Albemarle County Public Schools

 

District Information

District Name: Albemarle County Public Schools
District Address: 401 McIntire Road, Charlottesville, VA 22902
District Phone: (434) 296-5820
District Fax: (434) 296-5869
Superintendent: Dr. Pamela Moran
Superintendent email: moran@k12albemarle.org

Demographics

Number of Students: 13,049
Number of Eligible for Free and Reduced Lunch: 24.79%
Percent of LEP: 6.32%
Percent of Special Education: 11.34%
Racial/Ethnic Percentages:

White: 73.27%
Black: 13.40%
Hispanic: 6.43%
Asian/Pacific Islander: 5.03%
Multi-Ethnic: 1.70%

Schools in District:

Agnor-Hurt Elementary School
Baker-Butler Elementary School
Broadus Wood Elementary School
Brownsville Elementary School
Cale Elementary School
Crozet Elementary School
Greer Elementary School
Hollymead Elementary School
Meriwether Lewis Elementary School
Murray Elementary
Red Hill Elementary School
Scottsville Elementary School
Stone-Robinson Elementary School
Stony Point Elementary School
Woodbrook Elementary School
Yancey Elementary School
Burley Middle School
Henley Middle School
Jouett Middle School
Sutherland Middle School
Walton Middle School
Community Public Charter School
Albemarle High School
Monticello High School
Murray High School
Western Albemarle High School
Charlottesville/Albemarle High School
Technical Education Center (CATEC)
Math, Engineering & Science Academy

Student Achievement Data

The Commonwealth of Virginia measures student achievement through a high stakes testing program. We refer to the tests as the "SOL's." Since the advent of No Child Left Behind, we have monitored student progress by enrollment group. In Albemarle County, our goal is for all students to succeed on these baseline measures regardless of whether their enrollment group counts toward our schools making AYP. Test score pass rates depicted in the following tables are representative of SOL test scores.

Albemarle County 3-Year Trend Comparison With State SOL Results

 

	ACPS & Virginia
	2006-07	2007-08	2008-09
Math	85/80	89/84	91/85
Reading	89/85	91/87	93/89

 

Albemarle County 3-Year Trend Data for Math SOL Test Results by Enrollment Group

 

Math	2006-07	2007-08	2008-09	3-Year Gains
All	84	89	91	+7
White	88	92	93	+5
African- American	65	74	82	+17
Students with Disabilities	65	74	80	+15
Economically Disadvantaged	63	75	79	+16
Hispanic	80	82	85	+5
Limited English Proficiency	77	84	85	+8

 

Albemarle County 3-Year Trend Data for Reading SOL Test Results by Enrollment Group

 

Reading	2006-07	2007-08	2008-09	3-Year Gains
All	87	91	93	+6
White	92	94	95	+3
African- American	69	77	83	+14
Students with Disabilities	71	76	81	+10
Economically Disadvantaged	70	75	82	+12
Hispanic	78	81	83	+5
Limited English Proficiency	80	82	85	+5

 

Albemarle County vs. Virginia: Comparison of 3-Year Trend Data for African American Students for Reading & Math SOL Tests

	2006-07	2007-08	2008-09
Math	65/68	74/73	82/77
Reading	72/76	77/78	83/81

Albemarle County vs. Virginia: Comparison of 3-Year Trend Data for Economically Disadvantaged Students for Reading & Math SOL Tests

State/National/Division
	2006-07	2007-08	2008-09
Math	63/67	74/73	79/77
Verbal	70/73	75/77	81/81

 

Advanced Studies Diploma Attainment

To earn an Advanced Studies Diploma, students must earn at least 24 standard units of credit and at least nine verified units of credit. Verified credits are earned for passing the course and the SOL test associated with it. The table below displays the course and credit requirements for an Advanced Studies Diploma. Forty-four percent of students state-wide earn Advanced Studies Diplomas.

2006-07	2007-08	2008-09
65	62	66

 

Number of College Level Courses Taken by ACPS Students: 3-Year Trend Data.

