Budgeting For Student Achievement Program

As the newly promoted director of student achievement for Washington, D.C Public Schools, I am fully committed to the expansion of current program offerings as well as the creation of additional programs. To achieve this, I will make use of the principles learned in my graduate budgeting course to assess the current financial situation, plan the department’s future direction, create and implement the new annual budget, and lastly, evaluate the success of the programs and the budget in preparation of repeating these steps.

In order to provide a comprehensive school counseling program (CSCP) that meets the unique needs of Ocean Elementary School, the school counselor must understand the needs of the school. Therefore, conducting a needs assessment can help a new school counselor to evaluate the CSCP in order to plan, implement, and improve the effectiveness of the program (Astramovich & Coker, 2007). Additionally, utilizing the accountability bridge counseling program evaluation model, a continuous evaluation cycle helps to improve services based on stakeholder feedback, the needs of those served, and outcomes (Astramovich & Coker, 2007). Within this model, a needs assessment must be conducted in order to plan and develop services that address the needs of the students (Astramovich & Coker, 2007). Thus, by utilizing assessment questionnaires, the school counselor can gather information from the diverse population of students, parents, teachers, and administrator to determine how the CSCP can best support all students’ needs (American School Counselor Association [ASCA], 2012). Additionally, the use of other data, such as observations, standardized test scores, absentee rates, and student referrals can support the feedback received on the questionnaires. Based on the data, the school counselor can evaluate the school counseling program in order to improve the program in the domain areas of academic, social/emotional, and career development. Thus, within the accountability bridge counseling

Laurel Palm Middle School was considered to be a successful school. It was one of the top ten performing schools. For three successive years, it had been awarded a National Distinguished School Award. The school had had a strong culture of teaching and learning. Parents were engaged in planning school programs and improving all aspects of the school and its operations.

Our current school, Crestview Elementary, is located in Gainesville, Florida. Gainesville is a mid-size suburban community situated in Alachua County, which found in the northern part of Florida. Crestview Elementary has been a part of the Gainesville community for 60 years and served approximately 340 students in grades one through five. The school in located near serval low-income housing apartments, as well as an established housing subdivision. Ninety-seven percent of the student population is served by our free and reduce lunch program. The ethnic makeup of our school includes 90 percent African-Americans, 6 percent Hispanics, and 4 percent whites. Historically our school’s grade has fluctuated between a ‘C’ and ‘D’, with

Identifies skills, theories of change, program designs, partnerships, and ways of building schools where students achieve.

As a result of the location of the school in a suburban community, the parents are very actively involved in the school. As a result of the active of the supportive parents in the community, the students arrived every day with a smile on their faces and generally prepared for learning. However, as with

Many hours of intensive effort have gone into the development of this plan, but the work is not finished. The district will continue to monitor and adjust this plan according to the changing needs of our school and community to ensure

Making Middle Grades Work recommendation (CSR), Georgia Assessment of Performance on School Standards (GAPSS) recommendations, improvement team suggestions from the state department, various community consultants, and self-evaluations within the school all had major effects on improved academic performances and the culture of the school. The first areas for improvements targeted Language Arts, Mathematics and Reading. We simply felt that these areas would give students the necessary attention academically to be successful. Secondly, we strive to make sure our students do well on standardized testing and promote that their reading is beyond the classroom. The school’s contact with successful mentorship programs help structure the social, emotional and even cognitive aspect of healthy growth for our

If the current system not the administration calculates that the annually will increase as a chance to reinforce the district where it needs the assistance. While increased funding not necessarily equate to improvements in student performance, it’s funding and where it is clearly needs to be addressed. Ambitious effort to lift student achievement and, fundamentally, to undermine the idea of public

As a new charter school located in a vibrant neighborhood in Wilmington, our school has worked directly with neighbors, community groups, local nonprofit organizations and local elected and government leaders to establish a good relationship and prepare the way for our students and families to benefit from our neighborhood and location. The Brandywine neighborhood where our school is located is in the center of downtown Wilmington, easily accessible to many local businesses and government agencies, and area neighborhoods, by foot and by public transportation. We have worked extensively with local community groups, agencies and organizations to ensure that the relationship between our school and the community is mutually beneficial. When

Headland Middle School completed our School Improvement Plan in May 2014. The school leadership team, which consisted of parents, analyzed the 2013-14 School Improvement

The school that I chose to write this evaluation about is High Tower Trail Middle School, located in Marietta, Georgia. This was the middle school that I attended, and as I look back on it now with the knowledge that I have gained, I can see that it really is an amazing middle school. With middle school being a major struggle for many young adolescents, High Tower Trail did so many amazing things in order to ensure students felt included and had a safe learning environment. High Tower Trail also had some things that they could have improved on while I was there. Some of the strengths of High Tower Trail had were that it was always changing, it was challenging, and gave its students equal opportunities. Some areas where it could improve would be to encourage more parent involvement, encourage teachers to be more involved, and have more teamwork between the students and teachers. I believe that in this case the strengths out-weigh the areas that need improvement, but no school is perfect, and in order to be a successful middle school, it must keep changing in order to keep up with the students learning within its walls.

Primary strengths for new development: The staff within this organization is kind, compassionate, and committed to the students and the Williamstown community. Striving to meet their students’ needs creates a closer, safer and more respectful school community. However, Williamstown Middle School is a Title 1 School. This school has a large population of at-risk students due to homelessness, learning disabilities, neglect, and limited English proficiency with students relocating from many different countries. At-risk students are entitled to receive Title 1 funding to help support their educational goals under the No Child Left Behind Act. The initial concentration at this school is to be able to provide the necessary resources to parents and

An effective school leader possesses skills to create, implement, evaluate, improve and share a staff development plan. I met with Ben Rhodes, Sandy Creek Middle School’s principal, to interview him on the specific elements of his yearly staff development plan. We began with the design process focusing on the district and school goals. District goals include improving literacy across the content areas in reading and writing, Guaranteed and Viable Curriculum (GVC). Guaranteed and Viable Technology (GVT), and Closing the Achievement Gap (Equity in Excellence). Using a variety of assessments to focus on specific needs, Ben Rhodes and Mary Sonya, our Pupil Achievement Specialist, examined CSAP, Explore, MAP, and RAD data. They use the

As we review and synthesize data of a district for planning school improvement, the following information is needed to access and determine the needs of a school. First, a thorough analysis of performance data must be reviewed to see how school districts measure up with state and federal accountability. During this process, it is very important that schools focus the performance indicators that will guarantee growth and success. School teams must refer to the districts mission and vision to guide the planning process. The performance indicators will provide data that will be beneficial in creating improvement strategies. So, after careful evaluation of the data, the next step would be to plan effective methods and strategies that will improve student achievement. Moreover, this plan should include needs, demographics and opportunities for students to be successful. Additionally, the baseline data is important information to include in the improvement plan.