conducted at all levels of our technical assistance model. We look for broad audience participation across all of our conferences, consultations, and from those who find, download and use our products.

Q: Usefulness – Are our products and services useful in developing and sustaining changes in student and staff behavior?

A: We survey end users throughout the year to take measures on this criterion and ask experts for their opinions about our products and services.

Q: Market share – Are we expanding our knowledge networks and reaching new audiences?

A: We use online tracking tools to report increases in the number of requests for technical assistance, the number of new visitors to our web site, and which tools, products and pages they are downloading. We compare these results quarter by quarter and benchmark our performance to industry standards. We increase market share by leveraging these sources of information to take advantage of the yearly cycle of communications, conferences and other events that stimulate market response.

A: We measure authenticity by the degree to which our end users tell us that our products and services have immediate applicability to their contexts. We also ensure that products we create stem from fieldbased concerns and real experiences, which we garner through deep interactions in at all levels of technical assistance.

Q: Accessibility – Are our products and services accessible to families, students, and school boards in rural and suburban districts, small towns and cities?

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Continuous Improvement Goal 1: Increase knowledge and understanding of inclusive education through continuous assessment of current practice, change efforts and impact.

1.1. Create, launch, and refine the LeadScape platform 1.2. Engage principals in data analysis, school improvement planning and implementation.

1.3. Track changes over time in sites and within the project using project management tools.

Goal 1 Evidence: The LeadScape website platform serves as an important medium for dissemination of professional learning materials and as a way of drawing interest nationally to school leadership activities. The project views each digital tool in the platform as a mediating structure for change at every level of the system, for example, teachers’ instructional strategies, the principal’s role, school leadership team practices, and district and federal policies. Evidence documented in this section shows progress in refining the platform, engaging principals, and tracking changes that are resulting from our work with principals.

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The Facebook and Twitter feeds have been updated to include a new integrated logo that incorporates the LeadScape logo within the Equity Alliance logo (Figure 2).

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A new introductory tool about LeadScape is in development.

This application will be an interactive document with embedded videos that will link directly from the home page.

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The “Topical Briefs” and “Professional Learning” sections of the website are being revised to be cleaner, and less textheavy in order to pique readers’ interest and bring them to the Learning Carousel, our online clearinghouse of resources, through “click here to read more” links.

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A new Sharing Tool was added so that users can easily share (via Facebook, Twitter, email, etc.) products and tools throughout the website.

1.1 Refining the LeadScape Platform LeadScape continuously seeks ways to make the web-based platform more accessible and user-friendly. The following outlines several structural changes made during the April through June quarter: •

•

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Topical Briefs page was updated to include a full and detailed description of products available, and now informs readers how to acquire these products.

A “Find Out More” button on the Homepage was redirected to lead visitors to an informative document outlining the benefits of LeadScape to professionals. This document highlights the project’s work in transformative leadership, and invites readers to become involved.

The “Lead”, “Learn”, “Liberate” motto at the top splash page has been updated to match the colors on the LeadScape logo and the words have been linked to relevant pages within the site, as follows: Lead- Data Maps Learn- Professional Learning Modules Liberate – Learning Carousel This change accentuates LeadScape’s efforts to make the website highly interactive and visually appealing, and thus more engaging.

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Figure 2. Integrated Logos of LeadScape and the Equity Alliance

1.2 Engaging Principals in Data analysis and School Improvement Last quarter, we reported that a partnership had been created between LeadScape and the Arizona State University Institute for Social Science Research to create visual representations of education data pertinent to providing equitable educational outcomes for all children using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) mapping.

At the conclusion of this quarter, a prototype of the national-level maps was internally launched and is being readied for public use (Figure 3). The maps display data in the following categories: LeastRestrictive Environment (LRE), Disability Prevalence, Under-Qualified Teachers, and Risk-Ratios for LRE and Disability Prevalence.

Figure 3. New Data Maps Display We have found over time that when school leaders see their own communities in a larger context and with a new set of eyes made possible by alternative displays of their own data, it fosters new questions and a need to know more, which fuels inquiry into systemic change.

Maps are thus one of the many mediating tools developed by LeadScape to help advance positive change. These maps are vital for assisting principals in assessing and comparing their educational leadership goals with educational progress around the country.

Data for the maps comes from public sources such as the National Center for Educational Statistics and the IDEA.org web sites. Next on the development timeline, the Data Maps toolset will include classroom-level maps for partnership schools.

