Closing gaps with instructional coherence

www.acsa.org

A publication of the Association of California School Administrators

One district’s early partnership between principals, teachers and the department of equity

By Wil Greer, Agyei Green, Roxanne Williams and Francine Blacksher | September | October 2024

“All students can benefit from high-quality instruction, which might ultimately be the most promising hope of closing the student performance gap” (Wiggan, 2007, p. 323).

“If for example, a district expects for an equity director’s work to shape the district-wide instructional practice, the district must position that director to influence curriculum and instruction” (Irby et al., 2021, p. 4).

Research has repeatedly shown that teachers are the most important determinants of a student’s learning (Greer et al., 2022; Ladson-Billings, 1994; McKinney et al., 2008; Schmid, 2018). Principals, however, are the most important organizers of school-wide learning culture (Bluestein & Goldschmidt, 2021; Grissom & Loeb, 2011; Robinson et al., 2008). They are responsible for creating the conditions that influence achievement and play joint roles as instructional leaders, organizational managers and mediators of internal and external affairs. Principals have the vested authority to hire teachers, direct their professional development, determine the instructional focus for their school, observe teaching and give teachers critical feedback. There is a clear, symbiotic relationship between teachers, administrators and student performance.

Yet, the path to high student achievement is not often clear or simple. Twenty-odd years since the passage of No Child Left Behind, our learning and opportunity gaps have been made painfully evident, particularly by race, class, ability and gender. Though many school districts made incremental gains for minoritized students during the 2010s, student performance precipitously declined after COVID (Office for Civil Rights, 2021). According to the California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) website, just 30 percent and 17 percent of African American students met grade-level standards in English and math, respectively, in 2023. Performance was marginally better for Latinx students, with 36 percent and 23 percent meeting reading and math standards, respectively, in 2023. Indeed, of the 10 largest school districts in California, only two of them had more than 20 percent of African American students meet grade-level math standards that year.

To help improve teaching, learning and other related issues, many school districts are creating departments of equity, or DEs. Because of the varied needs of minoritized students, and the need for coherent, systematic equity protocols, DEs are often responsible for a broad range of goals (Lewis, et al., 2023; Weiler & Stanley, 2023). These may include closing performance gaps in math, reading, high school A-G completion, TK enrollment and attendance, to name a few. DEs may have more of a standard educational services focus, providing teacher professional development, coaching, support with instructional design and delivery, student progress-monitoring, influencing high school course access and so on. Alternatively — or additionally — they may have a student services focus, and create programs for mentoring, wellness, attendance, behavior and student and family engagement. DEs may also be tasked with responding to or providing guidance on issues of racism, racial slurs and racial hostility or bullying.

Clearly, this is a gamut of issues that relate to outcomes across all grade levels. For DE work to be successful, then, departments of equity need a great deal of capacity and coherence. As an example, consider math achievement gaps. To close gaps for underserved students, DEs must have: a) some staff who are math content and coaching experts; b) the full support of the central office for working with teachers and leaders in novel ways; c) collaboration and alignment with other departments that control curriculum, instruction and assessment; d) strong data literacy and data systems; e) emotional intelligence and the ability to work in challenging environments; f) a research-based model (e.g., action-learning, communities of practice, lesson study) that includes professional development, support, feedback and guidance; and g) expertise on the unique needs and concerns of minoritized students and communities. This is not meant to be exhaustive, but it does provide a glimpse into the complexity of DE work, and underscores the need for DE capacity (e.g., staffing, skills, competencies, knowledge) and coherence (alignment, support and integration across schools, departments and roles).

The purpose of this paper is to outline an approach for improving core instruction and closing learning gaps for minoritized students. It includes professional development for leaders and teachers, classroom visits and support, and student progress-monitoring. The authors piloted this approach in their school district, San Bernardino City Unified School District during the 2023-24 academic year. Early findings show that 99 percent of training participants — teachers and principals — have a clearer awareness of the instructional practices that help African American students excel, and coaching support has helped some teachers improve their class practice. However, greater coherence is needed between sites, leaders and our DE to affect teaching and learning more consistently.

Intervention 1: Teacher and leader PD Our base, four-day training is titled, “Gap-Closing Teaching: A Brain-Based Approach to African American Student Achievement.” This past year, 209 teachers and principals completed it. Logistically, days one and two are meant to provide foundational, somewhat traditional content on equity and diversity. Participants examine achievement gap data and research; brain-based preconditions for learning; the intersections of race, childhood trauma and teacher-student relationships; wellness strategies; and a history of the African American schooling experience. Days three and four, on the other hand, are more practical. They are designed to teach participants about the mindsets and instructional strategies that have been shown in research and practice to improve learning outcomes for African American students. By the end of day four, participants often indicate that the training helped them self-assess, learn about and identify the practices that enable Black students to excel.

Yet, to paraphrase an Italian proverb, the difference between knowing and doing is the sea. Though participants reported knowing what to do, district walkthroughs suggested that more support would be needed to get the practices fully implemented across our more than 2,000 classrooms. The gap between professional learning and implementation is well known but can be remedied with some best practices (Hill & Papay, 2022). To address this, we are taking two steps.

