October 1, 2008
El Segundo High School
WASC Parent Meeting
Hall of Fame –October 1, 2008
Attendees:
Nancy Cobb
Linal Harada
Jayne Pimlott
Gigi Thompson
Lisa Wilkin
Jenny Davies
Beth Muraida
DeDe Gerber
Meeting opened at 6:25PM
Chairperson: Jayne Pimlott
Handouts available: Mission Statement, Eagle Expectations, Dates of future meetings, the Support Pyramid for Success.
Jayne called the meeting to order. Nancy Cobb began with Clarification of the Vision which was updated last year 2007-08. She covered the purpose of the Mission Statement and Eagle Ears (our ESLRS). Some of the groups involved in the update were focus groups, Student groups and home groups.
One of the key questions that WASC will have us is:
Are we doing everything we can to meet our ESLR’s .? WASC wants to see that the ESLR is incorporated by the staff and students.
Our Mission Statement was revised; we changed the final clause to read “citizens who will be prepared for choices and challenges in the 21st century.”
A goal is to get information out to parents. Parents want to know what support we supply struggling students. The support Pyramid started as an intervention technique for students struggling in certain common areas, but turned into a support wherever a student needed help. The Pyramid is applied automatically when needed. Parents and teachers did not know that we had intervention techniques in place to support all students.
Linal added that though the Pyramid is in place it is always evolving and changes will be made to meet the needs of our students. Also, stated that even students who tend to succeed with little assistance are in fact receiving assistance through our counseling department.
It was requested of the PTA that an article be included in the PTA newsletter on interventions that are in effect to all students.
The PTA also requested that in addition to the message from the administrators that something about the WASC visit be given for the PTA website.
An example of institutionalizing a technique needed for student success is Link Crew. Link Crew began as a small informational time with freshman and has grown to be a 3 -day Freshman Orientation with two teacher leaders and a sizable group of student leaders working under the supervision of Linal Harada. Link Crew continues throughout the year.
Nancy introduced the accreditation process by WASC –Western Association of Schools and Colleges. Why is it needed?
WASC validates our institution and the fact that we are working and striving to improve our teaching and student success. UC’s and most universities will not accept students if their courses come from non-accredited institutions. Even military recruiters look for accreditation. For teachers, accreditation plays a part in their retirement when number of years worked comes in to play.
The process used for accreditation is taken from the Focus on Learning guidebook. This is a self-study process used in the leaders group, home groups, and focus groups. Most schools are accredited every 6 years with an evaluation done after three years. The school itself should be continuously reviewing their methods and ways to improve the success of the student.
In preparation for the WASC Team our school must examine what has been done so far and then create a new action plan for the next 6 years.
There were two handbooks from other schools available for the parent group to review.
One area of concern for our school is to increase the percentage of students meeting the A –G requirements. AVID is in place to help students struggling in that area. Regardless of where children are going after high school, the A-G requirement is good preparation and equity in a student’s life.
Question was brought up, “Do we have a goal of a certain % increase?” That will be determined in future Focus Group meetings.
It was shared that our school had an increase in the general population. We have two statistically significant subgroups: the Hispanic/Latino population (approximately 18-20% of our student population), and our new subgroup, the socio-economic disadvantaged. (these subgroups are identified by the state).
In discussing the Critical Academic needs the subjects we focus on are math and reading comprehension. These courses are the core for all other subjects. At the 3 year point math came into the light as a need. For the past 3 years there has been a literacy team in place to help with reading comprehension. One example of a technique becoming an automatic tool is Cornell notes. This was a district wide tool taught to all students and now the results are that students automatically use them as a learning tool, even without any encouragement.
A parent shared that the WAVE program used at the middle school has also helped with the language scores in the area of reading comprehension. (9th graders’ scores are the highest)
Why are the 10th grade scores dropping? Are the classes too large? Is it because we are not emphasizing the basic skills? We are bringing back the DOL (grammar).
In closing we were challenged by Lisa Wilkin to grow the group by each person present inviting one person to our next meeting.
Meeting adjourned at 7:00PM