We have enjoyed observing the progress you are making in your schools around PLCs. Many of you are establishing mission and vision statements, focusing on priority standards, or developing PLC leadership teams. We feel the conversations around the Learning by Doing readings have been productive and informative, and we have seen regular referrals to our district's tight PLC expectations.
As we are midway through the school year, our area director PLC would like to examine, calibrate, and discuss evidence of PLC implementation at all of our schools. Here is the assignment:
We've created a PLC Implementation folder embedded in your SIP folder (to reduce the number of folders). The link is below. Please upload the following artifacts to this folder:
One artifact from a PLC that is high functioning (you determine what high functioning means).
One artifact from a PLC that is on track at a basic but sufficient level (per our district's PLC phase timeline).
One artifact from a PLC that is struggling with an explanation (comment on doc or even separate Word doc) of how you are supporting this group and/or holding them accountable.
Artifacts may include agendas, minutes, placemats, common formative assessments, etc.
Please upload all three documents to your PLC Implementation folder by 5pm on February 12, 2025. Thank you! We look forward to seeing samples of your teachers' work.
Please put PLC artifacts in the "PLC Implementation" folder:
As part of our ongoing dedication to ensuring the safety and well-being of our students and school communities, we are reaching out to gauge interest from teachers and administrators in serving as School Guardians. This role directly supports the implementation of the HB 84 Utah School Safety Act, a key initiative aimed at enhancing safety protocols across our schools.
We are seeking committed volunteers to join this important effort. Your involvement would play a crucial role in fostering a secure and supportive environment for all. If you are interested in volunteering, we kindly ask you to complete the survey linked below.
Safety Survey Link
https://forms.office.com/r/QSRakuEzbx
Thank you for your continued dedication to the safety and success of our students.
Welcome back to school and to a fresh new year in 2025. We hope you all enjoyed your winter break and are looking forward to the second half of the school year. We are excited to share with you this month’s attendance focused email to LEAs across Utah to hopefully increase awareness of the resources available to LEAs from the Utah State Board of Education and also to share helpful information for you to distribute to other attendance leads in your LEA.
Celebration/Success Stories Ideas
It is essential in our attendance work that we focus on the positive and celebrate successes we are having at the LEA level and at the school level. Here are some ideas from LEAs in our state who are focusing on attendance.
One of the action steps Ogden School District is focusing on is using data to identify groups of students who they are able to impact related to attendance. Specific schools are piloting a "Moveable Middle" meeting where collaborative teams meet to review attendance data every 4-6 weeks. Parents/guardians are sent specific messaging based on data criteria sharing the impact of attendance and progress being made with the student's specific rate of attendance. At one of their schools, the team has identified a 10% improvement in the target students based on mid-term and term attendance rates. This is not only with the group identified in the "Moveable Middle" meetings but also in other subgroups. As a district, they will continue to refine their data analysis process to move to a district-wide implementation. Way to be an example of using data to drive attendance decisions!
Early Light Academy has created a focus on attendance messaging in their schoolwide monthly newsletter. They are holding attendance meetings with chronically absent students, families, and staff. As well as focusing on Tier 1 incentives for students and classes with greater than 95% attendance. We are grateful for their example of focusing on the positive and making sure to be consistent with attendance messaging!
Attendance Webinar
We hope you will join us on January 14, 2025 at 10:30am for our first attendance webinar for 2025. We are looking forward to sharing with you what resources USBE has to offer in regard to attendance. We will also hear from Murray School District who has worked really hard to improve attendance across their LEA and has shown a lot of progress. They will give a lot of practical information for all schools. We hope you will let all of your schools know about this opportunity to learn more about attendance in Utah! The flier can be found here if you would like more information.
Winter Messaging Ideas
Here are some helpful resources from Attendance Works on sending out messages during the winter months.
Here are some ideas on how you can engage with families to have discussions around attendance: home visits, special events, in-person family conferences, virtual family conferences, regular phone calls home, robocalls, automated text messages, manual text messages, letters home, attendance focused family night, digital newsletters, emails, engagement during pick-up and drop-off, dedicated communication app, etc.
Murray School District has been analyzing their attendance data and the correlation between attendance and transportation. They are wondering if any other LEA in Utah has noticed any of the following:
*Gaps in busing distance dependent on measuring point (example: 1.9 miles to the school from the leasing office, but the student actually lives farther away)
*Unsafe busing routes due to crime/unsafe neighborhoods
*Other busing/transportation barriers and gaps
If you have any questions or information you would like to share with Murray, please reach out to Brittany Roller at broller@murrayschools.org
Upcoming Dates/Information
January-March 2025- The Utah Legislative Session will start on January 21st and run through March 21st. Watch for updates on legislation surrounding education.
