Anne Fox School

School Information

School Name:  Anne Fox School
School Address:  1035 Parkview Drive, Hanover Park, IL 60133

School Phone: 630-736-3500
School Fax:  630-736-3501
Principal:  Dr. Nicholas Myers
Principal email:  NicholasMyers@sd54.k12.il.us

Demographics

Number of Students:  421
Number Eligible for Free and Reduced Lunch:  22% 
Percent of Limited English Proficient:  11%
Percent of Special Education:  14%
Racial/Ethnic Percentages:

• White:  34.7%
• Black:  14.7%
• Hispanic:  29.9%
• Asian/Pacific Island:  17.6% 
• Other:  Multiracial:  3%

Present Student Achievement Data in at least three points to demonstrate trends –

 

Grade 3	2005 (Anne Fox/State)	2006 (Anne Fox/State)	2007 (Anne Fox/State)
Math	76/79	94/86	96/87
Reading	64/67	67/71	90/73

 

Grade 4	2005 (Anne Fox/State)	2006 (Anne Fox/State)	2007 (Anne Fox/State)
Math	n/a	90/85	96/86
Reading	n/a	74/73	88/74

 

Grade 5	2005 (Anne Fox/State)	2006 (Anne Fox/State)	2007 (Anne Fox/State)
Math	76/73	88/79	92/83
Reading	57/63	63/69	69/70

Grade 6	2005 (Anne Fox/State)	2006 (Anne Fox/State)	2007 (Anne Fox/State)
Math	n/a	88/79	96/81
Reading	n/a	78/73	78/73

 

Combined All	2005 (Anne Fox/State)	2006 (Anne Fox/State)	2007 (Anne Fox/State)
Math/Science/LA	69/65	79/73	89/79

 

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

Anne Fox School has enjoyed a 20% jump in the percentage of students who are meeting or exceeding state standards in math, reading and science over a two year period.  Our school has moved from the bottom ranked school in our district to a school that now performs at district averages in reading and above district averages in math and science.  We are particularly proud of the fact that 90% of our third grade students met or exceeded state standards in reading.  ALL of our grade levels have enjoyed impressive academic growth and success in all subject areas tested.

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

Anne Fox School began its journey towards becoming a PLC three years ago.  Our initial steps involved setting our shared mission, vision and collective commitments – documents which are now prominently displayed in many public locations on our campus.  Two year ago, we truly dove into creating teams guided by norms and smart goals for student performance.  Our staff spent a great deal of time writing essential outcomes and common assessments tied to measuring student progress towards mastery of these essential outcomes.  During the 2006-2007 school year, we completely revamped our master schedule to provide increased common planning time for our teams and clearly identified times for intervention and enrichment blocks.  Our results were dramatic on all teams.

 

Please elaborate strategies you have found to be effective in the following areas:
            Designing Intervention and Enrichment Blocks That Get Results