1.3 Tracking changes over time This quarter, the LeadScape staff developed and refined three tools to administer to LeadScape principals and their staff in order to gain an idea of how reflective practices are emerging in their schools. The tools are entitled “Best Practices Rating Tool”, “Student Experiences Survey for Teachers”, and the “School Improvement Survey”.

The “Best Practices Rating Tool” is designed to offer schools a set of inclusive education best-practice indicators, a framework to guide inclusive programming, and a rating scale from which schools can evaluate their progress and determine targets for improvement.

The current draft of this tool has been edited from a version created by Anne Denham and colleagues, Inclusive Education Initiative, University of Kentucky. The Best Practice Indicators (Table 1) are divided into six areas that impact effective inclusive education. It is intended that schools address each of the areas over a period of time, so the rating scale is designed to facilitate growth over time in these dimensions.

Table 1. Best Practices Indicators 1.

High Expectations and Least Dangerous Assumptions

2.

General Education Class Membership and Full Participation

3.

Curriculum, Instruction and Support

4.

Ongoing Authentic Assessment

5.

Team Collaboration

6.

Professional Development

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Each school is in a different place on the road to providing high quality inclusive education (equitable services and supports to all students) and may address these indicators in a flexible manner appropriate to their progress or structure. The indicators may be completed as a school, including all faculty members, or with faculty and staff members working in collaboration to educate students with significant disabilities. LeadScape integrates the rating process into the school’s inquiry into practice. The survey is ideally completed prior to the beginning of the school year, again in January to review progress, and again at the end of the school year when progress can be measured. If all school and team personnel complete the rating independently, results can be tabulated and viewed as a validated expression of group self-assessment by the very people responsible for the desired outcomes, a process that enhances the organization’s shared vision and mental models of culturally responsive practice-in-action.

The Students’ Experiences Survey and the School Improvement Survey are both appended at the end of this report, in the hopes that readers will take, use and help disseminate these practices. To illustrate how tools such as these can impact a school, we next relate an in-depth story from this quarter’s efforts.

The School Improvement Survey was used with teachers in a LeadScape partnership school in Tempe, AZ. As a gap-finding exercise, the purpose was to evaluate and compare “ideal” with “actual” practices. The results of using the 25-question tool were shared with 30 participants in order to highlight areas of interest for further conversation. From the discussions an agenda for action and next steps emerged, which shaped how LeadScape would work with the school for the next year.

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Example School Improvement Survey Results: Gaps in Practice

GOAL 1 ACCOMPLISHMENTS The following list summarizes the evidence of accomplishment during this quarter, organized by the performance criteria carried out in a Tempe Elementary School.

Accessibility & Understanding Many changes were made to the LeadScape homepage to enhance usability and navigation, and attract visitors to other areas of the website.

Authenticity & Quality Survey tools created and utilized in a Tempe elementary school highlight the way in which teacher practices can be evaluated by self-reflection and inform principal leadership using innovative tools and dialogue.

Market Share Figure 4. School Improvement Survey Gap Analysis Example Results For example, using fictitious data in Figure 4, a list of issues is represented and organized by the largest to least gaps between the ideal and actual practices. Only issues with at least a 20% difference in opinion are shown. In other settings, choosing items with the least difference might be the best place for dialog to begin. These ways of ordering prioritizes the potential work with a school and gives the LeadScape principal “food for thought” to create a long-term strategy. LeadScape assists the principal in using this kind of data to drive decisions about next steps in improvement.

In this example (Figure 4), the top two issues concern the student experience, which might lead to a conversation to explore why people highly value the idea of students being engaged in decision-making and motivated by their own interests, while the actual situation is so far removed from that ideal vision. A gap like this is an opportunity to explore causes, connections, networks of relationships, and to surface the barriers and structural reasons for the differences, in order to design actions to improve the system in the direction of everyone’s shared vision.

During the conversation with leadership at an elementary school in Tempe, AZ, LeadScape staff also discussed those indicators that had a minimal difference between ideal and actual practices. This provided an opportunity to talk about small changes in practice that might produce significant results for the overall inclusive environment of the school. By focusing on those indicators that teachers believed were important, leadership could make concerted efforts that would support those actions that would make the indicator a reality.