February 4 & 12 2025- Engagement and Attendance Cohorts Collaboration Meetings
*If your LEA is interested in joining an attendance cohort starting next school year, please contact us and we can give you more information.
We appreciate all you do. Please let us know how we can best support you and your schools.
We want to ensure that you are aware of the expectations for the chilly time of the school year. Please reach out to your community and communicate to parents that students should be dressed and prepared for the cold weather with the following items: warm coats, sweaters/ hoodies, boots, hats, scarves, mittens/gloves, etc. Please ensure that these items are marked in case they are misplaced or lost. Students should come prepared to go outside, get some fresh air, and exercise outdoors daily. The exceptions to going out daily are listed below:
Morning:
Inside morning in the gym, IF there is significant rainfall or snowfall. (IF students will be getting wet outside.)
Inside morning in the gym, IF the temperature is below 20 degrees.
Students sitting on their pockets, not running around, playing sports, etc.
Inside mornings are from (List the time for your school)________ to ensure our outside-duty teachers are in the gym to help supervise.
Recess:
Teacher/Grade Level Discretion
Inside recess IF the temperature is below 20 degrees. Recess time is held inside the classroom.
Lunch Recess:
Admin/Office Discretion
Inside lunch recess, IF there is significant rainfall or snowfall (If students will be getting wet outside), recess time is held inside the classroom.
Inside lunch recess, IF the temperature is below 20 degrees, recess time is held inside the classroom.
Please reach out if you have any questions or need further information. Thank you for all that you do for the children of our district.
Good morning, School Improvement Leaders or Designees,
This email is only going out to LEA leaders on our School Improvement Listserv. Please feel free to share this information with your schools.
The Utah State Board of Education (USBE) School Improvement Team, in partnership with WestEd, is excited to invite school leaders and their LEA supervisor to apply for personalized, customized change leadership coaching. LEA's and principals are encouraged to include assistant principals, interns, instructional coaches and anyone else they deem interested to attend. The program is optional and will provide individual coaching for leaders that will enhance your leadership as well as impact the growth, proficiency and achievement of students.
The program is from March 2025 to December 2025 and will include a mutually agreed upon on site, virtual, and on demand instruction, modeling, mentoring, feedback, and support to assist the school (principal and LEA supervisor are required and may also include assistant principals, instructional coach, intern) with change leadership.
Priority will be given to Comprehensive Support and Improvement (CSI) Low Performing Student Group schools followed by CSI-Low Graduation Rate and CSI-Low Performance schools and then by schools with ATSI and TSI designation. The only schools not eligible for this program are Elevate schools.
The objectives of the program are to build leadership capacity to lead change to improve student outcomes through one or more of the following areas of leadership:
Data-Informed Teaching
Collaborative Teams with a Focus on Efficacy
High Leverage Strategies for Instruction
Fearless Assessment: Meaningful Assessments as the Heart of Feedback and Instruction
Fearless Classrooms
Effective Use of Time and Schedules
Culturally Responsive, yes! But Whose Culture are We Responding To
High Quality Student Data and Effective Analysis
The selected participants will collaboratively build and plan a personalized coaching plan with a WestEd coach.
If interested or you would like to find out more information about this opportunity, please register to attend a virtual informational kickoff meeting on January 27th (3:45 - 5:30 PM) and January 28th (9:30-11:30 AM) that will be facilitated by WestED.
Participants will need to register to attend and should plan to attend both sessions. To register, please click on this link.
What: The Utah Code Annotated 53G-9-606 requires the state board to create a model policy on bullying, cyber-bullying, hazing, abusive conduct, and retaliation. Due to legislative and rule changes (H.B. 84 (2024) and R277-613) the current model policy requires updating. We are asking for volunteers to participate in a workgroup to provide feedback on the updated model policy. We are looking for a sample of 10 members throughout the state of Utah to represent LEAs. You can volunteer using this form. Volunteers will be notified whether or not they are selected to join this workgroup.
Who: Ideal candidates include superintendents, charter school directors, building administrators, and policy analysts.
When: Starting in January 2025
2-3 virtual meetings (90 minutes each)
Exact dates will be determined based on participant availability
