September 6, 2016

School District News

From Superintendent

Robert Vian

Commendation

Erin Sellers, daughter of Bill and Michelle Sellers of Weippe and Timberline teachers, was selected to attend the Idaho Consumer Owned Utilities Association (ICUA) Youth Rally from Clearwater County. Thirty nine students in Clearwater Power’s service area competed for six spots at the regional rally. 

Eighty students from the Northwest attended the five day Rally.  The intent of the Rally is for students to understand their role as a citizen.  Students work in teams to solve or discuss business and political issues/problems and overcome physical obstacles.  Students learned about American Government, consumer-owned utilities and the basics of electricity.

Students were observed by a panel during the five days and also participated in an interview process at the end of the Rally.  Four of the students from Clearwater Power’s service area, including Erin, won scholarships from the Regional Group. 

Erin earned the highest score among the eighty students and will be invited to Washington D.C. for the National Youth Tour in 2017.  Congratulations to Erin and her parents.

Mastery Based Education

Orofino Elementary, Peck School, and Cavendish will be piloting a new report card and grading system for the 2016-17 school year.  The Mastery Based system will be similar to what parents and students experienced in Kindergarten through third grade.  K-3 students are given grades like “Exemplary”, “Satisfactory”, and “Needs Improvement” based on the student’s abilities to meet certain standards like knowing the alphabet, numbers, and the sounds letters make. 

For 2016-17 elementary students in grades 3-6  will receive “grades” for Academic Performance of “Exceeds Standard”, “Meets Standard”, “Approaching Standard”, “Concern Area” (not meeting standard), or “Not Assessed”.

Performance Standards for all areas graded have been establish using statewide and national norms.  Parents should be able to read a report card and know exactly where they child is in comparison with other students around the nation.  The parent will be able to determine how well their child reads, understand math concepts, social studies issues, or science as related to these established standards. 

Standards will be the same for every teacher at each grade level, as opposed to grades being determined by the individual teacher with extra credit, homework, behavior being factored in at varying levels by each teacher. 

Mastery Based grading will allow both the teacher and the parent to know if a child can complete a specific task.  A side effect will be that there will no longer be an “honor roll” as parents have become accustom to seeing. 

The correlation between grades and ability to perform a task has never been very accurate.  Students who have great grades go off to college and end up in remedial classes for a variety of reasons.  Maybe they had a solid foundation of support at home and always finished their homework thus improving their grades.

Students with poor grades frequently outperform their peers on standardized test for a variety of reasons.  The may have not been challenged by the level of school work or had other distractions which contributed to not completing homework or turning in assignments.

Working with clearly defined standards will allow all kids to be judged by what they can do, a real world standard.

Tour of Schools

On Monday, August 29^th I toured all our schools and visited most of the classrooms to see what was happening.  The first day is a very special day for kids, teachers, and parents.

At Timberline I observed a teacher and her aide working with twenty two kindergarten students.  It was “potty practice time” as the students learned to use the restroom.  I stood in for the teacher with the boys.  What a hoot as some of the boys didn’t quite understand the urinals, more than a couple went into the toilet stall for a couple of minutes, then came back out and mimicked their class mates at the urinals, some standing on their tip toes to make the reach, spyderman under ware on the floor.

Twenty two kindergarten students is a little like herding chickens or cats, you really need 22 adults not two. 

There were a bunch of very interesting discussions going on in classrooms as teachers got to know their students and vice-versa.

The school facilities looked great, floors shined, everything was neat and tidy, custodial staff did a great job of getting the buildings ready for students and staff.