Using tools to mediate thinking and dialogue about equity matters is central to the LeadScape approach to professional support of principals and is central to the way we approach Goal 1.

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The “Learn More” link on the website leads readers to a document that gives a snapshot of what LeadScape is and how it leads to transformative professional learning.

Understanding & Usefulness The new data maps are ready to be unveiled and utilized at the nationallevel. School-level maps for LeadScape partner schools are in progress.

Tracking may in fact be a significant determining factor in polarizing some students attitudes about themselves as winners and losers.

-- Ansalone & Biafora 2004

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Research & Development Goal 2: produce a set of 20 research syntheses that address the needs of practitioners and decision-makers.

2.1. Complete a synthesis of available research literature within the first 6 months of the project start date including a review of current NIUSI products and audience needs

Title:

Author(s):

Where are All of the Students of Color in Gifted Education?

Kathleen A. King, Elizabeth B. Kozleski, and Kimberly Lansdowne

2.2. Edit, review, and produce 4 new products per year

Did You Know??? 10 Things Any School Can Do to Build Parent Involvement….

Plus 5 Great Ways to Fail!

John H. Wherry

Did You Know??? About the Difference Between “Parent Involvement” and “Family/Community Linkages”?

Dianne Ferguson

Culturally Responsive Classroom Management Strategies

Skiba, R.J.

¿Ya sabía esto? ¿Ya sabía lo que los estudiantes de la escula secundaria piensan acerca de la participación de sus familias en la escuela?

Carolyn Ottke-Moore

Did You Know??? What High School Students Think about Their Families Being Involved in School?

Carolyn Ottke-Moore

2.3. Design and launch dialogue guides for each product to be launched on LeadScape

Goal 2 Evidence: 2.1 Synthesizing research The Systemic Change Framework (described in many previous quarterly reports) guides many dimensions of our work, including the choices we make to add resources to our large and growing online library and clearinghouse – The Learning Carousel. This quarter we added 12 new works by others (Table 2).

2.2 Creating and reviewing new products A new product, LeadScape Essentials, was developed this quarter. This news-style email outreach is targeted directly at principals, and focuses on leadership strategies that build inclusive schools. In addition, LeadScape Essentials serves as a networking medium to contact and connect principals with others by introducing conversation starters. Principals can respond to the ideas, and their comments are then linked to online discussion areas, increasing activities within communities of practice among educational leaders. Data is being collected on the performance of the new product and will be shared in future quarterly reports.

Broadly distributed monthly newsletters are also created and reviewed each quarter and are an important way that LeadScape connects evidence-based inquiry, analysis and reflection to real-world practice. These communications brings new information to the attention of

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FCPS Culturally Responsive Student Services Guide Did You Know??? What Parents of Special-Needs Kids Think About Their Child’s Educational Program?

Anne Stilwell

Systemic Change Framework Rubrics Assessment Handbook

National Institute for Urban School Improvement

Did You Know??? About Four Ways to Increase Parental Efficacy?

Anne Stilwell & Dianne Ferguson

Did You Know??? About Successful Strategies for Involving Migrant Families?

Anne Stilwell & Dianne Ferguson

The Reflective Principal

Gail McGregor & Christine Salisbury

Table 2. Open access documents added to the Learning Carousel

principals. The following are excerpts from three newsletters published this quarter that highlight critical themes in educational equity.

diverse population of students for a variety of individual and organizational reasons. One, among many, is that approaches to school discipline have traditionally been punitive. These ineffective measures have done little to teach new behaviors and have frequently contributed to school failure for countless students throughout the US. School administrators, teachers, families, and students have the immense, shared responsibility of creating and sustaining safe and orderly learning environments where students are empowered to safely share their opinions and perspectives. These strategies are used at individual, classroom, and school levels to prevent and intervene culturally, socially, emotionally, and behaviorally. This collective endeavor is vital to improving learning outcomes for ALL students.”

May 2011

Access and Participation: Summer Learning Edition Tracking may in fact be a significant determining factor in polarizing some students attitudes about themselves as winners and losers.

-- Ansalone & Biafora 2004

Figure 5. LeadScape Essentials news outreach.

April 2011

“Disparate school outcomes between groups of students continue to plague U.S schools. Culturally and linguistically diverse students are less likely to graduate from high school, apply for, enter, and complete college. They are more likely than their white counterparts to be placed in Special Education and less likely to be placed in gifted education classes. Further, failure to engage girls in STEM subjects means that African American, Hispanic, and Native American women in particular are drastically underrepresented in the STEM field. Each of these (and many other) troubling outcomes can find roots in access to and participation in rigorous learning opportunities both within the school setting and outside school time.”

