2021-22 School Improvement Plan:
Goal 1: Quality Teaching
District Goal: Wakefield Public Schools will increase quality teaching practices across grades and schools to support academic and social/emotional growth for all students, as supported by differentiated professional development, job-embedded coaching, highly structured professional learning communities, and an effective supervision and evaluation model.
School Goal: Create and maintain a safe and collaborative learning environment by using instructional practices that motivate students to take academic risks, challenge themselves, and claim ownership of their learning.
Desired Outcomes:
Grow and support learning environments where:
Teaching practices ensure that all students feel seen, heard, and respected
Teaching practices facilitate meaningful academic discourse, inquiry, and reflection
Teaching practices guide students to identify their strengths, interests, and needs, engage in problem-solving, take academic risks, and challenge themselves to learn
Goal 2: Rich and Challenging Curriculum
District Goal: Wakefield Public Schools will continue to utilize and refine a comprehensive curriculum review process in all content areas and across all levels to ensure that we are:
prioritizing content and practice standards
creating consistency across schools and levels and
adopting assessment practices that allow our students to accurately demonstrate what they know and are able to do.
School Goal: Classrooms will provide differentiated culturally responsive learning experiences that enable each student to access the curriculum and progress toward learning goals
Desired Outcomes:
High-quality, culturally relevant instructional materials in all classrooms
Successful implementation of Illustrative Mathematics curriculum in grade 9
Authentic opportunities within the curriculum to help students process and think critically about the content
Goal 3: Individualized Student Learning
District Goal: Wakefield Public Schools will prioritize individualized student learning by:
promoting best instructional practices that meet the needs of all learners
creating schedules to allow for equitable access to systems of support for academic and social-emotional learning needs and
creating differentiated learning opportunities across levels to help all students reach their educational goals.
School Goal: In order to support students’ academic and social-emotional growth, teachers will implement units and lessons that include challenging and differentiated tasks and support for all learners.
Desired Outcomes:
Teachers will grow their understanding and implementation of inclusive instructional practices
Co-taught and supported classrooms will effectively meet the needs of all students enrolled in these classes
Advisory will promote meaningful relationships between staff and students while providing students with personalized opportunities to develop self-exploration, interpersonal communication, self-care, planning and management, and coping skills.
2019-2021 School Improvement Plan:
Instructional Practice Goal:
Teachers will focus on the “what, why, and how” in order to promote deeper learning and engagement (in both hybrid and remote settings) as measured by classroom observations, walkthrough data, and professional development and professional learning communities work.
Student Learning & Growth:
Students will be able to articulate what they are learning, why they are learning, and how they are engaging in their learning in all modes (in-person and remotely) as measured by classroom observations and walkthrough data.
Professional Practice:
Teachers increase their learning about social-emotional wellness, gain a deeper understanding of CASEL’s competencies, and grow their work with social-emotional competencies to better support student needs.
2018-19 School Improvement Plan:
Target Student Growth Measures:
1. Through the implementation of common instructional strategies, differentiated tasks, and increased small-group learning opportunities, students will grow their academic discourse across disciplines to demonstrate their understanding of content.
2. Through engaging in opportunities to learn about social-emotional wellness, students will gain increased awareness, improve their social-emotional well-being, and grow their social-emotional competencies and skills.
B. High-Leverage Instructional Practice Goal:
During the 2018-19 school year, teachers will focus on implementing differentiated strategies in the areas of content and process to meet the diverse needs of WMHS learners.
C. High-Leverage Professional Practice Goal:
All Professional Learning Communities at WMHS will demonstrate growth in their practice by prioritizing learning standards across content areas and identifying effective instructional strategies to help students access content, resulting in advancing to at least stage 5 in the Seven Stages of Teacher Collaboration Diagnostic Tool framework.
