Rocklin Academy

 

School Information

School Name: Rocklin Academy
School Address: 6532 Turnstone Way, Rocklin, CA  95765
                          5035 Meyers Street, Rocklin, CA  95677
School Phone: (916) 632-6580
School Fax:(916) 784-3034
Principal: Robin Stout, Mary Decker
Principal email: rstout@rocklinacademy.org, mdecker@rocklinacademy.org
Web Address: http://www.rocklinacademy.com

 

Demographics

Number of Students:  557
Number Eligible for Free and Reduced Lunch:  5%
Percent of Limited English Proficient:  4%
Percent of Special Education:  5%
Racial/Ethnic Percentages:

- White:  64%
- Black:  1%
- Hispanic:  8%
- Asian/Pacific Island:  12%
- Other:  15%

 

Student Achievement Data:

CST (California Standards Test): % of students at or above proficient

All students	English Language Arts (School/State)	Math (School/State)	Science (School/State)
2007-08	88/42	89/52	79/46
2008-09	88/50	91/56	92/67
2009-10	79/46	84/49	92/67

Academic Performance Index (API): based on student proficiency levels

API	Rocklin/State	Ranking Similar Schools
2007-08	939/774	10
2008-09	948/788	10
2009-10	957/800	8

 

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

Rocklin Academy has achieved an outstanding API every year since its opening in 2001-02, and with the inception of our professional learning community our API continues to improve. These scores continue to give the Academy the highest state rank possible, a rank of 10. In addition, the Academy received a Similar Schools ranking of 8 for 2009 and 2010. The Academy’s score in all four years is the highest of all elementary schools in Rocklin and places it as the highest scoring school in Placer County for 2006/07, 2007/08, 2008/09, and 2009/10.

 

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

We began our journey as a Professional Learning Community (PLC) three years ago.  Although our state test scores were high, further analysis of the data showed a significant number of students who were not proficient.  This led us to ask the questions:  What do we want our students to learn, how do we know if they have learned it, and what are we going to do if they have not learned it?  With Learning by Doing as our guide and working closely with a learning community coach, we focused our efforts on creating a culture that was focused on student learning and results.  Our administration and leadership teams have attended workshops with Rick and Becky DuFour, Mike Mattos, and Ken O’Connor.  To this date, approximately two-thirds of our faculty has attended a DuFour workshop focusing on PLC’s.  For the first year of implementation, time was given within the school day for grade level teams to meet every 3 weeks.  Floating substitutes were utilized and administration facilitated the Collaborative Inquiry (CI) meetings to provide structure, protocols, and support with the intent to develop leaders within each grade level.  For the entire first year, administration attended all CI meetings.  Administration gradually moved from the role of facilitator to coach as the leadership team members facilitated the meetings. 

 

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

1. Monitoring student learning on a timely basis.
The Rocklin Academy learning team exemplifies Learning Forward’s definition of professional development by embodying the practice of  collaborative inquiry - a systematic, purposeful process during which teachers and administration work together to analyze student data and develop instructional strategies that address the needs of all students, including those who require additional support, those who are close to proficiency, and the students who have achieved proficiency and are ready to delve more deeply into a concept.   
     
It is not the fact that teams of teachers collaborate which is important, but rather that they collaborate with a clarity of commitment to ongoing learning and progress, examining student work on a regular basis, creating strategic goals to improve achievement, and enhancing their own skills as educators. Teachers continually improve their practice by regularly assessing student achievement and evaluating the effectiveness of teaching strategies and by learning from each other- by daily sharing the expertise that exists within our school. If, at the conclusion of a four-week cycle, assessment results show that academic goals have not been met, teachers re-evaluate and adjust instructional strategies and  readdress areas of need until all students reach proficiency in a particular concept.
 
With essential outcomes in mind, pacing guides and common formative assessments are utilized to ensure that all students are able to reach proficiency in grade-level state standards and that they will gain the appropriate knowledge, skills, and dispositions.

The collaborative inquiry results for a representative goal for each grade level are presented in the following table:

Grade Level	Skill	Beginning Average Proficiency (%)	Current Average Proficiency (%)
Kindergardten	Identification of consonant sounds	28	75
First	Reading consonant-vowel-consonant (CVC) words	55	95
Second	Reading Comprehension- predicting	39	100
Third	Identification and understanding of proper nouns	30	100
Fourth	Writing Organization- Topic Paragraph	10	60
Fifth	Response to Literature-summarizing	33	97
Sixth	Identification and understanding  of eight parts of speech	69	95

2. Creating systems of intervention to provide students with additional time and support for learning.
During the CI process, students are identified in three tiers:  proficient or advanced, approaching, or intensive.  Teachers develop shared strategies for each tier.  Time is provided within the school day to focus on areas of individual improvement during Enrichment Block. The intervention teacher is also utilized to share strategies or work with targeted groups or individual students. 

3. Building teacher capacity to work as membersof high performing collaborative teams that focus efforts on improved learning for all students.
Every week teachers engage in high-quality professional learning during purposeful, goal-oriented, grade-level team and faculty meetings.  Each meeting’s topic is determined by current student data which drives instruction so that all students are learning at high levels. Teachers whose data demonstrates effective strategies share their methods and ideas with colleagues in order to replicate their success.  Ongoing professional development is further embedded in the school day through peer observations and walk throughs targeted to specific student learning needs. To further our learning, Rocklin Academy became a Learning Forward (formerly National Staff Development Council) Learning School Alliance School (LSA).  As an LSA school, Rocklin Academy collaborates with schools across the country on areas to improve job-embedded professional development.  Every year, Rocklin Academy administers the Standards for Staff Development Assessment Inventory (SAI) to faculty to determine which Staff Development Standards will be an area of focus. 

List awards and recognitions your school has achieved:

- Official Core Knowledge Visitation School
- California Distinguished School 2010
- Learning Forward’s Shirley Hord Learning Team Award 2010