            ALL children CAN learn.  There is no more critical foundational belief that must exist on elementary school campuses across our country.  When faculties truly embrace this core belief and openly demonstrate it to students, parents, and to each other, dramatic improvements in academic performance can begin to result.  While it is certainly true that ALL children are capable of remarkable academic success – it is also true that learning happens at different rates.  This point is demonstrated very vividly in settings traditionally considered “at-risk’.  However, if we subscribe to the foundational belief that ALL children CAN learn – it is our collective responsibility to devise innovative systems that adjust TIME and SUPPORT to ensure that all students DO learn.  One such model of where this is occurring is at Anne Fox Elementary School located in Schaumburg Township School District 54.
            Anne Fox Elementary School is a moderately low-income, demographically diverse school located in the working-class suburb of Hanover Park, IL.  The Anne Fox student population is 34% White, 30% Latino, 17% African American and 19% Asian/Pacific Islander.  Over 35 different languages are represented at Fox School and the building’s low-income and mobility rates are double the district average.  Up until last school year, Anne Fox ranked dead last in academic achievement amongst the 21 elementary schools in District 54.  The incorporation of new systems of support have changed this trend and the building has enjoyed double-digit increases in overall student achievement as measured by the Illinois Standards Achievement Test each of the past two school years.
            The road to improvement was not an easy one to navigate for a faculty that up until very recently was experiencing great frustration over repeated low levels of student performance on local and state assessments. Over time, the school’s reputation had become marred amongst its parent base and the building came to be known as a “problem spot” for the district as a whole.  Of greatest concern was the absence of effective systems to truly intervene with each student exhibiting difficulty mastering grade level appropriate concepts and skills.  Several ineffective practices contributed to this disconcerting reality. 
Specifically, there was an absence of authentic data gleaned from well-designed formative assessments tied to grade level essential outcomes for EACH student in attendance.  Individual teachers were largely fending for themselves in the manner in which they assessed student progress and determined student grade level proficiency in targeted areas.  Without rich data, there was a clear absence of conversation and collaborative planning to develop strategies to intervene with students in need.  In truth, the grade level “teams” at Fox were not consistently functioning as interdependent units focused on results. 
In addition, when Fox was functioning as an underperforming school, the building relied solely on outdated and ineffective modes of remediating students struggling to grasp the essential skills required of all exiting students from a given grade level.  The three main responses employed on our campus were optional after school tutoring groups, large group pull-out instruction utilizing a canned literacy remediation program provided, and referral to our special education Child Study Team.  For years, students languished with these responses and the building inched dangerously close to failing to meet Adequate Yearly Progress as dictated by No Child Left Behind.  If the building were to turn its performance around, the staff would need to carefully examine the following questions:

1. Have we clearly identified the essential outcomes in core academic areas that all children must have in place before moving along to the next grade level?
2. Have we developed meaningful, formative assessments that truly identify the specific learning needs of each child in attendance?
3. Do we intervene the moment ANY child demonstrates difficulty mastering essential grade level skills and concepts or do we wait until children fail before placing them into remediation programs?
4. Are our interventions by invitation or are they systematically built into our 8:40-3:00 school day and delivered to ALL students in need of additional time and support?
5. Do we wait until a child has an IEP BEFORE we provide additional time and support?

The need to devise new systems of support for the learning of ALL children needed to be addressed at Fox School if past realities were to change.  The first critical piece of discussion that took place on the Fox campus involved teachers committing themselves to creating serious academic learning environments where a daily 90 minute literacy block was delivered to ALL children.  A comprehensive balanced literacy model calling for daily guided, shared and independent reading and writing as well as vocabulary and word study instruction was fully implemented in all classrooms during this initial 90 minute block.  This ensured that all children received high quality initial instruction from grade level teachers. An additional expectation was put before the staff related to the 90 minute literacy block – initial literacy instruction time is sacred time that NO child can afford to miss.  This meant that the outdated and ineffective practice of pulling students out for remedial literacy instruction during classroom literacy instructional periods had to stop.  Resource help was now asked to push support into the classroom with a shared responsibility existing between special education and regular education classroom teachers becoming the norm.  This practice ensured that all children were guaranteed exposure to grade level appropriate curriculum with an appropriate level of academic rigor. 
With students now receiving high quality initial literacy instruction in the whole-class setting, grade level teams administered regular common, formative assessments in order to determine the specific learning needs of ALL children in attendance.  In the era of accountability – it is critical that we identify EVERY child by name and need if we are to be successful in maximizing the learning potential of EACH child with whom we work.  With regular monitoring of student mastery of essential skills taking place, grade level teams functioning as collaborative units could effectively determine which students were in need of intervention and which students were ready for enrichment instruction. 
In order to provide students with an intervention and enrichment block of time during the school day, a 45 minute period was established on the master schedule for each grade level team referred to as Parallel Block.  During Parallel Block, ALL new instruction stops and students are regrouped by instructional need ACROSS the grade level team.  Students in need of additional TIME and SUPPORT in order to master a grade level appropriate skill or concept move to a classroom to receive structured, small group intervention instruction with an adult to student ration of 1 to 8 NEVER exceeded.  By utilizing special education resource staff, the building’s literacy coach and an instructional assistant, student support teams now “flood” services into the team at a regular time each school day.  Students mastering skills assessed on common assessments are regrouped for enrichment instruction in a whole-class setting.
            A wide variety of instructional practices are utilized during daily intervention block periods each day.  Additional guided reading time, vocabulary lessons, and mini-lessons in formal writing are among a few of the strategies employed by the grade level teams to enhance the level of mastery for students identified in need of intervention.  Likewise, students working in enrichment blocks benefit from differentiated instruction at their appropriate learning level.  Literature circles utilizing on-level texts and independent research projects are frequently utilized to “push” these students to heightened levels of academic performance.  In addition, have identified gifted students clustered for 45 minutes each day of the week has further enabled a part-time Gifted Resource Teacher to maximize her teaching time with this segment of the student population.
            Teacher collaboration is a critical component to ensuring that Parallel Block time is utilized to effectively meet the diverse learning needs of ALL students in attendance at Fox School.  Grade level teams are held accountable for the performance of their students and begin the school year by setting SMART goals for student performance in core academic areas.  The results of common, formative assessments administered by the grade level team are collected by building administration for review and are posted publicly in the faculty lounge for all to see and discuss.  In order for Fox’s grade level teams to produce improvements in student achievement, collaboration time needed to be set aside for staff to frequently discuss the following critical questions:

