Issue 2

TurnAround Schools and NWEA Partner to Prepare ALL Students for College. No Excuses.

Educators from throughout the Midwest gathered at the Hilton Hotel in Milwaukee on May 18th for a day of hands-on learning and professional development at the SPARK Learning Conference.

TurnAround Schools and No Excuses University founder Damen Lopez set the tone for the day with a powerful keynote presentation challenging every educator in the room to let go of excuses and believe that every child has the ability, and right, to go to college.

The San Diego-based former elementary school principal at Los Penasquitos in the Poway Unified School District woke up in the middle of the night back in 2004 with the spark of an idea - to create a program that prepared every student for higher learning. No matter what. This idea became the No Excuses University Network, and eventually TurnAround Schools, which has grown from one program at a So Cal school to a network of thirty-eight schools representing nearly 25,000 students in six different states.

NWEA partnered with Damen, and his brother, TurnAround Schools president Dan Lopez, to bring the second SPARK Learning Conference to the Midwest (the first SPARK Learning Conference was held in Orange County, Calif. in October 2008).

The SPARK Learning Conference offered a full day of hands-on sessions and idea sharing designed to inspire educators to create their own exceptional systems and adopt a culture of universal achievement. A major key to achieving these goals? Student goal-setting and using the right assessment tool, such as NWEA's Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) assessments, to inform instruction.

"It's time to stop perpetuating the cycle of poverty by letting excuses get in our way as educators," said Damen in his opening keynote. Damen used an analogy of a basketball court to illustrate the crucial need for every child to graduate from college. He showed the audience that kids who will graduate with a Bachelor's degree can shoot the ball easily from the free-throw line. The kids who don't go to college? Well, they have to shoot from half or even full court.

Why do Damen and his colleagues believe all kids should go to college? College graduates, he said, provide a greater value to society, have a better quality of life and more career opportunities. "Something has to change," he said.

Damen laid out the key principles of the No Excuses University program and fundamentals of creating "exceptional systems" and a culture of universal achievement. Some of his words of wisdom for the room full of educators included:

• Believe. Every educator must believe that all kids are capable of achievement in reading, language arts and math.
• Dream big. "Write down a big, hairy, audacious goal. It can be so big it may take 25 years to achieve. Or you could only have a 25% chance of ever achieving it. It doesn't matter."
• Focus on literacy. "Our job is to teach kids to be literate. Not just to nurture a love of learning."
• Student achievement should be the number one topic of conversation among staff.
• Embrace your inner maverick. Fight the status quo.
• There are no excuses for poor effort - this doesn't just go for students.

Don't judge a book by its cover. Damen showed a heartwarming video clip of an everyday, average-looking man on the hit U.K. show Britain's Got Talent who turned out to be a tremendously gifted opera singer to illustrate his point. "Treat every student as if they have the same potential," he said.

Success Strategies Straight from the Classroom

Damen and Dan brought three exceptional teachers from Los Penasquitos Elementary (aka "Los Pen") with them to lead the rest of the day's breakout sessions focused on giving educators the strategies they need to support student success using assessments and goal setting.

Laura D'Acquisto, an 11-year veteran teacher from Los Pen Elementary, broke it down for a group of third through fifth grade teachers. Laura says it took a while for her and her fellow teachers to embrace NWEA's Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) assessments.

But the wait was well worth it and she believes so strongly in the benefit of using the computer-adaptive assessment to improve instruction that she came all the way to Milwaukee to share her success strategies with other educators. "I'm here to share some information that will hopefully make your journey a little easier," she said.

Laura spent a lot of time illustrating the difference between assessments for learning and assessments of learning.

Laura shared some of the following benefits to using MAP assessments (for learning) in the classroom:

Getting students involved in their own learning. "MAP assessments help students learn about themselves," she said. "It's not just a test for teachers and administrators."

Helping educators understand what a student knows at the beginning of the year. But just as importantly, these assessments also illuminate what they don't know yet.

Convenience and efficiency in the classroom. "MAP allows you to use what you have in the most effective way," said Laura. "It's not going to add things to your already full plate."

Immediate feedback, which Laura feels is one of the biggest benefits to using MAP. She also said the longer it takes educators to get assessment results, the harder it is to incorporate into instruction.

Opening up dialogue between students, educators and parents. "Students have open conversations with teachers and parents about their own learning." This collaboration also helps students establish their own personal growth goals.

Student motivation. MAP is great for establishing short-term learning goals, providing opportunities for success and focusing on growth instead of seemingly unreachable target proficiency scores. Said Laura: "MAP adapts to these students so they start to feel successful. You can chart their growth and prove that they're engaged. This is much more meaningful than a proficiency score."

Keri King, a kindergarten and primary intervention teacher at Los Pen Elementary, shared strategies specifically tailored to helping K-2 students succeed. She emphasized the importance of helping these students understand the difference between dreams and goals. She told attendees to make sure younger students know that goals are something that each student can achieve and have an action plan.

Keri walked the group through a class goal-setting exercise, a strategy that helps Los Pen teachers focus their students on achieving academic growth in specific learning areas. She emphasized the importance of using student-friendly terms during the goal-setting process, which helps students take ownership in their own learning.

Often younger students set vague learning goals such as "I'm going to work harder." Kerri said it's important to press these students to be more specific. Ask them how they are going to work harder. How oftenthey will read and what they will read, for example.

Los Pen fourth grade teacher Kerri Kutzner spent the day with sixth grade teachers and above. Kerri has been doing class goals for the past four years. She says "99% of the time, the area the class works on as part of their goals shows the most growth." Kerri says it's important to involve the entire class in setting goals. She uses the NWEA DesCartes learning continuum to set an action plan to help every child in the class improve their skills in their goal area.

Kerri's advice to teachers? "Collaborate with your teams. Say here's what my class needs to work on. What resources do you have that I can use? When teams are working together, you find so many more ideas for how to work with your class."

For more information about TurnAround Schools and the No Excuses University, visit www.turnaroundschools.com. For more information from the latest SPARK Learning Conference and for future events, visit www.sparklearningconference.com.