Grade Levels: P-5

Orchard Park Elementary School Web Site

Goals

2006-2007

Teacher Preparation
Orchard Park would like to continue developing meaningful seminars for student teachers, and continue to increase the number of student teachers in our building.

Staff Development
Our goal is to continue in the implementation of writing across all subject areas and to continue the staff development in this subject.

Research
Our goal is to continue and encourage Action Research Projects and to examine the results of this research to determine best practices in teaching and learning.

Student Learning
Our goal is to continue the implementation of Waterford in kindergarten and first grade and to examine the effectiveness of this through the BSU research project. We will also continue monitoring student progress in the area of writing.

Site Review Visit

March 30, 2006

Partnership Functions and Goals

Teacher Preparation

Rubric: (4)

Pre-service teachers are receiving quality instruction in best practices, abundant experiences in exercising these practices, and highly professional feedback on their performance.

Notes:

Orchard Park has an exceedingly strong teacher preparation program.  Pre-service teachers are embraced as part of the whole educational experience.  They are exposed to professional development and demonstrations of high-quality instruction.  They receive feedback in multiple ways, including through the student teacher evaluation instrument, benchmark conferencing, weekly seminars, daily feedback, and appropriate instructional modeling.  The school also implements a co-teaching model of supervision that provides additional support to teacher candidates.  The faculty, staff, and liaison provide excellent experiences for the pre-service teachers.

Staff Development

Rubric: (4)

School staff is vigorously engaged in clearly focused, highly relevant professional development efforts that result in obvious professional growth.

Notes:

Everyone in Orchard Park Elementary School works collaboratively to improve the professional development of the staff and pre-service teachers. All staff development is based on the needs of children and learners. Through the dynamic leadership of the principal, Dr. Dudley, a learning community has been established. Ongoing literacy groups engage the faculty in professional reading.  Faculty Shares are held monthly to share new learning and involve new members and student teachers.  Staff members attend conferences like Effective Schools and the National Staff Development Council to learn about new staff development techniques and best practices.  Monthly staff development and PBA days provide time for staff learning opportunities.  New teachers participate in seminars alongside student teachers.  Cross grade-level sharing of reading strategies occurs on a monthly and sometimes weekly basis.  The principal supports half-day release time for the teachers to review and assess writing prompts, determine writing instructional goals for the future, and visit other schools and programs.   Some of the professional development workshop titles have been Everyday Math, Language Three Training, Shurley English, Differentiated Curriculum for Special Area Teachers, Technology Training, Grade Level Science Inquiry Kits, New Teacher Mentoring, and Special Education Everyday Math.

Research

Rubric: (3)

School staff, pre-service teachers, and University faculty are engaged in the examination of an important educational research question through study of research literature and classroom experimentation.   Results could lead to professional dissemination through publication or presentation.

Notes:

A variety of research and inquiry projects were described during this site review.  Several classroom teachers, the principal, the BSU liaison, and the pre-service teachers are involved at some level.  Dr. Dudley completed her doctoral dissertation entitled "Building School Capacity to Improve Student Achievement."   Dr. Melser has completed a comparison of urban and suburban teachers relating to multicultural attitudes, and an ongoing project with two other Carmel-Clay Schools to examine the Waterford Early Reading Program.  Dissemination of research is through presentations at state and local levels.

Student Learning

Rubric: (3)

Students at the school site are demonstrating good improvement in achievement or related desired behaviors, and these improvements appear to be clearly linked to PDS project activities.

Notes:

The work of Orchard Park is focused on student learning. Student data from ISTEP, DIBELS, and Everyday Math are analyzed and used to inform instruction. Many teachers keep portfolios for district wide reading prompts, classroom writing, and Everyday Math. Pre-service teachers demonstrate student learning through their Learning Assessment Model Program (LAMP) units which include the required pre- and post-testing. The three-tier literacy program and full-day kindergarten are examples of strategies implemented to provide instruction for individual needs. Dr. Melser, the BSU faculty liaison, works with small groups of children and demonstrates instructional methods.