June 2011

Planning for Culturally Responsive Schools

Culturally Responsive Behavior Supports ...the same kids who are least likely to do well in school are also the kids who are getting a disproportionate amount of discipline in school. And to show you the insanity of it, we typically discipline them by denying them school time.

--Pedro Noguera “Students need to feel physically and emotionally safe before they can focus their attention on actively participating in their own learning. Today many teachers and school administrators are often challenged to meet the diverse social and behavioral needs demonstrated by students. As the demographics have changed within many school communities, educators have struggled with proactively addressing the behavioral and social needs of an increasingly

When classrooms are organized into communities that are designed to encourage academic and cultural excellence, students learn to facilitate their own learning as well as that of their fellow students.

-- Elizabeth B. Kozleski “Culturally Responsive schools do not just happen by chance.

They happen because caring and knowledgeable individuals come together with ideas and plans that are carefully thought out, publicly scrutinized, and diligently executed. The best schools are intentional about everything they do - they are intentional about who is leading the school, who is teaching, how they use data to guide

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GOAL 2 ACCOMPLISHMENTS The following list summarizes the evidence of accomplishment during this quarter, organized by the performance criteria.

decisions, how resources are distributed, the way the curriculum is designed, the ways in which instruction is delivered, how progress is monitored, and the ways in which teachers and students are encouraged, engaged, and empowered. Everything is intentional, and nothing is left to chance.

2.3 Designing Dialog Guides No new activity took place during the quarter concerning dialogue guides, but web analytics data showed that existing guides are still being sought and downloaded. We share more specifics of the quarter’s analytics below.

Professional Learning Accessibility & Authenticity Three newsletters were published this quarter highlighting themes in inclusive education.

Market Share & Quality LeadScape Essentials, a new product, was developed this quarter, and is intended to stimulate conversation among principals and other school leaders.

Usefulness & Understanding Several new products have been added to the Learning Carousel, expanding the broad range of resources that our audience has at their disposal.

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Goal 3: leverage continued improvement of inclusive practices in schools through collaborative work with principal leaders focusing on research validated practices in the school improvement process, collection and use of evidence, universal designs for learning, early intervening, response to intervention, and culturally responsive practices 3.1. Recruit, select, and convene 400 principals across the U.S. for inclusive education leadership development.

3.2. Produce 5 online leadership modules for LeadScape.

3.3. Refine NIUSI-LeadScape coaching process using webinars, enews, email, weekly phone calls, and site visits.

Goal 3 Evidence: 3.1 Recruiting, Selecting and Convening Principals This quarter, LeadScape worked closely with the principal of an elementary school in Tempe, Arizona. Coaching dialogues, which staff members used to document LeadScape’s continuous improvement processes, reveal productive and useful conversations between our staff and the principal. LeadScape staff utilized the principal’s vision for the school, her understanding of inclusiveness, and the beliefs and values of the teachers at her school to help her reflect on and make decisions about improvement activities. For example, staff worked with the principal in identifying and discussing the challenges in relaying a vision to the teachers and administrative staff. In order to reflect on these challenges, LeadScape adapted a survey from its bank of tools and helped the principal collect data that produced information about the way teachers thought about inclusiveness and their alignment with the leadership team’s vision in terms of promoting inclusive practice. Some key results of this survey are presented in the Continuous Improvement section of this report, 1.3 Tracking Changes over Time.

LeadScape stresses to principals that it is important to share a vision of inclusive practice in ways that teachers can internalize and relate with inclusive practice. As improvement work progresses, LeadScape helps principals see the importance of observing the dynamics between people throughout the school in order to structure interventions to be as effective as possible. Typical questions that reflect themes in the dialogue between LeadScape staff and principals: What approaches do you want to explore and use in engaging all staff members in inclusive practices? What are the recurring topics that you see in data that comes from surveys such as this one? How might your teachers select topics for professional learning based on the

conversation raised from the results of using this tool?

LeadScape also worked closely with the school leadership team to develop a proposed scope of work for the upcoming school year, as outlined in Figure 6. The graphic shows Professional Learning (PL) experiences, Building Level Team (BLT) meetings and Professional Learning Community (PLC) team building and shared study experiences.

