School Board Agenda Item

Approve the Technical Service Agreement for Van Buren Middle School with Professional Development for Achievement (Student Services and Federal Programs Division)

Over the past several years, Van Buren Middle School has worked closely with the vendor, Professional Development for Achievement (PDA), toward the development of a successful school-wide reading strategy and the training of teachers in how to create FCAT-style assessments from any source for any subject. Last year, Mary Lewis, owner of PDA, through an agreement with the Middle School Language Arts Supervisor, worked directly with targeted students to help Van Buren raise both the levels of adequate progress and performance in Reading. As a result of this program design, training, and the efforts of students and teachers, reading performance increased from 27% to 36% and the adequate progress increased from 51% to 67% as determined by FCAT Reading. During that time, it became obvious that the areas in most need of further improvement were the eighth grade students’ subgroup struggling with the short and extended response questions and the Students with Disabilities (SWD) subgroup. To this end, Van Buren intends to have one consultant work for four days directly with eighth grade students on the short and extended response questions while modeling for other teachers and another specialized consultant work for four days directly with some SWD students while modeling for teachers.

Goal 1 - The percentage of students scoring at Level 3 or higher on Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test in reading will increase a minimum of 5 percentage points.

This Technical Service Agreement will be paid out of Van Buren Middle School’s Title I Staff Development set aside dollars. ($6,400)

There will be a scheduled follow-up meeting at the conclusion of each training day, for a total of eight meetings. In each of these meetings there will be a discussion of strategy, technique, and skill as well as observations of the training model and student performance. Teachers will then use the strategies and techniques with other groups of students and report findings to the faculty. At the end of the 2006-2007 school year, an analysis will be made based on the FCAT Reading scores of the targeted students that worked directly with the consultants as well as the eighth grade and SWD subgroups to determine if a positive impact was provided by the vendor.

Gwendolyn L. Luney Assistant Superintendent, Division of Student Services and Federal Programs 813-272-4879	Gretchen Saunders Chief Business Officer 813-272-4270
5.06
Hillsborough County Public Schools (Florida) * Mtg.#20061010_185 * Section E Item# 5.06