NCATE Standards

Standard I.  Learning Community
Standing: "At standard"

Conclusion:

Support multiple learners:  Pre-service teachers, the Orchard Park staff, and the Ball State liaison work together to provide an environment that encourages student success.  Pre-service teachers are seen as an integral part of the school and are held to high levels of expectation.  They become members of a grade-level team, participate on cross grade-level teams for professional development, and are expected to take part in all school activities.  When student teachers are placed at Orchard Park, they enter a system that is built to support their emerging skills.  A student teaching handbook has been developed to emphasize the expectations from both the school and the university.  A teacher resource file containing building-specific instruction is also available.  Pre-service teachers experience all facets of the school community.  This was made clear during the parent, teacher, administrator, and teacher candidate interviews. Because there are three PDS sites in the Carmel-Clay School District, there is a natural flow of information among the schools.  The fact that one liaison is assigned to two of the three schools increases the consistency of PDS expectations.

Work and practice are inquiry-based and focused on learning:  All student teachers complete the required instructional unit, LAMP.  An interview with a current student teacher revealed that the idea of inquiry-based instruction filtered into many of her activities.  Several faculty members engage in action research, although this practice is not a school-wide focus.  The school supports multiple ways for faculty to grow professionally and to focus on student learning.  Currently, cross grade-level book clubs have been formed.  The groups meet biweekly to discuss content and implications for the classroom.  Research supports this as a very effective type of professional development.

Develop a common shared professional vision of teaching & learning grounded in research and practitioner knowledge:  Pre-service teachers are involved in all aspects of school life.  In the words of John Goodlad, they are immersed in the "culture of school."  Interviews revealed a high level of involvement in a variety of activities including book studies, district in-service, weekly seminars, parent conferences, and math night. Teacher candidates all indicated that they felt they played an integral role in the education of children at Orchard Park.  Several teachers actively present at conferences and at the BSU PDS Advisory Council meetings.  Classroom teachers model "best practice" strategies for the teacher candidates.

Serve as an element of change:  School personnel actively participate in PDS Advisory Council meetings and the BSU liaison is in Orchard Park on a weekly basis.  Pre-service teachers are represented on school committees and take part in curricular decisions.

Extended learning community:  Orchard Park often collaborates with other elementary schools including PDS sites Forest Dale and Towne Meadow.  An interview with a parent revealed that the general attitude toward the partnership is positive.  Parents like the involvement of Ball State, the additional professional expertise available for differentiation of instruction, and the co-teaching model of supervision.

Standard II.   Accountability and Quality Assurance
Standing: "At standard"

Conclusion:

Develop professional accountability: All lesson plans, including LAMP projects, address the state and local standards.   Training sessions about teaching with standards are held for new teachers.  Newsletters from teachers include teaching activities based on standards. For example, the reading intervention teachers include in the newsletter the standards being used for that group and then report the data to parents through narratives and graphing.

Assure public accountability: Student teachers send introductory letters to families and participate in school events such as parent/teacher conferences and math night. The public may read about Orchard Park School in the newspaper or newsletters. To introduce the three-tier literacy program, many family sessions were held.  Parents are on committees and are welcome to offer input for developing curriculum. Community partnerships have been created and utilized.  State politicians visited the opening of the full-day kindergarten pilot project to highlight the importance of this as a future statewide initiative.

Set PDS participation criteria: Orchard Park is accredited through North Central Association and is an Indiana Four Star School for the 2005 school year. All partnership participants are licensed in the fields in which they teach or supervise.

Develop assessments, collect information, and use results: Formal and informal assessments of student learning include classroom achievement testing, ISTEP, and DIBELS. The performance-based system for evaluating student teachers, based on the INTASC principles, includes benchmark conferences, observations, and showcase portfolios.   Professional development school participants evaluate the university faculty through university procedures and a survey.  The school improvement plan is based on student needs and thus staff development is based on improving student achievement. 