Implicit Outcomes: 1. Building and maintaining relationships with various professionals throughout our network.

2. Solidify their perception of our expertise in this area.

3. Illustrate our flexibility in using various media to provide Professional Learning opportunities.

4. Attract people to our website-delivered resources.

5. Provide opportunities for participants to network with each other.

Explicit Outcomes: 1. Participants will know the elements of Culturally Responsive Cognitive Coaching, including preparing for coaching session, relationship building, creating a Third Space, identifying goals for change, planning and evaluating progress.

2. Participants will be able to identify technical, contextual, and critical questions in the context of a modeled coaching session.

Figure 6. Scope of work for a LeatdScape school

3. Participants will understand the ways coaching prompts can be worded in order to move a coaching session from the technical to reflection at the contextual and critical levels.

3.3 Refining the coaching process 3.2 Leadership modules A certification training was planned for this Fall in conjunction with the Equity Assistance Center. We have found that specific certification training opportunities attract principals and equity leaders, who are anxious to add to their skills and knowledge. The added emphasis of a certification gives weight to the experiences and enhances the professional resumes of key leaders in the field. The training workshop will be “Leadership for Equity and Excellence”, and logistical planning is well underway.

Also, two follow-up webinars are in the early planning stages on the following themes: 1. Refreshing participants’ understanding of Culturally Responsive Cognitive Coaching 2. Making It Happen These webinars will be designed for the purpose of further supporting participants from the Certification training in their development as leaders for equity. The webinars will have the following outcomes:

LeadScape’s work this quarter with schools reflected efforts to build a constructive Third Space, an integrative, inclusive perspective that focuses on the complementary aspects of different viewpoints. These efforts are clearly not without challenges, especially keeping the conversation to a critical level, where helpful differences can fuel the exploration of ideas.

A Third Space conversation can, at times, be uncomfortable, but the critical reflections they engender are absolutely necessary to nurture transformative leadership.

Further invitations from schools to participate in future leadership meetings illustrate an appreciation for the developing relationship between LeadScape and the project’s schools, and provide further opportunities for LeadScape staff to observe the dynamic interactions between the principal, assistant principal, and teachers on special assignments as they continue to strive towards building an inclusive environment. Continuing to support these efforts requires encouraging the principal to examine technical decisions with a highly critical and reflective standpoint.

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GOAL 3 ACCOMPLISHMENTS The following list summarizes the evidence of accomplishment during this quarter, organized by the performance criteria outlined in the introduction.

Accessibility LeadScape worked with a Tempe elementary school to develop a proposed scope of work. This proposed scope of work will be transparent to the school community, and will enhance and map out LeadScape efforts towards school reform.

Authenticity Two webinars were planned with a variety of intended outcomes, including reinforcing themes from previous professional learning activities.

Market Share Webinars served to expand our market share by connecting professionals to each other in a virtual learning environment.

Quality, Understanding & Usefulness LeadScape’s cognitive coaching efforts reflected striving towards selfreflection and understanding teacher practices and attitudes in order to achieve transformational learning at Nevitt Elementary School.

Networking & Dissemination

Goal 4: engage national discourse in local, professional practice, and policy communities on improving educational outcomes for all students.

4.1. Expand existing network to 16,000 participants.

4.2. Increase the usage of LeadScape from 400 to 1,000 principals.

Goal 4 Evidence: Engaging a national discourse in equity matters involves a number of efforts that share a common vision of the transformation of the culture of schools, including efforts noted under Research and Resource Development, and Professional Learning. In this section, we focus more narrowly on market share measured by our output of resources to increasingly larger networks of people, as measured by our online dissemination platforms.

To measure and continuously monitor changes in online networking and dissemination, Google Analytics provides a solid quantitative basis for estimating the quarterly and annual use of the LeadScape web site. There are three parameters used in the analysis: Absolute Unique Visitors - Provides the total number of people using the web resources. This measure ensures that multiple visits to the web site by an individual are only counted once.

Pageviews – Provides a picture of the extensiveness of the use of the web site as a whole, and represents the total amount of content reaching the audience.

Top Content - Provides a picture of the most-used pages; the measure can be disaggregated to a high level of detail to allow us to see exactly which electronic resources are being utilized.

As we share findings below, we’ll refer to these terms.

