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Newton focused on the apple
Freud researched anxiety
Piaget studied his children
Darwin played with Galapagos turtles

The Elementary and Secondary Education
Act (ESEA), renamed "No Child Left Behind"
(NCLB) in 2001, established goals of high standards, accountability for all, and the belief that all children can learn, regardless of their background or ability.

A Law of Accountability for Public Schools
On January 8, 2002, President Bush signed into law the No Child Left Behind
(NCLB) Act, the most sweeping education reform legislation in decades

A New Level of Educational Program Evaluation
• All educational programs evaluated on basis of student achievement and school performance measures
• An almost totally “quantitative” evaluation of public schools .

• To ensure that all children have fair and equal opportunities to reach proficiency on state academic achievement standards.
• Note emphasis on the word “opportunities.”

• The goal, worth, merit, and value of public schools shall be determined by student achievement and school performance measures.
• A series of performance targets that states, school districts, and schools must achieve each year to meet the proficiency requirements.
• To “meet” AYP, schools must be making adequate yearly progress towards the 2013/2014 NCLB goal.

Year Reading
3 - 8
76.7% 2005-2006
2006-2007 76.7 %
2007-2008 84.4 %
2008-2009 84.4 %
2009-2010 84.4 %
2010-2011 92.2 %
Math
3 - 8
81.0 %
81.0 %
87.3 %
87.3 %
87.3 %
93.7 %
Reading/LA
Grade 10
35.4 %
35.4 %
56.9 %
56.9 %
56.9 %
78.4 %
Math
Grade 10
70.8 %
70.8 %
80.5 %
80.5 %
80.5 %
90.2 %

• AYP focuses on all students and subgroups of students in schools, school districts, and states, with a goal of closing achievement gaps and increasing proficiency to 100 percent.
• Ten student groups defined in NC public schools.

1. School as a whole (all students)
2. American Indian
3. Asian
4. Black
5. Hispanic
6. Multi-racial
7. White
8. Economically Disadvantaged (FARMS)
9. Limited English Proficient (LEP)
10. Students with Disabilities (SWD)

All public school program evaluation
(until further notice) must include:
1) PROFICIENCY achievement;
2) school safety; and
3) teacher quality goals and objectives.
Regardless of the type of program evaluation conducted, NCLB requires program evaluation to include these standards and expectations.

• The ultimate goal of NCLB is to bring all students to PROFICIENCY (Level III or Above) as defined by North Carolina, no later than 2013-14.
• For the purpose of school, district and state accountability, the interim benchmark for progressing toward the goal is Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) in raising student achievement.

How do we locate and interpret student achievement data in public schools?
How do we organize the data into meaningful explanations that our stakeholders can understand?

The good news is that the NC School Report
Card provides vast amounts of information for principals and their stakeholders.
The bad news is that the NC School Report
Card provides vast amounts of information for principals and their stakeholders.

http://www.ncpublicschools.org/
Provides principals with the following:
Overall School Profile
High Student Performance Data
Safe and Orderly School Data
Quality Teachers

School report cards provide information and data which principals can use to evaluate programs and school activities.
Principals must be able to read, interpret understand, and communicate school report card data to their stakeholders.

•
School size compared to district & state
•
Average course size (number of students)
•
Specialized enrollments (AP, IB, Career)

NC Report Card: High Student Performance
• Overall student performance
• Demographic student performance
• Additional student performance data
(SAT, AYP, graduation rates, attendance rates, promotion rates)

NC Report Card: Overall School Performance Rating
 Honor School of Excellence
– 90% of students at grade level & AYP achieved
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School of Excellence - 90% of students at grade level
School of Distinction
– 80% to 90% of students at grade level
School of Progress
– 60% to 80% of students

NC Report Card: Overall School Performance Ratings
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No Recognition
– 60% to 100% of students at grade level but no increase in achievement percentages from previous year
Priority School
– 50% to 60% of students at grade or Less than 50% of students at grade level
Low Performing School
– Less than 50% of students at grade level.

NC Report Card: Overall School Performance Ratings
 AYP Results
 Met AYP or Did Not Meet AYP
 Targets met versus targets missed

• Acts of crime and violence
• Number of OSS and Expulsions
• Student Attendance Rates
• Access to Books & Technology
• School Heath Information

Parental Involvement Questions:
• Does the School Improvement Plan outline the school's parent involvement program?
• How does the school involve parents in decision-making?
• Are school personnel readily accessible to parents?
• Is there an organized volunteer program at the school?
• Does the school make every effort to communicate with parents?
• Are parents offered workshops and support materials to help support their child's learning?
• Is the community invited to be involved with the school?
• How well does parental involvement at their child's school reflect the diversity of the parents and guardians whose children attend that school?

• Number of Classroom Teachers
• Fully Licensed Teachers
• Number of Classes Taught by "Highly Qualified"
Teachers
• Number of Teachers with Advanced Degrees
• National Board Certified Teachers
• Years of Teaching Experience
• Teacher Turnover Rate
• Teacher Working Conditions

Quick and dirty summary of school data sets:
 Overall School Profile
 High Student Performance Data
 Safe and Orderly School Data
 Quality Teachers

 You will be expected to become very familiar with the NC Report Card
 You will need to be able to locate, select, extract, organize, interpret, and present information from all the data sets found in the NC School Report
Card.
 Your mid-term exam will ask you to develop a comprehensive needs assessment for your assigned school.

