Abstract:
Read About ItLos Penasquitos Elementary School, part of the Poway Unified School District in San Diego, is clear about one thing: everyone is held accountable for student learning — teachers, students, administrators, and parents. Before the start of each school year, teachers have in their hands the Los Pen “endorsement” document, which in the words of Principal Damen Lopez, “represents who we are as educators — it is not a contract — it is what we believe and everyone who teaches at the school endorses it.” This details what is expected of everyone in the school community to ensure academic success for each student. In addition, students are given a student handbook describing the school’s behavioral and academic expectations and parents receive a parent handbook explaining the expectations for them and their children.
The teacher’s endorsement document — quite unusual for its completeness, breadth, collaborative development, and detail — provides the map for everyone in the school to work toward unlimited academic success for every student. On the first page of this comprehensive 15-page document, Los Pen’s mission statement sets high expectations, the teachers’ commitment stresses the values that will help them meet the mission, and the school goal goes beyond mere improvement — the goal is to go the extra mile so that every student, without exception, will be proficient or advanced in reading, language, and mathematics.
While many schools have similar mission statements and goals, the remaining 14 pages of this document provide a blueprint for everyone in the school to work toward unlimited academic success for every student. It includes the: - Staff’s code of conduct
- Staff’s commitment to collaboration
- Collaboration schedule
- College readiness chart and college vocabulary by grade level (A separate Tip to Go, No Excuses University: All Students Can Go to College, describes this initiative.)
- Master schedule and sacred time schedule (for core-literacy instruction)
- A 8-page assessment plan including a calendar, a matrix of grade level skills to be assessed, guidelines on how to use the assessment for learning; how to involve students (by grade) in the assessment process, and helping students develop their own individual student goals. A separate tip, Everyone is Involved in Assessment, discusses the assessment plan in greater detail.
The school sees this endorsement document as something more than a mere blueprint, even more than a collective promise. It’s a living, working instrument for creating knowledge and concerted action. When staff have questions about the college curriculum, a schedule, the staff collaboration topic for the month, or the assessment topics for a grade, they can turn to the endorsement document. Not only do they find practical answer they need, usually they will also learn about the philosophical and pedagogical rationale underlying it, plus guidance in how to prepare for and carry out the task or use the results. Furthermore, its tools are refined, improved, and added to continuously throughout the school year so everyone can benefit from positive changes. Then it is revamped yearly as necessary incorporating large and small changes.
Because the Student Handbook and the Parent Handbook reflect the same content as the endorsement document, but from the perspective of the intended stakeholder, everyone knows what Los Pen stands for and what each person is responsible for doing. The endorsement document provides the detailed tools and guidance teachers need to help every student achieve success — and the teachers themselves collaborated to make the very tool they are using.
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