The number of absolute unique visitors to LeadScape is determined by tracking the web site www.niusileadscape.org. We reached 3,256 people in the quarter (up 66% over the previous quarter) who visited the web site over 4,758 times. People found LeadScape content in six ways: 1. Direct links (30%) – These people find us through our news outreach strategies 2. Google organic searches (27%) – this is evidence of market share/mind share of the Web 3. Cross links with Equity Alliance and our other web sites (17%) Altogether, this data represents over 17,000 page views. Over 60% of all visitors (2,959) were new people, which suggests that LeadScape has an effective mixture of outreach strategies: historical network connections, links to and from data tools, broad scale responsiveness to Internet searches, and direct appeals to our contact lists are all important aspects of networking and dissemination.

4.1 Expanding the network Network expansion also occurs through personal networks, and regular monthly emails, which get shared with others. The notion of expansion includes specific change in engagement from first contact, through accessing resources, to initial participation, and finally to intensive, long term participation. At each of these levels, which we refer to as tiers of technical assistance, we work to maintain and deepen relationships at the same time as we work to expand the numbers of people in each Tier. As LeadScape leaders travel, they expand our network by bringing back emails of people in groups they’ve contacted.

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LeadScape reaches people in all states each quarter (Figure 7), evidence of its accessibility. The top states sharing 5366 visits during the quarter were AZ (26%), CA (10%), CO (6%), NY (5%), TX (4%), WI (3%), IN (3%), IL (3%), MA (3%) and OR (3%)

Figure 7. U.S. outreach during the quarter.

The contacts in our 10,000 plus email communications are organized into four tiers. Tier 1 representing larger numbers of people who we reach via mailings but who we may not know by face. Tier 2 represents people for whom we provide targeted technical assistance. Tier 3 is comprised of people we work with on a regular basis, and who attend meetings, ask for assistance, and who have responded to many of our invitations. Tier 4 is the most intense level, where principals are working intensively with us to change their schools (Table 3). The statistics show an increase in the percentage of “opens” to “sent” rising steadily from Tier 1 to Tier 4. The industry average is from 9 to 10%.

Number of Emails & Audience Size

How many people less bounced who opened?

How many people clicked through?

Level 1: >9000

8 70675

8762 13%

1429 16%

Levels 2 : >1000

7 7510

895 13%

74 8%

Level 3: >100

2 465

48 11%

3 6%

Level 4: >25

7 185

45 28%

28 62%

Level of Mailing

Table 3. Number and percentages of this quarter’s communications, opens and clicks In addition to web site usage expansion and monthly contact via communications, LeadScape participation at national conferences are vital opportunities for networking and dissemination and allow us to be in tune with the dynamic needs of our audience.

4.2 Increase usage of LeadScape web site resources The LeadScape project has shown that blogs, emailed newsletters and spotlighted resources are effective new social networking tools for dissemination. The “Equity Advocate” highlight gives recognition and increases the involvement of principals in rewarding and recognizing talent and commitment in their schools and extended networks. The goal of the program is to expand our network by asking friends of the advocate to vote for them and make additional comments on their nomination. Each spotlight offers readers an introduction and a quote from the awardee. The purpose of the program is to increase usage of the web site resources by building identity and affiliation with our clients and expanding to their friends and networks. We invite the awardees to provide us with names of people to share the news, and we are planning to develop a social nomination and voting process as well as a social networking and “liking” capability for the program as it moves forward.

Within the larger picture of overall increase in use of the center’s products and services, we also monitor the patterns of use, which are measured by page titles and metadata content that are picked up in the analytics engine. The usage patterns give us information about what online strategies are working, how many people are being reached, and what kinds of information are getting the most use.

NIUSILEADSCAPE.ORG

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The Learning Carousel, for example, our premier clearinghouse of research on equity issues, served up 13,200 pages of information to over 2900 new people. Those new people came to the library via the web platforms we have developed, and contributed to the total page views of the library from these sources: 1. Google searches (41%, 1,567 visits) – this is an indicator of our market share 2. Links from the Equity Alliance (23%, 867 visits).

3. Direct links from our email campaigns and other direct links (13%, 499 visits) Recently, product orders from the Learning Carousel have increased, providing another sign of the increase usage of LeadScape web site resources. The orders also represent the value placed on our resources by others, provides modest program income that covers the costs of reproduction of the materials, and indicates themes of interest to our audience. In this quarter, we fulfilled orders for:

The following list summarizes the evidence of accomplishment during this quarter, organized by the performance criteria.

