Testing: programming rooms, testing modifications, and scheduling explanation and reflection:
There were many aspects on my internship that I felt could be encompassed within ISLLC Standard 3.0. Over the past year and a half however, I have been involved with the programming and operational aspects of testing, student modifications, and scheduling. These artifacts below put my theories of programming and effective and efficient learning environments into a deeper perspective. Being a teacher first, I have experienced only 2% of what goes into the managing and organization of an entire school building. By being fully involved with programming and organization of testing, I was able to see the details and time that it takes to operate an effective and efficient environment and therefore, truly shows my understanding and involvement within Standard 3.0.
While my mentor oversaw my involvement with the testing operations, I worked hand-in-hand with our program coordinator starting at the end of the spring 2019 school year, up until March 2020. Together, we took our yearly testing and created a teachers schedule to alert teachers to specific state testing dates and important timing measures. We then worked together to breakdown student testing modifications and programmed students in rooms according to our classroom sizes, daily schedules, and grade level specific needs.
Not only were general education students needing specific testing rooms, but I handled most of the Special education students on my own. I had to take our master modifications spreadsheet, break students down into grade specifics, then organize their testing rooms according to their specific modifications, making sure that all student modifications were being met. For the 8th grade science testing modifications, students were also then broken down into lab testing rooms according to their extended time needs and additional resources.
The next step that the program coordinator and myself covered was to take our students that were opting out of testing and organize there schedules. We also broke down our list of alternate assessment students and English Language Learners, because those students were also not testing with the general population. I then worked and oversaw the making of teacher schedules, and aligned them with programming rooms. Making sure the organization of teacher proctors did not overlap with their lunch periods and preparation periods that are required for them to have throughout the school work day was another important aspect of this operation.
The management of operations and organization of over 1500 students as well as over 120 staff members is something that I experienced first hand with this aspect of my internship. This was an overwhelming task to take on. Overall, this experience was time consuming, but helped me to understand the "behind the scenes" importance of time management, proofreading documentation, legalities involved with testing and accommodations, and the importance of team work and data driven organization. This was an artifact that I was involved with over a long period of time and my realization that not only does organizational operations affect students, but it affects the staff and teachers as well.
Managing the operations behind the scenes in my school building was a great experience to see that if one aspect does not line up, then the entire system may not work. I felt that working with the program coordinator throughout my time interning was a highly stressful experience, but it opened me up to new avenues of administration that I would not have seen as a teacher alone.