As a principal, an educational program evaluation of your school is equivalent to a qualitative case study assessment.
One of the best-known and most influential books in effectively managing and developing organizations was a case study on 62 highly regarded companies:
In Search of Excellence

Peters and Waterman visited companies
( field-based research ), conducted extensive interviews, and studied documents
( qualitative data collection ).
From a massive amount of data, they extracted eight (8) excellence attributes:

1. A bias for action
2. Close to the client (customer)
3. Autonomy & Entrepreneurship
4. Productivity through people
5. Hands-on, value-driven practices
6. Stick to the knitting (meat & potatoes)
7. Simple, lean staff
8. Simultaneous loose-tight coupling properties

Stephen Covey used this same qualitative sampling approach to conduct case studies of highly effective people.
Covey identified seven (7) habits that highly effectively people practiced.

1. Being proactive
2. Beginning with the end in mind
3. Putting first things first
4. Thinking win/win
5. Seeking first to understand, then to be to be understood
6. Synergizing
7. Self-renewal

• Both In Search of Excellence and The 7
Habits of Highly Effective People gleaned a small number of very important lessons from a huge amount of data.
• The quality of the information’s meaning and its’ usefulness is what matters…not the quantity of information collected.

Developing A Comprehensive Needs Assessment
To Improve Student Achievement
• The No Child Left Behind Act in January, 2001 mandated that public schools receiving federal funds achieve Adequate Yearly Progress.
• Across the United States, principals, faculty and staff have spent numerous hours on the issue of school reform trying to improve student achievement.
• If we are serious about improving student performance, then we must first understand how to conduct comprehensive needs assessments.

• There has been too much emphasis on the uniform practice of school effect models and too little attention given to the change process.
• Principals often hurry to complete tasks and sacrifice effective program processes as a result.
• Schools must identify their strengths & weaknesses before implementing improvement programs.

The purpose of needs assessment is to identify the strengths and weaknesses of existing programs, practices, procedures, and activities.
The identification of strengths & weaknesses should include student test scores, student demographic data, discipline & attendance rates, teacher quality measurements, and report card rankings.

 NC ABCs criterion-referenced tests give administrators, faculty, and students specific information on what skills & content areas students have mastered
 The most effective strategy for principals and faculty members is to analyze test data by dividing into groups to identify curricula strengths and weaknesses

 After identifying strengths and weaknesses in the curriculum, the principal and the faculty members should develop an action plan with
SMART Goals to target these areas.
 No more than three areas should be targeted during any one academic year.
 The SMART GOAL Action Plan should be implemented at the beginning of an academic year.

The three areas targeted for improvement in the Needs Assessment should be written as
SMART Goals:
S pecific
M easurable
A ttainable
R ealistic
T imebound

 SMART Goals are typically long-term statements about moving students from one achievement level to the next.
 If, for example, 70% of your students scored
Proficient or higher on Reading/Language
Arts/English tests at the end of the 2005/2006 school year, and the NC Target AYP Proficiency
Standard for 2009 is 85%, then your SMART
Goal could read as follows:

 Specific – “ Students in our school will demonstrate mastery of Reading/Language Arts/English…
 Measurable as evidenced by NC EOC state assessment tests…
 Attainable … by increasing the percentage of students scoring Prof/Advanced
 Results-oriented … 15%
 Timebound …in the 2008/2009 school year .”

for
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SMART Objectives are typically annual or yearly student achievement statements that support the long-term SMART Goal.
In the previous example, your school could write a SMART Objective for each year ( 2007 , 2008 , &
2009 ) that supported the overall long-term goal of increasing student proficiency percentages in
Reading/Language Arts/English by 15% in the
2008/2009 school year. The SMART Objectives could be:

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Annual SMART Objectives for Increasing
Reading/Language Art/English Test Scores
Specific – “Students in our school will demonstrate mastery of Reading/Language Arts/English…
 Measurable as evidenced by NC EOC state assessment tests…
 Attainable … by increasing the percentage of students scoring Prof/Advanced
 Results-oriented & Timebound … 5% in the 2006/2007 school year, 5% in the 2007/2008 school year, and 5% in the 2008/2009 school year.

Yearly SMART Objectives allow you to eat the AYP
Proficiency
Elephant “one bite at a time.”
By breaking up the 15% Goal into three 5 % annual objectives , the SMART Goal becomes a more
attainable and realistic goal for all stakeholders.