 

2006-07	2007-08	2008-09
3893	3904	3981

 

Percentage of ACPS Students Earning a 3 or Better on Their AP Exams: 3-Year Trend Data

 

2005-06	2006-07	2007-08
78	81	79

 

Percentage of ACPS Students Earning a 3 or Better on Their AP Exams: 3-Year Trend Data

 

	2006-07	2007-08	2008-09
Math	511/502/557	511/502/553	511/501/574
Reading	511/515/554	512/515/544	512/515/570

Please comment on any aspect of the data that you believe is particularly significant.

ACPS has changed from the status as a division not meeting Federal Benchmarks for Adequate Yearly Progress for No Child Left Behind to a division that has exceeded the benchmarks for the past three years and moved to surpass Virginia state averages on end of course assessments whether as aggregate scores or as disaggregate data for enrollment groups. We are moving to eliminate achievement gaps. Specifically, the gap between African American and White students has been diminished from 23% to 12% on the SOL reading assessments over the past three years. In mathematics, African American students have closed the gap from a 23% difference in pass rates in 2007 to an 11% gap in 2009. This and other gains made by African American and other student enrollment groups are both dramatic and attributable to the focus on results that is one of the cornerstones of the PLC model. Our PLC journey is outlined in the timeline below.

 

Please present any additional information that indicates your efforts to build a professional learning community have had a positive impact upon students and/or teachers.

In 2005, our School Board adopted the strategic goal of “Eliminating the Achievement Gap.” We used the PLC model as a strategy to achieve this goal. Embedded PLC practices of teacher-team collaboration around lesson design and improvement, cooperation in creating assessments based on power standards, and frequent common formative assessment of student performance followed by directive intervention during school hours, all became part of our structures and culture. As schools adopted this model, division leadership provided resources, including School Net (a data warehouse built for assessment data management and analysis) and E-Walk (an electronic walkthrough classroom observation tool) to reduce variance in performance and support collaboration. As a result, silos in our organization have been toppled and replaced with horizontal teams to support teachers.

 

Please elaborate upon strategies you have found to be effective in any of the following areas:

1. Monitoring student learning on a timely basis.

Each school in the county has developed collaborative teacher teams for the past five years (including this year) to build shared knowledge regarding state standards, district curriculum guides, the content and format of high stakes assessments, and the expectations of the teachers in the course or grade level above them to clarify the essential knowledge and skills all students must acquire in each unit of instruction for their course or grade level. Schools developed individual plans for creating PLC teams based on the specific subjects and grade levels for teaching staff. Teams meet at regular and frequent intervals to improve student learning through common formative assessment, data analysis, strategy sharing, and intervention planning. These meetings take place during regular work time for teachers. The collaborative teams of teachers have clarified the specific proficiency standards students must achieve on each skill and the criteria they will use in assessing each student’s proficiency. They have practiced applying the criteria to ensure consistent reliable assessment of student learning. They help students to understand the criteria and to use the criteria to monitor their own learning. School leadership teams have collaborated around the question, "What does proficiency look like?" and to respond to all three key PLC questions addressed in a process that leads a teacher from the lay of the land to examining individual student work samples: What do we expect students to learn? How do we know they are learning? How will we respond based on this knowledge of student results? Teams are gaining proficiency in using the school system's data warehouse, School Net, to break down student data by standard and enrollment group. This process and technology is the nerve center of PLC work over the backbone of common formative assessment. Our schools have created processes for carefully monitoring each student’s learning on an ongoing basis. This frequent monitoring of student learning includes common assessments created by collaborative teams of teachers responsible for the same group of students. From the beginning of our division’s PLC journey, schools have evolved their systems into regular PLC meeting times. Every team gives at minimum, a common quarterly assessment, and many embed common items for analysis in every unit assessment. Teams use on-line testing programs like School Net and Quia. Common assessment was the key to beginning the PLC process. It was the biggest hurdle to overcome, but we have embedded this process in our work at both the school and division level.

2. Creating systems of intervention to provide students with additional time and support for learning.

Our schools have planned processes for responding when students experiencedifficulty in learning rather than leaving it to the individual classroom teacher to resolve. This coordinated process ensures students receive additional time and support for learning in a way that is timely, directive (rather than invitational), and systematic. Students are not required to miss new direct instruction to receive this additional support.

