Learning, Working and Living: Keeping Promises to Our Youth

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Learning,Working and LivingKeeping Promises to
Our Youth

• Virginia Department of Education
• May 7, 2008

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• VDOE Timeline
• 2001-2002 school year, VDOE relied on the local
  school
• divisions to count the number of students who
  dropped
• out of school each year
• 2002-2003 school year, VDOE began collecting
  records
• for all students enrolled in Virginia public
  schools
• through its Education Information Management
  System
• (EIMS) that requires school divisions to
  report the status
• of all students enrolled in the public schools
  three times
• per year.
• Summer 2003 Project Graduation designed to help
  
• rising seniors who had already earned required
  standard
• credits in English to obtain their English
  verified credits
• towards graduation

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• 2004-2005 VDOE implemented the use of a state
  testing identifier, which allows the Department
  to track students over time
• 2005 - Code of Virginia established
  responsibility for Re-enrollment Regulations of
  Students Committed to the Department of Juvenile
  Justice (DJJ)
• September 2005 Regional Truancy Institutes and
  publication of Improving School Attendance A
  Resource Guide for Virginia Schools
• 2005-2006 SPP/APR Secondary Indicators focused on
  
• transition, dropout, graduation and post
  school outcomes

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• 2006-2007 school year, the EIMS provided 36
  different
• exit options that can be used to describe why
  students
• exited a particular school. The codes provide
  consistent
• definitions that school divisions use to
  document why
• students exited school.
• June 2006, The Study of Truancy Intervention
  Practices in
• Virginia for VDOE by Policy Works, Ltd.
• November 2007 VDOE recipient, National Governors
• Association Honors States Grant to improve high
  school
• graduation and college-ready rates

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• 2006, the Board of Education approved the
  implementation
• of a new calculation for graduation rates
  beginning in the
• fall of 2008. This rate reflects the percent
  of students who
• were first ninth graders in 2004-05 school
  year and
• graduated in the 2007-2008 school year.
• October 2006, VDOE Student Services staff
  attended the
• National Dropout Prevention Network Conference
  in San
• Antonia, TX
• November 2006 - Statewide training on
  Re-enrollment
• Regulations (DJJ, DCE, DOE and school division
  staff)

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• Virginia Team for Youth - Nine meetings across
  the state, hitting every Superintendents region.
  Brought together people from local and regional
  Education Agencies, Correctional Education,
  Social Services-foster care, Juvenile Justice,
  WIA Youth Coordinators, GED coordinators,
  truancy/attendance coordinators, Department of
  Rehabilitative Services counselors, to create a
  collaborative approach to prepare youth for
  success in a global, demand-driven economy.
  Focus on coordination, collaboration, job
  placement, partnerships, joint services,
  integrated approach, better access, information
  sharing and level of commitment among the primary
  stakeholders.
• 2006-2007 Presentations to the VA Board of
  Education Graduation and Dropout Prevention
  Committee

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• Spring 2007 Attended Secondary Indicators and
  Transition meeting in Baltimore with Student
  Services, Special Education and Federal Program
  Monitoring team
• August 2007, the Virginia General Assembly
  required the Virginia Board of Education (BOE) to
  study high school dropout and graduation rates in
  the state the Board required VDOE to conduct the
  study
• August 2007, the BOE and VDOE defined a dropout
• October 2007, The Report on the Study of High
  School Dropout and Graduation Rates in the
  Commonwealth was submitted to Board of Education

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• Eighty-five percent of the 132 school divisions
  responded to the survey.
• Fall 2007 Virginia Commission on Youth
  Legislative Studies and Initiatives recommended
  that VDOE establish guidelines for statewide
  implementation of Student Assistance Programs
  (SAPs) and a budget amendment for VDOE to
  construct a database to capture the utilization
  of Student Assistance Programs (SAPs) in the
  state
• January 2008 Applied for Americas Promise
  Alliance Dropout Prevention Grant
• February 2008 - Received grant from Americas
  Promise Alliance for Dropout Prevention Summit