S PECIFIC
Based on needs assessment
M easurable A ttainable
Information needed to address the needs and/or problems you are trying to solve
Data collection, how you are going to collect
(and if you can collect) the information to assess your progress
R ealistic
Performance indicators, what you need to be doing to accomplish your objectives and goals
T imebound
When you will begin data collection, complete data collection, and report your evaluation
Determines long-term goals and yearly objectives
Can we measure what we are trying to evaluate
Observations, document review, interviews, test data, and surveys
Can we realistically achieve these goals and objectives?
Must establish and stick a schedule

• Student Surveys
• Teacher Surveys
• Parent Surveys

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Surveys should be used to measure stakeholders’ perception of how well the school is performing.
Students, parents, teachers, staff, and members of the school community should be surveyed to measure their perceptions of the school’s performance.
Students should be given the opportunity to participate in the survey.
Students often provide valuable perceptions about school climate and discipline practices.

1. Please describe the purpose of your school’s ISS Program.
ISS Assessment Survey
2. Do you have written procedures that detail how students are referred to the program? If yes please explain.
3. Who has the responsibility for determining if in-school suspension is the appropriate course of action?
4. What are the expectations for students who are assigned to ISS?
5. How do students who are referred to ISS keep up with their class work?
6. Do ISS students receive direction and support on how to modify their negative behavior patterns? If yes, please describe these support services.
7. How are parents of ISS students involved in the program?
8. Please describe how ISS students’ academic progress and behaviors are monitored after returning to the regular classroom.
9. How do students with special needs who are referred to ISS continue to receive their FAPE services written in their IEPs?
10. Do you believe the ISS program in your school is effective? Please explain.

Arts Integration Training Workshop Survey
What were your expectations coming into this workshop?
Were your expectations met? In what ways were they or were they not?
On a scale of 1-5 (5 being “most satisfied”), how would you rank this session?
What did you learn or experience that you think will be particularly useful for you working in the classroom?
What did you take away from this workshop that you would like to have more of?

Teacher Survey SA A DK D SD
1. New teachers in my school receive a quality mentoring program.
2. Teachers at my school plan and work together in grade-level, vertical, and other team formats.
3. My school’s goals are clearly communicated to me.
4. I enjoy working at this school.
5. I receive a lot of support from other faculty members in my school.
6. I have the resources, supplies and materials I need to do my job.
7. If I had the chance, I would leave education and find a job in another field.
8. My school is safe for students and teachers.
9. I know I can depend on help from other teachers in my school.
10. I receive high job satisfaction from teaching in my school .

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My child’s school provides high quality teaching each day.
My child’s teacher cares about him/her.
My child’s school does a good job communicating with parents.
The tutorial assistance program at my child’s school is improving student achievement.
My child feels safe at school each day.
The administration at my child’s school does a good job.
The principal at my child’s school is open and willing to talk to parents.

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There are seven general categories that most schools should collect data on:
School Climate
School Culture
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School Administration (Principal/A.P.)
Discipline
Parental/Community Involvement
Professional Development
Technology

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Survey items should be aligned to the categories; this simplifies the process of identifying patterns.
Survey items must be simply written and easily understood.
The reader should not have to apply problem solving skills to complete the survey.
The survey should not contain more than 20 items.
 It should not take the reader more than fifteen minutes to complete.

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Previous school report cards issued to schools by state departments of education, school improvement plans, suspension and drop out rates of students
The school’s mission statements, school newsletters, school yearbooks, and any other materials that would provide any insight as to what events/persons direct the school to be as it is today.
The more information collected, the more information that will be learned about the school’s strengths, weaknesses, and improvement needs.

Demographic Data in Needs Assessments
 Demographic data includes student population, number of students who qualify for free or reduced meals, racial composition of students, mobility of students, education and occupation of students’ parents and guardians.
 The purpose of demographic data is to form a concept of the students’ home environment.

 Educators should not have lower expectations for students from lower socioeconomic status environments.
 However, they may have to provide learning experiences that these students have not had due to lack of resources.
 For example, grants may need to be written or resources allocated so that students will have trade books in their homes during the summer.

 The majority of all federal and state grants require a narrative explaining the purpose of your request for funds.
 Most grants label this narrative as a Needs
Statement section.
 The data categories listed in the previous slides are what grant funders use to determine who gets the money and how much money is distributed for each site.

 It is necessary to include all stakeholders in the needs assessment process.
 It is only good managerial practice to create a core committee to initialize, collect, manage, sort, and publish data.
 The core committee or steering committee should be composed of responsible individuals who will be key players in the needs assessment process.

 As the school leader, you must have a strong knowledge base and clearly understand the
NC Accountability Model for Public Schools.
 Your stakeholders will expect you to be comfortable discussing Report Card Results,
NCLB Mandates, AYP Benchmarks, and
School Ratings.
 One more time, it is always a good idea to
be the smartest person in the room.

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A needs assessment is a comprehensive evaluation plan of a school’s strengths and weaknesses.
The concept of needs assessment is to build on the school’s strengths and improve areas of weakness.
Educators are expected to use data from the needs
 assessment to write a school improvement plan that has specific SMART Goals and SMART objectives designed by the school stakeholders to improve the school and student achievement.
This process is more important than the data collection.

Program Design, Evaluation, & Needs Assessment
If we know that a school’s goals are its programs, and we know that programs should be based on worth, value, merit, and solutions to problems, then it makes sense to establish school needs assessments as the critical factor to be used in determining program design, program inputs, program processes, program outputs, program outcomes, and program evaluation.
Is this making sense?