Accessibility vAnalytics show that LeadScape web resources are accessible at all times and over a wide range of visitors; all 50 states sent visitors to the web site during the quarter

•

500 copies of “Understanding Culture”

Authenticity & Usefulness

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300 copies of “Disproportionate Representation of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Students in Special Education: Measuring the Problem”

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300 copies of “Preventing Disproportionate Representation: Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Pre-referral Interventions”

Top content of the quarter is evidence that people find LeadScape resources useful for learning about equity matters.

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300 copies of “Racial Disproportionality in School Disciplinary Practices”

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300 copies of “Distinguishing Difference from Disability”

These data, all of which showed increases from the previous quarter, provide evidence of not only market share – mind share of digital dissemination – but also show the effectiveness of the LeadScape platform in providing many ways to access and find needed resources, and the effectiveness of our direct email dissemination of news and guides to learning.

We look at the Top Content used from the Learning Carousel to sense the needs and interests of readers. The titles people browse and read and the order of interest in those topics, guides our decisions about content that people need and where they want more information. We also are interested in a deeper level of analysis of the resource used, as part of the way we listen to the field to stay responsive and authentic. This information comes to us from online searches, keywords, and the topics and keywords in the actual documents used. This quarter’s top content included (in priority order): Culture, Behavior Interventions, Equity, Instruction, Families, Education, Curriculum, and Professional Learning. We also look at the length of visits as a sign of the quality of materials. If people do not stay and download or read at length, then the quality is not high enough to capture and hold their attention. This quarter saw over 1200 people spend over 10 minutes on the site, an amazing performance metric when compared with industry average site visit times that are measured in seconds .

A summary of the visits, absolute unique visitors and number of pages accessed is presented in Table 4.

Month

Visits

Visitors

Pageviews

April

2258

1370

8185

May

1905

1227

6396

June

2320

1525

7792

Totals

6483

3896**

22373

Table 4. Google Analytics Data for LeadScape Website Activity ** NOTE: The total of absolute unique visitors is not a simple sum of the monthly visits by unique visitors. The total for the quarter subtracts return visits by someone who may have been unique during one of the months. The total is a good measure of new outreach during the quarter.

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GOAL 4 ACCOMPLISHMENTS

Market Share Increases in new visitors, unique visitors and pageviews all point to expanded market share during the quarter.

Quality & Understanding 1200 people spending over 10 minutes on the site is evidence of quality materials of interest to them. The industry standard is measured in seconds, but our norm is 3 minutes or more, a good sign for a web-based networking project

Conclusion LeadScape performance in this quarter contains evidence that the project has a national outreach, is developing and supporting equity leaders in schools, and is continuing to scale up by fully utilizing its blend of personal, face-to-face and online professional learning systems.

STUDENTS’ EXPERIENCES SURVEY Directions:

Please respond to each statement in this survey while thinking about students in your classroom. In the right column, indicate the degree to which the school in which you are involved accomplishes the statement. Please note this survey is anonymous and is meant for reflective purposes.

Students’ Experiences Strongly Disagree

Some What Disagree

Neither Agree nor Disagree

Some What Disagree

Strongly Agree

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5

2. Annual goals on students’ IEPs reflect age-appropriate, grade level content from state standards and the general education curriculum.

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3. Related services are delivered primarily through collaboration and consultation in the general education classroom.

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4. All students participate in classroom instruction in similar ways, for example: whole class discussions, at the board, in small groups, in partners, and when called on by the teacher.

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5. All students participate in classroom and school routines in typical locations, such as the Pledge of Allegiance, lunch count, jobs, errands, eating lunch in the cafeteria, etc.

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8. All students are on all class lists, lists of groups put on the board, job lists, etc.

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9. All students attend all classes, arriving and leaving at the same time.

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11. All students’ participate in school plays, field trips, and community service activities.

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12. All students are supported to develop positive peer relationships appropriate for the age-level.

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1. All students receive core academic instruction in the general education setting.

6. All students are on the roster of and formally a member of an age-appropriate general education class.

7. All students receive the same materials during lessons and classroom activities, with supports (i.e., accommodations and adaptations) provided as necessary.

10. All students’ individual behavioral goals, supports and interventions are aligned with the school-wide behavioral rules.

