Alison+Parker's+Wiki+Space++8843


 * Alison Parker 8843 Performance Improvement Intervention**


 * MODULE I: From Chaos to Definition **
 * Organization **: Public School 315K, School of Performing Arts
 * Location **: 2310 Glenwood Road, Brooklyn, New York 11210
 * Clientele **: Serving grades Pre-K-5, 803 students
 * Founded **: September 1998


 * Problem Summary **: PS 315K would like all students to have better access to educational technologies as well as to use these technologies to make differentiation of instruction easier for already overwhelmed teachers struggling to find viable solutions for ELLs and SWDs (English Language Learners) (Students with disabilities). A chief complaint of teachers is that they do not have enough working laptops for 1:1 instruction for students. Many of the computers the school does have are not operational. Of the DELL laptop computers the school used to have many of them grew legs and walked away during the 2010-2011 school year when the school was transitioning from its founding principal leaving for a promotion as a superintendent to another district. During that time the school had one interim acting principal and then later a different candidate got the job and became the new principal. With this whirl-wind of chaos and so many changes taking place the school's morale decreased and many laptops were damaged, stolen from/removed from/never returned to the building.

**Background of the Organization**: PS 315K was opened in 1998 and founded by Mrs. Beverly-Ffolkes Bryant who served first as the assistant principal of PS 152. PS 152K was the original school which served over 1600 students with 2 Assistant Principals. The superintendent decided to split the school to relieve the current principal Mr. E. Cypress and made Mrs. Bryant the new principal of the other half of PS 152, which he renamed PS 315K, school of Performing Arts since the "arts" were her specialty. The school remained under her tutelage from September 1998 to Oct. 2010. After over 10 years as the building leader in this Brooklyn, NY Title I public school she moved on to a role as a superintendent in Queens, NYC, Oct. 2010. In that time PS 315K has had one interim acting principal who was a friend of the principal. She only had middle school experience and after the interview process she lost the race of becoming the principal to a candidate that also interviewed for the job who happened to score slightly more points than her. The staff had adapted to the interim acting principal after accepting that the first principal refused to pass "the baton" down to her assistant principal (who many thought would make a fabulous and effective principal). So as of April 2011 the staff has been dealing with moving cheese, chaos and constant changes! Currently the school is being led exclusively by J. Ranft-Quartana who served as an Assistant Principal in a different district with a different population of children in Brooklyn, N.Y. As soon as she took office as the new principal she began to put systems in place to help the school refocus spiritually, academically, and collaboratively. Behind the scenes there was consistent internal strife between the new principal and the assistant principal. The assistant principal really wanted the principalship and the new principal didn’t want to delegate to her. There were also issues of a lack of trust between them, poor communication and a toxic work environment blanketed in low morale, confusion, and tension. In December 2011 the assistant principal interviewed and accepted an offer as an Arts Director elsewhere within the larger organization. The school is being led and managed by a brand new principal with almost 100 employees and over 800 students. [] .
 * Where the Organization would be in a reasonable amount of time **: In a reasonable amount of time, perhaps 1-3 years, the school could possibly have moved and matured in a plethora of ways, particularly if the school leadership grows next year to include a new Assistant Principal and a full time technology integration specialist, both which the principal has communicated with me in (2) interviews, are two human resources that she hopes to hire next year (2012-2013). With these human resources in place, coupled with a data driven, research based-Technology Plan, along with shared leadership between the School Leadership Team, school pedagogues and the principal/assistant principal the school may be well on its way to eradicating the gap between Students with Disabilities/ELLs and students performing at grade level.

