UCLA School Management Program

 

Dear Superintendent:

Recently, the California Department of Education published a guide for districts and school on how they might use the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds to improve student outcomes and advance reform. As you may recall, California will receive approximately $8.0 billion from ARRA in 2009 for education programs.

NOTICE: The preliminary entitlements for each California Title 1 school have been announced. These entitlements include the total regular 2009-10 funding for each school under Title 1 as well as the additional Title 1 funding under ARRA. The first payment will be made to schools this month (May 2009). Visit the CDE website for more information.

The guide provides examples of programs that will be supported by ARRA. These examples fit within the five priorities of ARRA, which are:

  1. Adopting rigorous college- and career-ready standards and high-quality assessments;
  2. Establishing data systems and using data for improvement;
  3. Increasing teacher effectiveness and equitable distribution of effective teachers;
  4. Turning around the lowest-performing schools; and
  5. Improving results for all students, including early learning, extended learning time, use of technology, preparation for college, and school modernization.

The document also includes framing questions to help districts and schools determine in which programs to invest. The framing questions districts and schools should ask themselves include, will the proposed program:

  1. Drive results for students?  Will the proposed use of funds drive improved results for students, including students in poverty, students with disabilities, and English language learners?
  2. Increase capacity?  Will the proposed use of funds increase educators’ long-term capacity to improve results for students?
  3. Accelerate reform?  Will the proposed use of funds advance state, district, or school improvement plans and the reform goals encompassed in ARRA?  
  4. Avoid the cliff and improve productivity?  Will the proposed use of funds avoid recurring costs that states, school systems, and schools are unprepared to assume when this funding ends?  Given these economic times, will the proposed use serve as “bridge funding” to help transition to more effective and efficient approaches?
  5. Foster continuous improvement?  Will the proposed use of funds include approaches to measure and track implementation and results and create feedback loops to modify or discontinue strategies based on evidence?

Over the last sixteen years, UCLA School Management Program (SMP), a non-profit organization in the UCLA Graduate School of Education & Information Studies, has worked with districts throughout the state to support the sustainable transformation of public schools. Through our interactive intensive summer institutes, on-site professional development and ongoing coaching, UCLA SMP empowers educators with processes and protocols to improve student results, increase capacity, accelerate improvement plans, secure resources for ongoing education, and foster continuous improvement.

  1. UCLA SMP’s Programs Drive Results for Students
    Evaluations of our programs have shown that our work improves not only educator leadership, management, and strategic planning of educators but also student achievement. Student data shows the significant impact of our efforts in terms of improved student achievement. From 2002-03 to 2006-07, schools with 15 or more faculty participating in one of UCLA SMP’s programs had 67 percent higher growth in their Academic Performance Index scores than those schools with no participating faculty. Similarly, schools in which 15 or more educators attended a “Bridges to Understanding: Teaching That Matters Most for English Learners” Institute had 82 percent higher API growth from 2002-03 to 2006-07 than those schools with no participating faculty.
  2. UCLA SMP’s Programs Increase Educator Capacity 
    One of the primary goals of each of our programs is to introduce processes that focus on building the capacity of administrators and teachers to effectively lead the change process at their schools themselves and, ultimately, ensure lasting and sustainable system-wide school improvements. We build capacity through several methods, each of which is a core element of all of our work: using a bottom-up approach, establishing protocols for continuous learning, and forming leadership teams.
  3. UCLA SMP’s Programs Accelerate Improvement Plans 
    Our team of professionals includes school- and district-experienced faculty members and UCLA staff with proven skills and established track records in facilitating and managing large-scale, multi-year, multi-layer school transformations. Our first step with any district or school is to carefully assess data on teacher and student learning to identify areas of opportunity to make significant strides in improving student achievement. We then encourage districts and schools to use appreciative inquiry – inquiry into and dialogue about strengths and successes – to foster transformational growth.
  4. UCLA SMP’s Programs Avoid the Funding Cliff 
    Throughout our programs, UCLA SMP ensures sustainability of the transformational improvement in student achievement by transitioning responsibility for facilitation of processes and planning to the district and school. When teachers and principals take responsibility for their own professional development, they ensure its long-term sustainability.
  5. UCLA SMP’s Programs Foster Continuous Improvement 
    Our programs – including Classroom Walk-throughs and Critical Friends Groups – are based on a formal appreciative model called the Continuous Cycle of Instructional Inquiry and Improvement, in which educators examine their own questions linked to student data and pedagogical practice in an iterative cycle of continuous improvement. The cycle of inquiry grounds professional development throughout the organization in questions about practice based on short- and long-term student data. The appreciative processes, which use student achievement successes as the basis for planning, foster the experimentation that leads to innovative educational practice.

I would like to set up an appointment with you to discuss how ARRA funding could potentially impact your district and how to use UCLA SMP to enhance your efforts to achieve student achievement. I will call you in the next 7-10 days to arrange a mutually convenient time to meet to discuss this critically important opportunity. In the meantime, please do not hesitate to contact me at dchernow@smp.gseis.ucla.edu or (310) 825-2488.

Sincerely,

Dan Chernow, EdD
Executive Director

P.S. Additional information on UCLA SMP is available on our website: http://www.smp.gseis.ucla.edu