3. Building the capacity of teachers to work as members of high performing collaborative teams who focus the efforts of their team on improved learning for students.

At all schools, teachers are organized into collaborative teams by grade level, course, or by subject area. Members of teams work interdependently to achieve common goals for which they are mutually accountable. Each team has identified SMART goals that are aligned with one or more school goals. The SMART goals focus on student learning and require evidence of improved student learning in order to be accomplished.

Our division’s work with PLC coincided with Albemarle County's implementation of a new Teacher Performance Appraisal model (TPA) whereby each teacher develops SMART Goals. The power of collaborative teams that focus on results is that each teacher's SMART Goal is the team's SMART Goal, and the team's goal lines right up with the school's improvement goal. Refer to this example from Albemarle High School, where each teacher creates goals in line with the school improvement goals. AHS follows the rule of six. If a teacher sets one goal, it must be a SMART Goal and can include no more than five strategies. If a teacher sets two goals, he can have no more than two strategies for each. Goals and strategies must add up to six.

School Goal: All Albemarle High School students will master the essential curriculum and reach higher levels of learning as reflected through academic achievement and data. We will continue to use the Professional Learning Community model and observation of professional practice to improve instruction, learning, intervention, and remediation to further close student achievement gaps and stretch students' higher levels of learning.

We will continue to use E-walk data collection and reporting experiences including peer-walks. We will provide feedback to both teachers and PLC teams pertaining to their use of effective instructional strategies and activities.

Here is an example of an AHS’s Teacher / PLC Team SMART Goal:

English PLC Goal: By the end of this school year, at least 80% of 12th grade English students will move up one level on each of the four criteria under Composition Control in the SOL Writing Rubric.

Strategy 1: Emphasize pre-writing planning by modeling the use of outlines/webs/graphic organizers.

Strategy 2: Teach students to peer edit and proof-read, providing methods to examine their own writings more critically.

What we find important here is that it is a collaborative special education teacher's goal for work in her PLC team and collaborative English Class. It is a leading goal with a deadline prior to the end of the year. It includes high yield strategies, and the goal is certainly attainable. Also, notice that the rubric is a common rubric used by all 12th grade English teachers.

Teachers are provided with time to collaborate during their contractual day. Teachers use their collaborative time to engage in collective inquiry regarding issues directly related to student learning. Initially, teachers were spending a lot of their PLC time compiling data from common assessments. As we have moved forward with technology initiatives like School Net (a data warehouse for common assessments and PLC work), teachers use meeting times for face time to compare data, to talk about teaching practices and strategies, and to plan units and lessons, among other work. In his latest edition of Results Now, Mike Schmoker recommended 45 minutes of team time during the school day every two weeks for PLC collaboration. Most schools are exceeding this amount. At the beginning of the year, teachers establish norms, set goals, and begin the work of supporting students and improving instruction. Throughout the year, teachers attend meetings to discuss and take action on common assessment practices, results, and intervention.

To further our work, ACPS has embarked on an instructional coaching model, enhancing the culture of job-embedded professional growth inherent in PLC design. A group of instructional coaches recognized by their peers as strong classroom teachers and teacher-leaders work with clusters of schools to share and improve curriculum, instruction, and assessment methods through a focus on 21st Century Skills development. The coaching model has ushered forth a greater use of enhanced communication technologies such as Yammer, Google Docs, and SharePoint throughout the division both to support collaboration and instruction.

 

List any Awards and Recognition Garnered by Your District

Each year, starting in 2007, the Virginia Department of Education and State Board of Education have recognized schools and school divisions through the Virginia Index of Performance program based on students achieving advanced proficiency on the SOL assessments and based on progress toward learning goals identified by the governor as part of Virginia’s plan to strengthen public education. In 2007, 16 out of 26 ACPS schools were recognized. In 2008, 17 won the award. Awards for 2009 have not been announced yet.

ACPS has also had the honor of V.L. Murray Elementary School being named a national Blue Ribbon School for students attaining and maintaining high academic standards. This school and Albemarle High School have both been identified on the “All Things PLC” website as exemplary PLC’s.

Recently, two of our ACPS leadership team members published an article in
ASCD’s Educational Leadership on the topic of PLC work across grade levels
and schools.