1. Which students are in need of intervention and which students are in need of enrichment?
2. What will daily lesson plans be for students in both intervention and enrichment blocks?
3. How will we redistribute personnel to deliver this instruction effectively for our students?

In order to provide teams with the time needed to collaborate around these and other critical questions of learning, the Fox School Master Schedule needed to be redesigned in a dramatic way. 
            Past scheduling practices at Fox School did very little to promote collaboration amongst members of grade level teaching teams.  Year after year, the wants and desires of unified arts teachers dictated how the master schedule looked and functioned.  Seeking a comfortable teaching day, specials teachers at Fox manipulated past schedules so that they could see one grade level after another throughout the school day.  While the practice of building a “vertical schedule” where a specialist sees one grade level after another provides specialists with ease in transitioning in between periods, it also ensures that teachers in the same grade level have minimal opportunities to meet and collaborate around the critical questions of learning.  For our intervention and enrichment block to yield impressive results, the Fox staff needed to reassess priorities and design a master schedule that provided frequent opportunities for common planning amongst members of grade level teams, uninterrupted blocks of time for core literacy instruction as well as common blocks of time for Parallel Block periods to be scheduled.  To achieve this aim, the master schedule was set up where specials classes were assigned “horizontally” with all sections of a grade level team having a special at the same time.  By scheduling in this fashion, grade level teams were given 2 to 3 hours each week to meet and collaborate.
The Parallel Block system of Intervention and Enrichment has proven to be an extremely effective way for the Anne Fox staff to systematically provide differentiated instruction to our diverse group of student learners.  Today, EVERY Fox student is guaranteed a timely, structured intervention for each skill with which they are struggling - 225 minutes per week – all within the course of the 8:40-3:00 school day.  In addition, increased collaboration levels amongst teaching staff has focused us on the “right” questions and provided direction for common planning time meetings.  Most importantly, Anne Fox School is truly living up to its responsibility to ensure that ALL students have mastered the skills essential at a given grade level. 
Anne Fox School has witnessed double digit increases in student performance on state assessments each of the past two school years and is poised and motivated to create further successes in the future.  ALL children truly can learn.  However, educators across the country must have the courage to examine ineffective past practices and realign TIME and SUPPORT in a way that ensures that ALL students DO LEARN.

 
  List awards and recognitions your school has achieved
In the spring of 2007, the Schaumburg Township School District 54 Board of Education awarded Fox School the “Above and Beyond Award” for our work towards improving student achievement.