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">**Key Personnel within the** **Organization:** <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Principal: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">J. Ranft-Quartana v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Literacy Coaches: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Mrs. Ellman, Ms. Kennedy v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Math Coaches: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Mrs. Fandacone, Ms. Fava v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Librarian: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Ms. P. Bailey-Hollon v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Grade 2 Teacher that “volunteers” and currently supports technology integration and hoping to be assigned the technology Integration Specialist position next school year: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Mr. LaVeglia v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Special Education Coordinator: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Mrs. Falik v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Social Worker: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Mr. Carranard v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">ESL/ELL Coordinator: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Mrs. Khan v **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Dean: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> Ms. Johnson


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Stats and Fast Facts: **<span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">**Progress Report Data** <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[] <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">**Learning Environment Survey** <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">**Quality Review Report** <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">The most recent

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Quality Review visits to the school just took place in March 2012. However the

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">report has not been officially published online yet.Accountability Report (still shows the name of the Interim Acting Principal from Oct. 2010-April 2011.) <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[]


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Budget Information **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">:

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[]


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Stakeholders and Decision Makers **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">: Primarily the School cabinet members and the School Leadership Team along with the principal make instructional decisions that relate to the work of the classroom teachers. The school cabinet is made up primarily of the Literacy Coaches, Dean, ELL Coordinator, Social Worker, School Psychologist, and Math Coaches. A full time parent coordinator supports the needs of parents. A PTA meets once or twice a month. The School Leadership Team (SLT) is made up of teachers, parents, DC 37 member (representing para professionals/school aides) the principal and a rep from the teachers union who is also a teacher. There are "visiting" cabinet members and they are some of the out of classroom teachers with a teaching specialty: art, dance, music and science. A Data Specialist works part time and provides reports to the principal as well as assists students/teachers with selecting data driven instruction from the district software Acuity. The SLT meets once or twice a month in the evening hours to discuss issues relevant to the school. I serve on the School Leadership Team.**MODULE II: The Performance Gap****Mission:** <span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">PS 315 strives to serve the needs of its students, parents and the entire community. We envision a school environment which celebrates the diversity and enables all to learn from the past and be ready to face the challenge and technologies of the future. We believe that the performing arts, combined with standards-driven instruction, will serve as an integral part of our academic program, which will build self-esteem and further increase the academic achievement of our students. While our primary goal is the improvement of pupil performance in keeping with city and state standards, we hope that through the emergence of the arts our children will be afforded the opportunity to make valuable contributions to our community.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Schools’ Goals/Objectives: **

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Teachers will differentiate literacy instruction using various technologies.

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Teachers will collaborate on and between grade levels sharing various best practices, <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">technologies, and strategies used to close the achievement gap of Common Core Standards.


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Principals’ Desired Performance of Teachers: **

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Teachers use technology to create/plan various Tiered I, Tiered, II, and Tiered III differentiated activities for use with SWDs and ELLs. v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Teachers will use “//Award Reading Online”// and laptop computers as a RTI (Response to Intervention) strategy for students in Pre-k to grade 3. This program is designed to meet the specific receptive/expressive language, fluency, phonics, phonological awareness, reading comprehension, and sentence structure needs of SWDs and ELLs that do not readily respond and progress to the tiered activities created by teachers. <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">There are not enough Laptop computers/Lap top carts for teachers to use to help differentiate instruction school-wide. With over 800 students, most students needing remediation in literacy, teachers and students are at a loss. Kindergarten classes have 25 students and grades 1-5 have 30-32 students in each class. There are only (3) laptop carts for a total of 45 laptop computers and many of them have missing/broken parts. Others are seriously outdated lap tops and/or have missing laptop power cords so the batteries are dead. There is no full time pedagogue leading in the distribution, management, maintenance, professional development and technology integration of the technology available.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Existing Performance Gap: **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Causal Analysis: Environment-Information **

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">There is an expectation to integrate technology and use it for differentiating instruction particularly for ELLs and SWDs. However, the frequency and format this should occur have not been clearly stated, no guides are used to facilitate this process and the building leader does not coach and mentor in the area of technology integration. In other words, formal observations are deemed sufficient even if the teacher doesn’t utilize technologies. Therefore, there is a disconnect with the expectations and the reality that exists.


