Sarah Gustus E-Portfolio

Recommendation for Anchorage Public School District

Anchorage Public School District

61 Elementary Schools.
Serves nearly 50,000 students at over 90 schools.
Minority-majority district - all minority groups make up the majority of the population.

Flexibility

Allow teachers to share responsibility of lunch duties. This is dependent on size of grade.
Allow the 54-minutes of activity to be flexible based on how academics are progressing.
Movement breaks at discretion of teachers, not based on a specific time. Make movement breaks spontaneous and when needed, not at the same time so students are expecting a break.

Staffing

An increased need for additional support staff and noon duties exists.
Potentially adding an updated, new position for the addition of staff coverage during lunch and recess. One idea would be the addition of para-professionals that would take on the responsibility of noon duties.
Multiple focus groups advocated for higher pay for noon duties instead of the current $10/hour.

Buy-In

Plan to problem solve with teachers and principals and administration prior to implementation.
Create an implementation "toolbox" for principals by principals and for teachers by teachers to help with implementation.
Greater communication between principals, administration, and teachers needs to occur to ensure effective strategies are being utilized.

Major Theme of Curriculum Structure

A major theme throughout the study was teacher and parent issues with the current curriculum. The curriculum in the Anchorage Public Schools includes: 90 minutes of reading every day, 40 minutes of math, and 40 minutes of W.I.N. or What I Need.

WIN is an extracurricular time for students to focus on studies where they need additional help. Overall, parents did not seem to like WIN.

Due to the 90-40-40, the hour of lunch and recess, and the initiative to reach the 54-minutes of movement, most teachers were finding they were completely missing out on teaching science or social studies because of time restraints.

A teacher stated:

"Sixteen minutes a day is for transitions, science and social studies, social emotional learning."

Implementation Will Need to Differ With:

Title I Schools

Immersion Schools

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