ELPA Conference on Doubling Student Performance

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ELPA Conference on Doubling Student Performance

• Findings on Doubling Student Performance from
  Research in School Finance Adequacy Analyses
• Allan Odden
• Co-Director, CPRE UW-Madison
• Summer, 2007

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Three Bases of Knowledge

• Emerging knowledge about how students learn
  complex materials How People Learn
• Research on individual programs that work class
  size, tutoring, professional development, summer
  school, etc.
• Emerging understanding of the resource dimensions
  of schools that double student performance

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Knowledge of Learning and Teaching

• How People Learn (Bransford)
• How Students Learn (Donovan Bransford)
• Mathematics in the Classroom
• Science in the Classroom
• History in the Classroom
• Reading
• What Teachers Should Learn and Be Able to Do
• Darling-Hammond and John Bransford

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Process of School Improvement

• The Core
• High quality instruction
• Students exerting effort to learn to high
  standards
• Recruiting and retaining high quality teachers
• An integrated HRM and teacher compensation system
• Classroom resources
• Class size, formative assessments, rigorous
  curriculum
• Teacher support and ongoing professional
  development
• Sequence of extra helps for struggling students
• Other teacher, student supports school, district
  and community leadership around high quality
  learning

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Schools/Districts Doubling Performance

• Dozens in Washington, Wisconsin, Illinois and
  Wyoming that LOP Associates has studied
• Scores across the country, e.g., Aldine (TX),
  Garden Grove (CA), Chula Vista (CA), Jacksonville
  (FL), Long Beach (CA), etc.
• All have dramatically improved student academic
  performance, which we call doubling student
  performance
• Very similar improvement strategies

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Ten Steps to Double Performance

• Conduct a needs assessment
• Set higher goals
• Double performance
• 90 percent of children at or above proficiency or
  advanced.
• Adopt a new curriculum program
• Implement Data-based decision making
• Formative assessments
• Tailor instruction to exactly what students do
  and do not know

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Ten Steps to Double Performance

• Invest in extensive, long-term professional
  development
• Summer institutes for teachers
• Instructional facilitators in schools
• Money for trainers
• Use school time more efficiently
• 90-120 minute reading blocks
• Protected math blocks
• Replace electives with double reading or math
  periods for struggling students
• Cross age achievement grouping

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Ten Steps to Double Performance

• Multiple extra-help strategies for struggling
  students
• 1-1 tutoring (by licensed teachers)
• Small group tutoring (by licensed teachers)
• Double periods during the regular day
• Extended day programs
• Summer school
• Extensive assistance for students with
  disabilities

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Ten Steps to Double Performance

• Create professional learning communities that
  work together relentlessly to boost student
  performance
• Support for improving instruction by
• Teachers
• School principal
• District leadership
• Take advantage of external professional expertise
• State department of education, Regional service
  units, Consultants, Research-based curriculum
  programs, Practice-based research findings, etc.

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The Challenge

• Scale up these strategies in all districts in in
  a state by all having schools feel the sense of
  urgency to dramatically improve performance and
  close the achievement gap

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Resource Needs for Doubling Performance
Evidence-Based Model

• Evidence-based model provides resources for every
  element used by schools and districts doubling
  student performance
• See the just published 4th edition of School
  Finance A Policy Perspective, by Odden and Picus

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Several Remaining Questions

• Do educators know about and believe in these
  approaches to designing a more powerful school
  and deploying dollars and time more effectively?
• Do educators feel a sufficient sense of urgency
  to engage in the school restructuring and
  resource reallocation that launching this
  doubling performance agenda would require?
• Are educators willing to focus on core subjects
  and spend less time and effort on electives?
• Is there leadership educator, political or
  business to launch, support and fund these
  efforts?