Knightdale High Works to Boost Student Achievement
November 5, 2008 - Student success, classroom instruction and learning teams are the talk of faculty meetings at Knightdale High School.Listen to Principal Carla Jernigan talk about working for student success 10 minute mp3 file |
Principal Carla Jernigan says first-of-the-year discussions with students that had revolved around policies and discipline in the past have turned to discussions about academics and student success this year.
“When I do lunch duty, I typically have my laptop out and if a student comes by, I say ‘Come over here. Let me pull up your interim,’” said Jernigan. “A lot of our conversations with students are now centered around academic progress, so the students have a better understanding and I think they want to do better. They always wanted to do better, it’s just that we had to work differently in order to help students.”
Communication
Jernigan says the school has promised a new discussion between teachers and families on academics. She says they will continue to provide families with information such as interim grades and newsletters, but new expectations have been set for communication.
“Communication is a two way exchange that results in an action plan,” said Jernigan. “We’ve told every teacher that if a child at the three week period – every three weeks we send an interim, sharing information, but at that period if a child has an F, we communicate. If that child has dropped two letter grades, we communicate. If the child’s grade improves by two letter grades, we communicate.”
Communication means a discussion with parents where questions are asked and viewpoints shared resulting in an agreed upon course of action to help the student.
Strengthening learning teams
Jernigan is working to strengthen teacher leadership and teacher teamwork at Knightdale High by working with the Center for Teacher Quality.
“Our school leadership team met and talked about some of the things they are doing and we thought it would be good for our teachers,” said Jernigan. “We identified 20 teachers who we thought would go back and demonstrate leadership for their departments and for their learning teams to introduce some 21st Century learning skills.”
The training from the Center for Teacher Quality has taken place at the school, meeting every Friday in October. The training will build on the strengths that the principal already sees in the faculty.
“Teachers are taking responsibility for the learning process in the classroom, taking responsibility for every aspect of our school environment that really helps our students be successful,” said Jernigan. “You will see it in the classrooms. You will see it in the halls where teachers are on duty. We do staff meetings during planning periods here which allow teachers to really stand up and give their opinions about the issues we are trying to work on.”
After the October sessions, Jernigan says the teachers will be working with CTQ staff on an action project at the school.
“They’ll still be talking to us as we are working with our teachers to see if these strategies we’ve implemented are really making a difference for our students,” said Jernigan. “They guarantee we will see an improvement with student achievement.”
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