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Causal Analysis: Environment-Resources (Materials/Tools and Human Resources) **

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">There are only (3) laptop carts and many of the computers in them are either missing, broken, and/or outdated. In addition, a plethora of power cords are missing so the batteries are completely dead. v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">There is no full time pedagogue leading in the distribution, management, maintenance, professional development and technology integration of the available technology. v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Currently there is no Technology Plan in place and a plan has never existed. Therefore,

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">practices, procedures and processes with regard to educational technologies are lacking and

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">as such there is no way of measuring performance and holding all teachers accountable to

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">the same standard.

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Current administrator seems to have a weak foundation in best practices for technology

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">integration.


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Causal Analysis: Environment-Incentives **

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">There is no reward system in place for teachers that borrow the existing laptops from the laptop carts and use them to differentiate instruction. v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">The principal hires consultants from outside to provide professional development instead of create enriching opportunities for teachers that are skilled, motivated and knowledgeable with using technology and willing to share how they differentiate with other school level colleagues. v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Many teachers lack the motivation to build their own capacity as they are complacent and comfortable “doing things as they always have.” As such these teachers even given the appropriate tools and resources would not utilize the educational technologies. Many teachers are driven to become teachers to have summers off, built in holidays off, a great NYC salary and perfect working hours that allow teachers to balance both their home and work lives. Thousands of dollars have been spent to “staff development,” “professional development,” and “training” and yet still some of these teachers will never measure up because they were a poor selection from the beginning. <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Every classroom teacher has a Dell laptop computer, mounted LCD projector with Smart Board, grades 3-5 have a set of Student Response Clickers, most classrooms have (2) very old Dell desktop computers, and far less classrooms have a working laser jet Lexmark printer with or without ink in the ink cartridges. Many teachers that have working ink jet printers ran out of toner so they can’t print resources for the literacy block. Many teachers utilize the Smartboard for interactive lessons downloaded from <span style="color: #0000ff; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.smarttech.com] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> while many use the Smartboard as if it was a blackboard from long ago and require students to merely copy the notes from the board and engage in boring lessons that lack interactivity. Every class is connected to a network wired for Internet. Zero percent of grades 3-5 use the Student Response Clickers, 100% of teachers use the Smartboard, only about half use it for interactivity among the students, and only (2) teachers use the existing laptops for small group/individual differentiation of instruction. The principal recently brought and distributed (5) I pads and “secretly” distributed them to teachers and fails to follow up with how they are being used to drive instruction/differentiate and target gaps in student achievement. **MODULE III: Three Intervention Strategies**
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Causal Analysis: Individual-Knowledge, Skills, Capacity and Motives **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Current **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> **Level of Performance:**
 * **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Low end Solution $5,000 ** || **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Medium Solution $25,000 ** || **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">High end Solution $50,000 ** ||
 * * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Run a Saturday School tutorial program for the 30 neediest SWDs and ELLs in grades K-2.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> Use existing educational technologies (laptops) and Internet.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> Put students in (3) distinct groups of ten students, based on an initial diagnostic needs assessment data.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Hire (3) Saturday School Teachers (skilled, knowledgeable, and motivated) to use data driven reading instruction with the program <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.awardreadingonline.com] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">. Teachers would work from 9 am to 11 am for 18 consecutive Saturdays at $40 per hour.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Run a Saturday School tutorial program for 96 of the neediest SWDs and ELLs in grades K-5. Thirty K-2 students would use existing laptops. While 66 students in grades 3-5 would use sixty-six new Asus Netbooks.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">$20,000 of the $25, 000 would facilitate the purchase of sixty-six Asus new Netbooks from <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.bestbuy.com] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> each costing about $300.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Hire (3) Saturday School Teachers (skilled, knowledgeable, and motivated) to use data driven reading instruction with the program <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.awardreadingonline.com] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">. Teachers would work from 9 am to 11 am for 18 consecutive Saturdays at $40 per hour. Because class sizes would be as large as 33 students per class, Brooklyn College students in the School of Education would also be used to help “staff” this project providing support and assistance while students read online and engage in differentiated literacy activities. Nine of them would be selected to volunteer, 3 for each class, thus bringing the ratio of students to teacher to 8:4.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">One hundred-sixty six Asus Netbooks would be purchased from <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.bestbuy.com] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Professional Development and Technical Support would be provided by an undergraduate unpaid intern who has recently earned a BA/BS in Computer Science or Educational Technology/Instructional Technology looking to gain work experience through volunteer work.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">This Educational Technology Intern would work alongside the current teacher that donates his time to manage technology and together they’d manage, monitor the use of, model best practices and support teachers in differentiating reading instruction in an effort to close the achievement gaps in decoding, language, fluency, reading comprehension and phonics.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Teachers would collaborate and work on a schedule of how and when they’d rotate the use of the e 27 laptops that they would have for their grade levels. ||  ||   ||