Thanks for your time and thought in responding to this survey.

* Visit the Equity Alliance at www.equityallianceatasu.org

Visit the Equity Alliance N I U S I L Eat: A D Swww.equityallianceatasu.org CAPE.ORG

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Please Complete by ________ and return your copy to:

CODE: __________________________________________________

_______________________________________________

SCHOOL NAME: _________________________________________

SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT SURVEY Directions:

Please respond to each statement in this survey in TWO ways. First, indicate in the left column the degree to which the statement represents how an ideal school might operate. Then, in the right column, indicate the degree to which the school in which you are involved accomplishes the statement.

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Strongly Agree

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Some What Agree

Strongly Agree

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Disagree

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Strongly Disagree

Disagree

Actual Practice

Strongly Disagree

Your Ideal

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5. Instruction in our school is adapted to fit the individual needs of students.

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7. Classroom instruction is differentiated based on student needs.

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Teacher Practices 1. Practitioners1 make sure their activities and assignments are directly related to school improvement goals and curriculum standards.

2. Practitioners are encouraged to develop new and use innovative practices in their classroom and curriculum.

3. Teachers respond effectively to student diversity and make learning motivating and relevant to all students.

4. Learning goals are challenging enough to prepare students well for the next educational level.

6. Students are expected to explore their interests and new ideas.

8. Practitioners provide alternative structures, materials, standards, etc. so that all students can learn.

9. Classroom practices help students engage in learning strategies, such as reflection and goal setting.

10. Teachers2 collaboratively assess and reflect on implementing more effective teaching practices.

11. Teachers encourage students to direct, understand, and take responsibility for their own learning.

12. Modifications are made to the general curriculum for all students with disabilities so that they may participate in and benefit from general education classes.

13. Teachers primarily use mixed ability grouping to deliver instruction.

14. The curriculum helps students understand their own cultural perspectives and promotes understanding and respect for different perspectives.

1

The term practitioner means anyone (i.e., school psychologist, counselor, teacher, para-educator, therapists and others) who provides services to students

2

The term teacher is used to identify classroom teachers as well as special educators, teachers of bilingual students and others who provide direct instruction to students.

Visit the Equity Alliance at: www.equityallianceatasu.org

5

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Strongly Agree

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Strongly Disagree

Disagree

Actual Practice

Strongly Disagree

Your Ideal

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16. Students with a range of disabilities participate in using all school resources with their nondisabled peers, i.e., computer lab, music, art, gym, library, study halls, recess, lunch, and extracurricular activities.

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17. Students with a range of disabilities participate in, attend, and become members of all school sponsored social activities, clubs, organizations and sports teams.

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School Practices 15. Each classroom is deliberately composed of a variety of students who represent the complete diversity of students who attend this school

18. The school makes school improvement decisions based on careful consideration of school, classroom, and student outcomes.

19. Assessment practices are fair and equitable to all students regardless of prior achievement, gender, race, language, social class or cultural histories.

20. School practices do not track or label students.

21. Decision-making groups or teams include students.

22. Our school schedule and calendar give adequate time for reflective, thoughtful work.

23. The school allocates its resources to give all students the instruction and materials they need to learn.

24. School goals and action plans reflect careful consideration of our school demographics, results from student assessments and other relevent information.

25. Our school has been successful in enrolling its neighborhood students with disabilities who were assigned to other schools because of special programs.

Thanks for your time and thought in responding to this survey.

Please return your copy to the ________________________________________

If you have any questions about this survey please call (000)-000-0000

Visit the Equity Alliance N I U S I L Eat: A D Swww.equityallianceatasu.org CAPE.ORG

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NIUSI-LeadScape Arizona State University P.O. Box 870211 Interdisciplinary B353 1120 S. Cady Mall Tempe, AZ 85287-6103 Phone: 480.965.0391 FAX: 480.727.7012 Web: www.niusileadscape.org Funded by the U.S. Department of Education Office of Special Education Programs Award No. H325P060012 Project Officer: Grace Zamora Durรกn The contents of this guide were developed under a grant from the Department of Education. However, those contents do not necessarily represent the policy of the Department of Education, and you should not assume endorsement by the Federal Government.

Also visit us at www.equityallianceatasu.org.

CFDA: 84.325P Principal Leadership Technical Assistance to Support Schoolwide Improvement GRANT NUMBER H325P060012