Meetings: Consortium for School Improvement Supports for Improving the Performance of Diverse Learners Supports for Improving the Performance of Diverse Learners March 26-28, 2006 Hyatt Regency Miami Miami, FL This meeting was co-sponsored by the Consortium for School Improvement at the Council of Chief State School Officers, the Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement, the CSR Support and Capacity Building Program at The Education Alliance at Brown University, and the IDEA Partnership at the National Association of State Directors of Special Education. The conference focused on four goals: To help participants develop an understanding of what we know about effective or promising practices for schools that serve high proportions of students with disabilities, students living in poverty, English language learners, and African American, Native American, and Latino students To provide a forum for educators to discuss how these techniques are closing achievement gaps across program divisions and across states and districts To demonstrate how states and districts are developing and maintaining the capacity to support these strategies To expose participants to ideas they can act on in their current work, as well as motivating ongoing conversations among state, district, and school leaders Audience Agenda Speaker Presentations, Sunday, March 26, 2006 Speaker Presentations, Monday, March 27, 2006 Speaker Presentations, Tuesday, March 28, 2006 Critical Challenges and Promising Practices Identified by States and Districts Supplemental Resources Audience SEA and LEA staff working with the following programs: Students living in poverty School improvement Comprehensive school reform English language learners Native American students Special education Extended learning opportunities Participants Agenda Speaker Presentations, Sunday, March 26, 2006 Projects Related to School Improvement at CCSSO Elaine Bonner-Tompkins, Director of Special Education, Council of Chief State School Officers The CSR Support and Capacity Building Program Brett Lane, Project Director, The CSR Support and Capacity Building Program at The Education Alliance at Brown University The IDEA Partnership Joanne Cashman, Project Director, The IDEA Partnership at the National Association of State Directors of Special Education The Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement Hugh Burkett, Director, The Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement Speaker Presentations, Monday, March 27, 2006 Joint Statement from All Conference Partners Julia Lara, Deputy Executive Director, Council of Chief State School Officers The Role of State Government in Supporting Struggling Schools Pedro Noguera, Executive Director, Metropolitan Center for Urban Education, Steinhardt School of Education, New York University Response to Intervention (RtI) in General, Remedial and Special Education Daniel Reschly, Professor of Education and Psychology, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN Promising Practices for African-American Students: Research Findings Olatokunbo S. Fashola, Senior Research Scientist, American Institutes for Research, Washington, DC; Adjunct Research Scientist, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD Findings from the National Literacy Panel on Language Minority Children and Youth Diane August, Senior Research Scientist, Center for Applied Linguistics Creating a Model for Systemic Change in Schools that Results in Significant Improvement in Academic Achievement on the Part of Students with Disabilities Mike Jones, Assistant Superintendent, Educational Services Diana Walsh-Reuss, Director, Special Education Dawn Walsh, Project Monitor, Focused Monitoring Facilitated Districts Grant Project Riverside County Office of Education, Riverside, CA Extended Learning Opportunities – Summer Adventures in Learning: A Comprehensive Program to Close the Achievement Gap Chrisandra Richardson, Director, Academic Support, Federal and State Programs Felicia Lanham-Tarason, Principal, Wheaton Woods Elementary School Montgomery County Public Schools, MD Native American High Performance Learning Communities: A School Improvement Process Focused on Culturally Appropriate School Improvement Strategies Patricia Stone, Director, Native American High Performance Learning Communities Developing a Strategic, Integrated, and Multilevel Approach for English Language Learners from Pre-K to 12th Grade Susan McGilvray-Rivet, Director Sara Hamerla, Assistant Director Bilingual Education, English as a Second Language and Sheltered English Programs, Framingham School District, MA Speaker Presentations, Tuesday, March 28, 2006 Concurrent Sessions Scaling up Access to the General Education Curriculum for Diverse Learners Anita Buckley Commander, Director, Classroom Improvement, Alabama State Department of Education Closing Achievement Gaps in Norfolk Public - Journey to World Class Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Gloria P. Hagans, Senior Director, Compensatory Education Programs Bythella Hickman, Supervisor, Title I Schoolwide Programs Rhonda Ambrose, Early Literacy Specialist Sarah Peoples-Perry, Principal, Campostella Elementary Kathy Gradeles, Instructional Specialist, Campostella Elementary, Norfolk Public Schools, Norfolk, VA Universal Education Elizabeth W. Bauer, Member, Michigan State Board of Education Response to Intervention in Pennsylvania Judy Marquette, Program Director, Pennsylvania Department of Education and Pennsylvania Training & Technical Assistance Network (PaTTAN) Addressing the Disproportionate Representation of Linguistically and Culturally Diverse Students in Special Education Edward Fergus, Director, Research and Evaluation, Metropolitan Center for Urban Education, New York University Comprehensive School Reform Support and Capacity Building Program: Developing a Framework for Inclusive and Sustainable School Improvement Brett Lane, Project Director Phyllis Hardy, Program Planning Specialist Maria Pacheco, Director, Equity and Diversity Projects The CSR Support and Capacity Building Project, The Education Alliance at Brown University Critical Challenges and Promising Practices Identified by States and Districts The conference gave participants three formal opportunities to network and reflect on what they heard from the plenary and breakout sessions. Facilitated by content experts, these sessions grouped participants across states and roles, by comprehensive center regions. The following critical challenges and promising practices emerged from these conversations. Critical Challenges Monday’s plenary and breakout sessions applied research to strategies for diverse learners. The following obstacles were repeatedly cited in relation to the implementation of research- and evidence-based strategies: Overcoming resistance to using research findings Building staff capacity Aligning strategies with different contexts Working within an infrastructure that does not support implementation Involving families and parents in a meaningful way Addressing conflicts between research on early literacy and research on second language acquisition Translating research findings into action The importance of building relationships and establishing trust Retaining excellent teachers Identifying and learning from successful large-scale reform Tuesday’s focus shifted to scaling up effective practices for diverse learners and coordinating separate service systems. The main challenges included: Maximizing inadequate and fluctuating resources coordinating complex systems within the organization Monday’s conversations revealed that participants are using research in various ways, including applying specific techniques and models to student needs, structuring professional development opportunities for teachers, implementing training strategies, and learning to evaluate research findings. Strategies that are working for our participants include teacher study groups, professional learning communities, differentiated instruction, data-based decision making, and partnerships that include universities and comprehensive centers. On Tuesday, participants identified how they can move forward on these ideas in their own context, including (1) convening cross-agency taskforces or committees to structure collaboration on common topics, and (2) tracking funding and interactions with an organization-wide database. Supplemental Resources Click here for a comprehensive list of resources on diverse learners Several participants requested access to the following resources focused on becoming critical consumers of research: CPRE Policy Briefs: The Use of Research Evidence in Instructional Improvement Tom Corcoran Consortium for Policy Research in Education November 2003 Show Me the Evidence: Effective Programs for Elementary and Secondary Schools Robert Slavin Center for Data-Driven Reform in Education at Johns Hopkins University September 2005 Using Scientifically-Based Research in Schools The Center for Comprehensive School Reform and Improvement October 2005 In this section, participants have submitted additional resources that relate to the conference's focus on diverse learners: Our Impoverished View of Educational Reform *You must purchase this article, but a complimentary abstract is available. David C. Berliner Arizona State University August 2005

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document last updated 11/17/2008