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">The Medium Strategy was chosen because the school has already been a victim of “Directive Change.” Chevalier (2007) distinguished the difference. With ‘Directive Change’ a top down power struggle on the part of the building leader against the teacher to demand immediate policy changes in curriculum and instruction where employees change temporarily however, they never really internalize, self actualize n this process and show no commitment to the research based solution. Under the tutelage of the former principal PS 315 teachers were already demanded to use the new tools or be forced to be written up, embarrassed, have their new technologies taken away. Is there any wonder why so many laptops disappeared out of their locked laptop carts? <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">However, the Medium Strategy will allow for a small fraction of the students at school to serve as a ‘focus group’ being carefully observed by a team of dedicated teachers, monitoring the gaps, and growth documenting both qualitative and quantitative data. This team would serve as leaders at the grade level that carry the message of success/student growth to other teachers while also being recognized by the principal at faculty conferences, meetings, by receiving small non-financial trinkets and bolts of encouragement and verbal appreciation. This strategy would be monitored and will take longer to carry out but it would outperform the “buy a bunch of computers and throw them in teachers’ hands and wonder what happened to them later” strategy. <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">There are embedded strengths and limitations in all three Intervention Strategies. One common strength among all three strategies is that students SWDs and ELLs would receive more attention and direct instruction. They tend to be the group with the least amount of instructional time devoted to them. Rogers (1995) discusses how consumers/users of a product do so by way of ‘communication channels’ persuading them to yield in that direction. With this, it seems to me that Intervention Strategy I/Low end Strategy would be limited because the older computers are older, slower, and would only be reaching students in grades K-2. On the other hand, the High End Strategy seems to be a “haste makes waste route” that may perpetuate the naysayers who still don’t commit to the potential power of best teaching practices coupled with integration of technology. Any time humans are forced to conform, it only has short term effects. This is the solution to reject. __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Role as Project Manager __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">: In an effort to see the Intervention Strategy through the Project Manager must already have skills in communication to keep the three teachers/nine volunteer tutors and ninety-six students engaged and motivated for (18) Saturdays. In addition, delegating to the three teachers and nine volunteers would ensure that a sense of community is being fostered amongst all key stakeholders. __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Role as Resource Manager __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">: Ideally the Project Manager would monitor the purchase and distribution of the new Netbooks/monitor distribution and use of old DELL laptops already at the school level by systematically vouchering them and ensuring that they are stored/housed and consistently utilized to differentiate reading instruction. __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Delivery Systems Management: Project Manager would delegate and e __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">ach Saturday the Technology Interns/Volunteers etc. would ensure that the DELL laptops (old) and the (new) Asus Netbooks are delivered to the three classrooms where data driven assessments are used to drive instruction. __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Information Management __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">: Project manager will present created mini brochures which will be used to maintain two way information- communication between principals’ expectations and teachers in the form of guides. One might be titled, “How to use the Award Reading Online website to help SWDs enhance letter sound relationships” and the frequency of how often the students have access to the sites. Various guides, technology plans, principal expectations, teacher feedback an ideas will be housed in a binder (hard copy) as well as stored in a digital Drop box for all stakeholders to view electronically. Finally, a shared assessment tool, based on the HPT model will be used to collectively assess the extent to which the gap has been filled by the Intervention Strategy. __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Financial/Budget Information: __ <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Volunteer $0, use <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.craigslist.com] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> or Brooklyn College job board to post ads for the intern. ||
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Note **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">: In all cases/intervention strategies students would have pre/post/monthly assessments in reading/phonics, etc, to help monitor and target weakness and celebrate student growth and success. In addition, the principal would work with a team of teachers to devise a technology plan with benchmarks and use her time to monitor technology integration for differentiated reading instruction, reward the use of it, be working on grant writing to ascertain more Netbooks, perhaps by having teachers write and request funds from <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.donorschoose.org] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">, and keep the lines of communication open so teachers can begin to shift the paradigm from teaching the way they were taught to integrating 21st century strategies/technologies.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Best Intervention Strategy Chosen & Rationale: **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">MODULE IV: Rationale and Justification **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">MODULE IV: The Manager’s Many Roles **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">MODULE V: The Manager As Change Agent: Financial, Technical and Assessment Information **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Phase I || __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Phase II __ || __<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Phase III __ ||
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">$0 used from the budget. The K-2 students will use existing computers. || <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">$5,000 for hiring teachers to work on Saturdays in (2) hour tutoring study sessions from 9 am to 11 am, three teachers totally, $1500 per teacher @ $40 per hour. || <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">$20,000 for the purchase of 66 new Asus Netbooks at <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.bestbuy.com] <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> for students in grades 3-5. http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Asus+-+Eee+PC+X101CH-EU17-BK+10.1%22+Netbook+-+Intel+Atom+N2600+1.60+GHz+-+Matte+Black/5059337.p?id=1218604282989&skuId=5059337