Engage with the PDS context: Collaboration with Forest Dale Elementary School to exchange ideas for student teacher seminars is one of the ways Orchard Park engages with other schools in the PDS Network.  At a recent PDS Network meeting, Orchard Park shared information about their Homework Club.  The reading intervention coach and the principal presented the three-tier literacy program at a conference. Site council members communicate with BSU partners as expected or as necessary.  The BSU liaison participates in the PDS liaison meetings.

Standard III.  Collaboration
Standing: "At standard"

Conclusion:

Engage in joint work: The entire Orchard Park faculty is involved in the partnership work. This includes interviewing potential student teachers, mentoring BSU students, participating in the student teacher seminars, and sharing materials. The partnership is mentioned frequently at staff meetings. Teacher candidates are accepted as professionals by the entire school community. They participate in all staff development activities and are expected to join one of the book study groups. Dr. Melser, the BSU liaison, is actively involved in staff development by offering personal assistance and consultation to teachers, teaching in classrooms, conducting workshops, and supporting and supervising the student teachers.

Design roles and structures to enhance collaboration and develop parity: Both beginning and veteran Orchard Park teachers are encouraged to take leadership roles and share their expertise. Many teachers actively participate in the weekly seminars that are available to both student teachers and new teachers in the school. The school has adopted the co-teaching model for working with pre-service teachers. This design allows the teacher and student teacher to gradually change roles in the classroom, allows more small group instruction, and maintains consistency for the students.

Through the partnership, Dr. Dudley and Mrs. Szuhaj are recognized as BSU adjunct faculty and participate in many BSU PDS Network activities. Ball State gives the school $1000 per year to purchase materials, support activities associated with the supervision of student teachers, and support attendance at professional meetings. Teachers who supervise teacher candidates are given a stipend by the university.

Systematically recognize and celebrate joint work and contributions of each partner: Student teachers are valued by the entire school community. Teacher candidates are actively recruited. The PDS partnership is recognized and valued by the Carmel-Clay administrators and school board.

Standard IV.  Diversity and Equity
Standing: "Leading"

Conclusion:

Insure equitable opportunities to learn: Orchard Park teachers and administrators gather data about the gaps and weaknesses among students of diverse groups through testing.   This occurs for third through fifth graders using the ISTEP results.  Additional testing is completed by the ESL teacher, district central administration, and classroom teachers.  Supplementary testing includes, but is not limited to, CAT for second grade and DIBELS for kindergarten and first grade.  Data from standardized tests and formative classroom testing is disaggregated and examined to identify strengths and weaknesses.  Students with exceptionalities are provided with IEPs to determine the least restrictive environment for learning.  Further assessment is completed using the Carmel-Clay writing prompt four times a year which is a tracking process for writing development, and reading progress is tracked through the Accelerated Reading Program.

Evaluate policies and practices to support equitable learning outcomes: In response to the diverse population of students who attend Orchard Park School and the data collected on their students, a full-time ESL teacher has been hired. Additionally, a full-time Spanish-speaking instructional assistant was hired to help teach the Hispanic students.   This is highly commendable and provides the ESL children instruction on language and literacy as well as providing them with teachers who reflect their culture and language back to them.  The administrators and faculty have focused on additional multicultural training and book studies regarding diversity issues, which have influenced their daily work.  Furthermore, the media specialist has purchased multiple books for the children's literature collection cognizant that all children need books that reflect their culture/diversity back to them, as well as provide windows into other cultures.

Children with learning disabilities are identified as early as possible and are taught by full-time special education and speech teachers.   Due to the diverse population, and based on need, the school offers a full day of kindergarten, hopefully setting the stage for future success for these children. A vibrant self-study culture within the teaching faculty has been studying a book on differentiating instruction for diverse populations.  This provides absolute documentation of the commitment of the staff to be as informed as possible to effectively teach a diverse population. Two self-contained gifted and talented classrooms (grades 2/3 and 4/5) allow the top students to be challenged by accelerated approaches. These students are identified through their performance on the ISTEP and by teacher recommendation.  This has been widely recognized throughout the educational community and other schools have requested visits to view these classrooms.  It was not known at the time of the interview if any diversity was represented in these classrooms.   The K-12 students exhibit continuing achievement gains as documented by the attainment of the school's Four Star School Award.

