Communication Plans

The Pacific East District provides schools with direction and guidance regarding communication plans in alignment with the Pacific East District purpose. Schools develop detailed communication plans and communication matrices to help ensure clear communication with stakeholders. School communication plans include how information is shared and how dialogue is facilitated with stakeholders. All schools utilize virtual means to communicate with parents, which includes emails, newsletters, and Facebook pages. Schools also provide opportunities for face-to-face meetings with school administrators in formats such as principal’s coffees.

To support communication with stakeholders, the Pacific East District utilizes ePortals as a means to communicate with teachers, administrators, and ISSs.

The implementation of communication plans has encouraged improvements in communication across the district, as evidenced by the results from the Internal Review Visits.

Community Partnerships

The Pacific East District engages in a variety of community partnership opportunities at the school, installation, district, and regional levels.

Opportunities for Pacific East DoDEA leadership to partner with base and community leadership are established at different levels: Each school has School Advisory Committees (SAC); each complex has an Installation Advisory Council (IAC); the district has the Pacific East Advisory Council (PEAC); and the Pacific Region has the Regional Advisory Council (RAC). In addition, each base has a School Liaison Officer (SLO), an employee of the military installations who support school and base partnerships.

In addition to partnerships with the local military community, the Pacific East District engages in work with the local Japanese community, through offering Host Nation courses and engaging in partnership events with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Pacific East District has increased its work with community partners to include stakeholders at various levels.

Focused Collaboration

Focused Collaboration serves as the vehicle for educators to collaboratively engage in job-embedded professional learning focusing on student achievement. During this time, educators review evidence of student learning and use this information to make instructional decisions. All educators are engaged and provided with direction and guidance regarding Focused Collaboration on a weekly basis. The district’s guidelines, expectations, common schedule, calendar, and framework have led to improvements in its implementation.

Interactive Customer Evaluation (ICE) System

The Interactive Customer Evaluation (ICE) system is a means for stakeholders to provide anonymous or named feedback regarding DoDEA, the Pacific East District, and schools. Comments received from the ICE system are provided to appropriate stakeholders for a response to be given. Action is taken to acknowledge and possibly address any identified problem within five days. Praises are highlighted and celebrated within the district. The Pacific East District has increased our responsiveness to ICE comments from stakeholders.

Internal Review Visits

Internal Review Visits (IRVs) within the Pacific East District are the method in which the Pacific East measures school continuous improvement. The IRV process annually requests student, parent, and teacher stakeholders to provide honest feedback, to include strengths and weaknesses, about their schools and the district.

Professional Learning

The Pacific East District Professional Learning Plan outlines the professional learning opportunities for educators within the district. The plan uses the Kirkpatrick Model’s Four Levels of Training Evaluation (results, behavior, learning, and participant reaction) to gauge the success of professional learning implementation within the district.

Purpose Statement Process

The district’s guidance, as described in the purpose statement, led to each school developing a purpose statement and a process to review their purpose statements. Purpose statements and the purpose statement review processes are revisited regularly through collaborative processes. Stakeholders engage in the process of reviewing school and district purpose statements, allowing for greater input from stakeholders regarding the purpose statements for schools.

Steering Committee

The Pacific East Steering Committee serves as the continuous school improvement team for the district. This team provides their insight and feedback into district decisions and examines various aspects of the district improvement plan.

Strategic Plan

The Pacific East Strategic Plan, developed by the Pacific East Steering Committee, aligns with standard 1.8 as it arose from feedback from stakeholders in requesting direction for schools, administrators, and teachers across the district in alignment with DoDEA’s goals and initiatives.