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• January April 2008 VDOE held five regional
  Student Assistance Programming (SAP) 2 day
  training
• March 2008 - 23rd Annual Virginia Transition
  Forum preconference on Dropout for Students with
  IEPs Dr. Bost presented- Participants included
  general, special education and career and
  technical staff
• March 2008 Dr. Bost met with key DOE staff
  across divisions to discuss dropout prevention
  issues and collaborative efforts
• April 2008 Virginia Commission on Youth asked
  to study the compliance with the compulsory
  school attendance law school truancy

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• 2008 Superintendents Cabinet holding ongoing
  meetings and planning regarding dropout
  prevention and school completion
• May 2008 Attendance at National Secondary State
  Planning Institute, Charlotte, NC
• June 2008 Regional Dropout Prevention Meetings
• September 2008 Statewide Dropout Prevention
  Summit

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• Descriptions of Areas Included in a Systemic
  Approach to Student Graduation
• Studies of the reasons why students leave
  school include failure to keep pace with academic
  standards. Studies of dropout recovery efforts
  have also lead to observations that adequate
  instruction is not the only impediment to
  learning, but also social, economic, and health
  and mental health factors. A systemic approach
  to student graduation needs to embrace the entire
  student with effective practices in both the
  academic and the student supports area. In
  addition, a systemic approach must include
  organizational structure that promotes
  implementation of effective practices and
  policies that ensure that they are sustained.
• The academic aspects of keeping students in
  schools focuses on matching instructional
  strategies to what students need on a class and
  on an individual basis. Skills and knowledge
  development of instructors is a key element.
  Understanding how to change instruction so that a
  student will learn, how to measure student
  progress, and providing opportunities for a
  student to demonstrate successful learning are
  elements of the academic subsystem. The
  development of standards and model curriculum to
  teach those standards, the establishment of
  tutoring systems, the programming of time for
  additional instruction and remediation for
  failing students are also elements of the
  academic subsystem.

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• One individual with the philosophy that a teacher
  must find ways to reach a student and help him or
  her to learn will not thrive in an environment
  that does not recognize individual student needs
  as a catalyst for changed instructional
  approaches. The culture of a school system,
  expectations and investment in staff learning,
  use of staff knowledge and strengths, formal and
  informal organizational relationships, must be
  aligned to promote and to support changes in the
  academic approach. Without an organizational
  management subsystem that expects, supports, and
  reinforces practices such as use of data for
  monitoring, assessment, and intervention,
  school-wide reform and improvement for students
  who fall through the cracks cannot occur.
• What the school board and the superintendent
  reinforce through formal, written, policies will
  be a statement of what is important to that
  school system, will be given attention, and paid
  attention and will be expected to be followed.
  Without formal action to specify expectations and
  practices of a school system, permanent change
  cannot be sustained. The formal documents of a
  school board present what is important to
  families and to school personnel. These policies
  ensure that academic and student supports reform
  is not individual dependent.

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• Even with the building of academic
  approaches, policies, and supportive
  organizational structure and management, a
  student who is not succeeding may need
  intervention for reasons that are not related to
  his or her ability to learn. Help with a family
  situation, diagnosis and intervention with a drug
  problem, planning for individual student
  assistance to overcome distressing situations,
  are all part of the student supports subsystem
  that provides the foundation for learning to take
  place. A student must be engaged to learn. The
  student support subsystem identifies and
  addresses the reasons why the student is not
  engaged.
• All of the subsystems must operate in concert to
  an aligned overall system that addresses student
  school graduation.

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• Vivian G. Stith-Williams, Ph.D.
• Student Services Specialist
• Office of Student Services
• Virginia Department of Education
• Vivian.Stith-Williams_at_doe.virginia.gov
• 804-225-4543