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Technical Information: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">N/A embedded in financial information
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Project Assessment/Evaluation: **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Utilization of the **‘**Performance Analysis’ worksheet would be a starting point in terms of objectively evaluating the extent to which the performance gap has been closed by weighing the present level of performance against the desired level of performance to see if our goal has been met. Qualitative (interview questions for focus group of students) and quantitative data (attendance records, pre/post/monthly test results, etc.) will be collected and analyzed as well. Since the gap is mainly a gap in resources (human and materials) this data can be easily analyzed.

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">I Performance Analysis Worksheet <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">II Summative Evaluation and tool <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">III Interview Questions for Principal & Responses
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Appendix **


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Summative Evaluation Tool for PS 315K **
 * <span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Goals/Objectives: **

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">1. Teachers will differentiate literacy instruction using various technologies.

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">2. Teachers will collaborate on and between grade levels sharing various best practices, <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">technologies, and strategies used to close the achievement gap of Common Core Standards.

v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">3. Teachers use technology to create/plan various Tiered I, Tiered, II, and Tiered III differentiated activities for use with SWDs and ELLs. v <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">4. Teachers will use “//Award Reading Online”// and laptop computers as a RTI (Response to Intervention) strategy for students in Pre-k to grade 3. This program is designed to meet the specific receptive/expressive language, fluency, phonics, phonological awareness, reading comprehension, and sentence structure needs of SWDs and ELLs that do not readily respond and progress to the tiered activities created by teachers.


 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Goals Met: (circle one) **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">#1 Y or N **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Explain why/why not **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">#2 Y or N **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Explain why/why not **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">#3 Y or N **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Explain why/why not **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">#4 Y or N **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Explain why/why not **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Next Steps: **
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ **

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Note: Text in red denotes the response of the principal. Interviews took place following SLT meetings. <span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Hire a full time Technology Teacher for the 2012-2013 school year. The person will need to be Smart Board certified, have a degree/training/experience in tech support, differentiate in reading and work well with students and adults. || **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Day 2 ** <span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Award Learning is available now, I may order <span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">[|www.raz-kids.com] <span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">. However, I have to survey teachers to see who wants it. And I believe that achieve3000.com is very expensive. We may not have funds to cover that. ||
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Interview Questions for the Principal of PS 315K **
 * **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Day 1 **
 * 1) **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> What do you see as the biggest challenge to using technology to drive instruction for out subgroups (SWDs & ELLs)? **<span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">A lack of computer hardware to meet the needs of 803 students.
 * 2) **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">How can we improve human resources to fill the gap in terms of technical support for teachers when there is a break down in technology? **
 * 1) **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;"> In terms of planning, what steps will you take to ensure that all means all, that all students will be able to receive one to one computing for differentiation in reading? **<span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">We got a grant to order new computers. I will also order some more because monies for Technology have not been used yet and it has to be used before this school year ends.
 * 2) **<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Other than Award Reading Online, are you open to **[|**www.raz-kids.com**]**<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">, **[|**www.ticketto**]**<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">read.com and/or **[|**www.achieve3000.com**]**<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">? **<span style="color: #ff0000; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Absolutely! Teachers will need to assess to see how individual learners respond to the sites.

<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Chevalier, R. D. (2007). //A manager's guide to improving workplace performance.// New York, NY: American Management Association. <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Januszewski, A., & Molenda, M. (Eds.). (2008). //Educational technology: A definition with commentary.// New York, NY: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Taylor & Frances Group. <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">Rogers, E. M. (2003). //Diffusion of innovations// (5th ed.). New York, NY: Free Press. Laureate Education, Inc. (Executive Producer). (2010). //Leading and managing educational technology.// Baltimore, MD: Author.
 * <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 16px;">References **


 * MODULE 1: From Chaos to Definition**
 * Name of Organization**: Public School 315K, School of Perfoming Arts


 * Problem Summary**: PS 315K would like all students to have better access to educational technologies as well as to use these technologies to make differentiation of instuction easier for already overwhelmed teachers struggling to find viable solutions for ELLs and SWD (English Language Learners) (Students with disabilities). A chief complaint of teachers is that we don't have enough working laptops for 1:1 instruction for our students. Of the computers we do have they are not operational and of the computers we used to have many of them grew legs and walked away during the 2010-2011 school year when the school was transitioning from its founding principal leaving for a promotion as a superintendent to another district. During that time we had one interim acting principal and then later a new candiate got the job and became the new principal. With so many changes taking place the school's morale decreased and many laptops were stolen from/removed from/never returned to the building.


 * Background of the Organization**: PS 315K was opened in 1998 and founded by Mrs. Bryant who served first as the assistant principal of PS 152. PS 152K was the original school which served over 1600 students with 2 Assistant Principals. The superintendent decided to split the school to relieve the current principal Mr. E. Cypress and made Mrs. Bryant the new principal of the other half of PS 152, which he renamed PS 315K, school of Perfoming Arts since the "arts" were her specialty. The school remained under her tutelage from September 1998 to Oct. 2010. After over 10 years as the buidling leader in this Brooklyn, NY Title I public school she moved on to a role as a superintendent in Queens, NYC, Oct. 2010. In that time we've had one interim acting principal who was a friend of the principal. She only had middle school experience and after the interview process she lost the race of becoming the principal to a candidate that also interviewed for the job who happened to score more points than her. The staff had adapted to the interim acting principal after accepting that the first principal refused to pass "the baton" down to her assistant principal (who many thought would make a fabulous and effective principal). So as of April 2011 the staff has been dealing with moving cheese, chaos and constant changes! Currently the school is being led by J. Ranft Quartana who served as an Assistant Principal in a different district. As soon as she took office as the new principal she began to put systems in place to help the school refocus spiritually, academically, and collaborativley. Because of internal strife between the assistant principal that was there when Ms. Quartana took the position (she wanted the principalship) and Ms. Quartana, the Asssistant Principal interviewed and accepted an offer as an Arts Director elswhere within the larger organization. Thus, the school has just the principal, over 50 employees and over 800 students.


