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Summit Response
Teams Plan
for 'Closing Achievement
Gap'
November 1, 2004
As our school district continues to seek ways to “close
the achievement
gap” among students, approximately 150 Plano ISD teachers, administrators
and community leaders have joined forces as members of Summit Response Teams
to study the critical areas of student learning, capacity development, data-driven
decision- making and community connectedness.
 Members
of these four teams participated last school year in
the district ’s
Learning Summit and/or Community Summit. “These
district meetings provided forums for crucial conversations among our
school district’s stakeholders,” noted Superintendent of
Schools Dr. Doug Otto, “In order to build upon that momentum,
our Summit Response Teams are more closely examining issues
that will result in
action plans
for helping
our schools close the achievement gap.”
The process currently being
implemented by the Summit Response Teams includes the following steps:
- Analyze recommendations and critical areas emerging from the district
learning and community summits,
- Identify other similar recommendations
and “best practices,”
- Develop strategies, evaluation
methods and benchmarks for measuring success,
- Establish
time lines and identify resources,
- Recommend and develop
policies as needed, and
- Report to school trustees
recommendations which will become part of the District
Improvement Plan
and help focus district priorities and programmatic
decisions
over the next three to five years. (Team facilitators are scheduled
to provide reports to trustees on December 14.)
Michael
Novotny, Jasper High School principal and Student
Learning team facilitator, noted that, “Plano ISD is doing
a phenomenal job of educating students, as witnessed
by the recent announcement
of 95 National
Merit Semifinalists
this year. However, as we continually seek ways to bring all students
up to a higher
performance level, bringing together many of our outstanding educators
to study critical issues is a great step toward closing the achievement
gap."
 The
following district staff members are leading the Summit Response Teams
(lead facilitators are listed
first):
Capacity Development – Jane Ball, Mathews Elementary
Principal, and Jayne Cantwell, executive director for elementary curriculum
and multilingual education;
Student Learning – Michael Novotny, Jasper High School principal,
and Marilyn Brooks, associate superintendent for curriculum and instruction;
Community Connectedness – Tonya
Horton, Bowman Middle School principal, and Karla Oliver, executive
director of government and community relations; and
Data-Driven Decision
Making – Lisa
Long, Wells Elementary School principal, and James Ashby, director
of assessment and accountability.
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