Proud of:
Work to align curricular maps with updated standards
Ongoing work to diversify curricular materials with inclusive representation
PD work to improve instructional practices to meet the needs of all learners in heterogeneous classrooms
PLC time to plan collaboratively, share best practices, and align assessments
Implementing SEL strategies (taking responsibility for the social and emotional well-being of all students)
Relationships with students and families - ensuring every student has at least one trusted adult
Concerned about:
Vision of the Graduate
Facilities issues
Building morale
Stronger collaborative focus on teaching and learning
Supporting diverse pathways for students after high school
MA Teacher Evaluation protocol adapted and implemented at WPS:
Develop a process for the implementation of teacher evaluation in which core values and 21st-century learning expectations are clearly identified and aligned with best practices in the classroom
All educators (PK-Post) engage in a PLC once per cycle during the school day:
Ensure a guaranteed curriculum for all students in the same course, regardless of teacher
Utilize dedicated time to discuss and to direct curriculum in informal and formal settings
New district Facilities Director hired to coordinate with the town and engage the Building Committee in the MSBA building process (currently in phase 3):
Develop a process for the implementation of teacher evaluation in which core values and 21st-century learning expectations are clearly identified and aligned with best practices in the classroom
Address facility issues that impact student learning and effective curriculum delivery, including, but not limited to, technology, leaks, temperature controls, science labs, and classrooms
Begin the process of designing a new school that meets all of our maintenance needs and all priority areas related to Standard 7
Five new core content areas (5-12 Curriculum Coordinators) were created to oversee the curriculum and instruction of teachers in these content areas, including organizing content-area PD, PLCs, professional growth including goal setting, and curriculum and instruction development. These positions coordinate with building administrators and evaluators to:
Ensure a guaranteed curriculum for all students in the same course, regardless of the teacher
Utilize time as dedicated to discuss and direct curriculum in informal and formal settings
Adequately fund curriculum development
Implement increased, regular scheduled professional development for curriculum development
Implement a formal professional development plan for the analysis of student work to inform improvements in teaching and learning
Offer authentic learning opportunities to all students regardless of course levels and grades
Ensure that teachers engage all students in higher order thinking strategies regardless of course level
Integrate core values and learning expectations into the curriculum, instruction, and assessment of all teaching and learning
Ensure clear connections between course content and school-wide 21st century learning expectations
Engage students in cross-disciplinary instruction
Provide active student-directed learning opportunities in all courses
Engage all students in higher order thinking and inquiry in all grades and ability levels
Differentiate classroom instruction strategies and practices
Prioritize initiatives so that teachers have adequate time to embed best practices in the curriculum
Continue the development of common assessments in all departments and utilize common assessment and progress report data to revise the curriculum
Increase the use of student survey data to provide a meaningful reflection on, and measure of student growth for attaining the school-wide civic and social learning expectations
Ensure that all curricula are written in a common format that includes units of study with essential questions, concepts, content, and skills; the school’s 21st-century learning expectations; instructional strategies; assessment practices that include the use of school-wide analytic and course-specific rubrics
Improve instructional practices through feedback from a wide variety of sources
Created a new English 9 course for all incoming students to take Freshmen year as a baseline ELA course with small class sizes, heterogeneous groupings, and a focus on skills development and instructional differentiation to meet the needs of a diverse range of students in the class. This also provides students the opportunity to learn from their peers, collaborate with different types of learners, and create an opportunity for WMHS teachers to grow the skills of all students in ELA.
Provide a minimum of one heterogeneously grouped core courses
SEL/Advisory and Guidance Counselor Curriculum:
Implement an ongoing formal curriculum in which each student has an adult in the school, in addition to the school counselor, who knows the student well and assists the student in achieving the school’s 21st-century learning expectations
Created and implemented SEL Advisory curriculum delivered once per month by Advisory teachers in an extended Advisory period. Each lesson involved videos, discussion questions, and a specific piece of work that students add to their portfolio. Examples of monthly topics are Emotional Awareness, Motivation and Mindset, Responsibility, and Self-Care.
Administered the SBIRT (Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral To Treatment) screening to all 9th graders. SBIRT is intended to identify substance use risk behaviors and to improve health, safety, resilience, and success in students.
Conducted S.O.S. (Signs of Suicide) screening for all 11th graders. The program is a depression awareness and suicide prevention training that encourages students to seek help if they are concerned about themselves or a friend. The SOS Program is the only youth suicide prevention program that has demonstrated an improvement in students’ knowledge and adaptive attitudes about suicide risk and depression, as well as a reduction in actual suicide attempts.
Implemented several small SEL lunch groups led by school counselors. Each group targets a specific SEL topic (ex. Anxiety & Coping Skills, Self-Esteem, Stress Management, and Social Skills).
Addition of two Adjustment Counselor positions to address student social/emotional issues. One-on-one and group counseling are provided. These positions did not exist at the time of the last accreditation visit.
Library/Media Center Updates:
Review all aspects of the library and media center (staffing, print and non-print collections) to fully support the curriculum
District Curriculum Review Cycle:
Implement a regular multi-year curriculum review cycle and protocol for all content areas
What was recommended by the last visiting team that is still a priority?
Recommendations from 2011 that are still a priority
Address facility issues that impact student learning and effective curriculum delivery, including, but not limited to, technology, leaks, temperature controls, and science labs and classrooms. We are in phase 3 of the MSBA design process.
Differentiate classroom instruction strategies and practices
Establish a timeline and a formal process to evaluate grading and reporting practices and align them with the core values, beliefs, and learning expectations:
Ongoing Grading for Equity work
Increase the level of involvement of students in the decision-making process:
An Ongoing effort to engage more student voices: in the School Council, the new logo selection, hiring of building level administrators, School Committee representation, and a developing leaders group facilitated by the administration.
Provide funding for all school programs and services
Purposeful work by the district to engage more voices in the budget process - open meetings, feedback from teachers, administrators, and families, the transparent budget process
Implement an ongoing formal curriculum in which each student has an adult in the school, in addition to the school counselor, who knows the student well and assists the student in achieving the school’s 21st-century learning expectations
Provide professional development for teachers to support the co-teaching instructional model