Because the school has a variety of ethnic, SES, religious, and other backgrounds, pre-service teachers must demonstrate their ability to work well with diverse learners and their families.  They participate in parent teacher conferences with a diverse group of families and have the opportunity to participate in diverse learning activities outside the school day such as the spring festivals, fundraisers. The student teachers work with the ESL children in their classrooms on a daily basis with the assistance of a full-time ESL teacher.  The ESL teacher frequently offers a seminar for the student teachers.  They also benefit from working with the full-time Spanish-speaking instructional assistant on staff.  The teacher candidates attend ongoing staff training sessions about diversity and ESL issues and participate in EVERYBODY COUNTS, a program about disabilities.

Recruit and support diverse participants: Orchard Park has two teachers of minority status.   A Hispanic teacher who teaches Spanish and a Hispanic Spanish-speaking instructional assistant are employed at the school, however; there are no full-time minority classroom teachers.  Dr. Dudley reports that attempts to recruit minority teachers are unsuccessful due to a lack of applicants. Diverse pre-service teachers are actively recruited but the one they accepted had to withdraw due to financial difficulties.  Cognizant of this issue, the principal keeps a watchful eye out for minority applications.

Standard V.  Structures, Resources & Roles
Standing: "At Standard"

Conclusion:

Establish governance and support structures: The PDS site council includes a core group of administrators, teachers and the BSU liaison. The council meets frequently during the year, with additional faculty members participating depending on the issues to be addressed.

Ensure progress towards goals: Partnership goals are set by the council and reviewed and revised yearly. The required yearly report has been submitted to the PDS Network director each year. 

Create PDS roles: All faculty members are involved in the partnership in some way. The principal and assistant principal are university adjunct faculty members and Dr. Melser is the BSU liaison. During 2005-06, a teacher, Mrs. Riego, has become co-coordinator of the PDS activities. Teachers are able to count the supervision of student teachers on their professional growth plans. The PDS work of the liaison is recognized through the promotion and tenure process. 

Resources: The school receives $1,000 per year from Ball State to support the partnership activities. Individual teachers receive a stipend from BSU for each student teacher they supervise. The school corporation honors requests from administrators and teachers to participate in PDS activities.

Use effective communication:   The Orchard Park and Ball State partnership work is communicated through the PDS Network reports. The school community is informed through parents visiting the school, the school Web site, and school newsletters.

Summary/Recommendations

The site review team enjoyed its visit to Orchard Park Elementary School and sees evidence of an exemplary PDS partnership.

Commendations:

• Orchard Park has an incredible professional development plan in place.  It was inspiring to learn about the many ways in which faculty members are studying to improve their practice. What gives this school star status in this area are the multiple opportunities for staff development, teacher-led study groups, and a very vibrant enthusiastic vision by everyone involved in this process.  This is work above and beyond the daily work of the school, which is teaching kids!

• Teacher preparation is particularly strong.  Pre-service teachers truly encounter all aspects of being an educator in today's society.  The Orchard Park personnel provide modeling of very high standards.  It appears that the faculty and staff see themselves as teacher educators with a role to play in mentoring emerging professionals.

• The concept of supporting multiple learners (Standard I) is clearly demonstrated. Administrators and faculty members are to be commended for their responsiveness, cognizance, and empathy for the ESL students in their school population.  They have a focused plan in place to meet the needs of these children in every aspect of their school.

• The leadership team is commended for the collaboration among all of the stakeholders. The administrative leadership and the commitment of the BSU liaison have been responsible for this strong partnership.

Recommendations:

The team recommends the following steps be taken to ensure the continued   development of the partnership:

• Consider disseminating the results of research to a wider audience.

• Consider highlighting PDS work and communicating what makes your PDS special to the broader community.

• Continue to recruit minority student teachers and minority teacher candidates for your school as staffing needs present themselves.
• Continue working with appropriate administrators at Ball State to recruit the maximum number of student teachers.