 * Where the Organization would be in a reasonable amount of time**: In a reasonable amount of time, perhaps 3-5 years, the school could possibly have moved and matured in a plethora of ways, particularly if the school leadership grows next year to include a new Assistant Principal and a full time technology integration specialist, both which the principal has communicated are two human resources that she hopes to hire next year. With these resources in place a Technology Plan can be created allowing the Technology Integration Specialist to lead and manage the educational technology while the Assistant Principal manages half of the school freeing up the principal to led in other capacities.


 * Stats and Fast Facts:**

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Grades Served: Pre-K to grade 5 Total Population: 800 students

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 * Progress Report Data**

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 * Learning Environment Survey**


 * Quality Review Report**

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The most recent Quality Review visits to the school just took place in March 2012. However the report has not been officially published online yet.

Accountability Report (still shows the name of the Interim Acting Principal from Oct. 2010-April 2011.)

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 * Stakeholders and Decision Makers**: Primarily the School cabinet members and the School Leadership Team along with the principal make instructional decisions that relate to the work of the classroom teachers. The school cabinet is made up primarily of the Literacy Coaches, Dean, ELL Coordinator, Social Worker, School Psychologist, and Math Coaches. A full time parent coordinator supports the needs of parents. A PTA meets once or twice a month. The School Leadership Team is made up of teachers, parents, a DC 37 member (representing para professionals/school aides) the principal and a rep from the teachers union who is also a teacher. There are "visiting" cabinet members and they are some of the out of classrom teachers with a teaching specialty: art, dance, music and science. A Data Spcialist works part time and provides report to the principal as well as assists students/teachers with selecting data driven instuction from the district software Acuity. The SLT meets once or twice a month in the evening hours to discuss issues relevant to the school. I serve on the School Leadership Team.


 * MODULE II: The Performance Gap**

Clarify the problem identified in Module 1: There is an inadequate amount of computers schoolwide and there is no existing computer lab to facilitate the technology movement towards utlization of laptops to use for differentiation of instruction. There are over 800 students and most of them need remediation in reading, phoonics, mathematics and writing. Having access to various technologies, particularly laptops for one to one instruction, coupled with sound instruction, best practices and high teacher expectations might help to close the achievement gap that exist between the general education student population and the SWDs and ELLs (Students with learning disabilities & English Language Learners).


 * Determine the existing performance gap**:


 * Current** **Level of Performance**: Every classroom teacher has a Dell laptop computer, mounted projector with SmartBoard, grades 3-5 have a set of Student Response Clickers, most classrooms have (2) very old Dell desktop computers, and far less classrooms have a working laser jet Lexmark printer with or without ink in the ink cartridges. Many teachers utilize the Smartboard for interactive lessons downloaded from [|www.smarttech.com] while many use the Smartboard as if it was a blackboard from long ago and require students to merely copy the notes form the board. However, the principal requires the use of tiered and differentiated lessons/activities to meet the needs of indivvidual students. One school wide agreed upon way to differentiate is to integrate laptop carts/one to one computing in order for 800 students to all have ready made/easy to access practice work to help ameliorate the academic gaps.


 * NCLB** requires that students are proficient in English Language Arts and Mathematics by 2013-2014. In addition, the NCLB requires that ELL students become proficient in English. Furthermore, supports need to be in place to fully support special needs students, LEP students (Limited English Proficiency) and homeless students. Part of supporting students is by providing the necesary tools and research based best practices/programs/and strategies while monitoring student progress and making curricular adjustments and instructional decisions until students have reached mastery in literacy and mathematics.


 * NETS: T**he National Educational Technology Standards for students indicate a push towards 21st century skills where students use computers and various other technological tools to create, communicate, collaborate, read, research, think,and problem solve. In fact, the NETS require that teachers "customize and personalize learning activities to address students’ diverse learning styles, working strategies, and abilities using digital tools, and resources."


 * Cause Analysis:**

Continue to compile background information and history about your organization, including goals, objectives, vision, and mission of the organization, along with insight into the stakeholders and decision-makers for the organization