First, we are developing a tool to help site leaders easily spot some observable gap-closing practices in classrooms (visit bit.ly/GCTclassvisits to view the tool). We have reviewed the tool with several principals and will begin to pilot it in the 2024-25 academic year. It will be reviewed again during the 2024 summer management conference that is attended by all district principals. Second, we will calendar three to four site meetings with each principal in our district. Our DE has two managers. We will split the meetings in half to improve feasibility. These meetings will enable us to discuss, observe, provide feedback on and troubleshoot any issues with the walkthrough tool. With the training, class tool and follow-up site meetings, we can better illustrate for leaders what it means to be a gap-closing teacher, and we can support their instructional leadership in the process.

Intervention 2: Class visits, coherence and feedback loops To directly affect the instructional core, our DE added three new full-time employees just before the start of the 2023-24 school year. This gave us a reading and math equity team of five total employees. The staff members are program specialists who were veteran, successful classroom teachers. Some had experience with coaching and training other teachers as well. All had a background in diversity, equity and improving outcomes for minoritized students. Three team members were deployed in the early grades, 1 to 3, to help teachers and students with reading, and two were deployed in grades 6 and 8 to help with math. A goal of their work was to create coherence and a feedback loop between the teachers, site leaders, site academic support (e.g., teachers on special assignment, or TOSAs), and themselves in order to improve student outcomes. Student learning and teacher instruction were key focal areas.

In practice, specialists began by putting the students on their caseloads into one of three support tiers. This was based on students’ reading or math performance. Tier 3 students received the most support and were visited more frequently. There was more communication between specialists, teachers and administrators around the needs of Tier 3 students as well. As specialists built rapports with teachers, this enabled them to create a dialogue around student needs, student learning, instruction and support.

Principals were then looped into this dialogue. Given the various responsibilities a school administrator must balance, the job of a program specialist is to graciously extend a helping hand in a school’s student achievement efforts. This must be done in a way that honors the teachers and the sometimes-confidential conversations they may have with district specialists. Yet, it must also honor the principal — their authority, the culture they are building, the competing needs they may be facing and the plans they have likely already established to move student growth.

Thankfully, because of the high skill levels of our DE specialists, many administrators welcomed their support. We saw this, for example, in 6th grade. Our elementary principals were eager to have upper grades math equity support. This was our first time offering it in our district, and there was high need given our decline in math performance after COVID. After several conversations, we decided to collaboratively focus on a few standards from the Ratio and Proportions, Expressions and Equations and the Number System strands. This was because of their importance to and over-representation on the CAASPP. Spot assessments during walkthroughs revealed a need for spiraling and reteaching key content. They also highlighted important topics for principals to focus on during coaching and training sessions with their teachers.

As a result of this feedback loop and the coherence it created, we saw some positive gains. Sixty percent of African American students in grade 6 made growth from fall to winter on our district math assessment (NWEA). This was in comparison to only 15 percent of students whose scores decreased. Additionally, the gap-closing practice of spiraling back to previously taught content (e.g., that which was taught two to three months prior) became a regular part of 20-25 teachers’ repertoires. Qualitatively, our specialists were able to build valuable relationships with students, teachers, support staff, principals and families. When we combine this support with the systems our principals are creating, and with those from other district departments, there is a greater likelihood that we will be able to close racial achievement gaps and create excellence for all students.

Twenty-odd years since the passage of No Child Left Behind, our learning and opportunity gaps have been made painfully evident, particularly by race, class, ability and gender.

Conclusion In real estate, a key phrase is, “location, location, location.” For DEs, two terms that are just as meaningful are “capacity” and “coherence.” Capacity includes staffing, budgets, the express support of district leadership, the right training, the ability to progress-monitor and provide data-driven support, relationships that enable coaching and collaboration, and the ability to set and work toward joint goals. DEs must have capacity to influence instruction, and to support a principal’s instructional leadership. One way to think about it might be as a ratio: We can add the number of caseload students and teachers, then divide by the number of DE staff available to support them. Certainly, the lower the ratio, the greater the likelihood of providing meaningful, timely support. A DE with two to three full time employees may be hard pressed to provide high quality support in a medium- or even small-sized district. This will be doubly true if they do not have the full backing of their superintendent and cabinet, or if they cannot create positive relationships with principals and teachers. However, if those elements are in place, then coherence will be crucial for advancing and amplifying the work. A large, urban school district can have several, if not dozens of departments. Each department will have its own set of pressing needs, accountability mandates and demands for principals’ time. Moreover, some of those departments will likely have authority over key programs that are directly tied to the DE’s goals. They may “own” and have legal responsibility for district-wide curriculum, instruction, assessment, attendance, enrollment, professional development or student discipline initiatives. Similarly, principals acting as instructional leaders and drivers of school success will undoubtedly have their own plans and programs. It would be wise for DEs to create as much coherence across departments and sites as possible. Shared goals, progress-monitoring, data chats, class walkthroughs and calendared standing meetings can help accomplish this. In doing so, DEs can support principals’ instructional leadership goals and help improve the quality of classroom instruction. Working together, they can elevate the performance and life chances of historically underserved students. This is indeed a worthy goal for us all. References Bluestein, S. B., & Goldschmidt, P. (2021). Principal effects on academic progress over time and the potential effects of school context and principal leadership practices. Journal of School Administration Research and Development, 6(1), 12-23. Greer, W., Clark-Louque, A., Balogun, A., & Clay, A. (2022). Race-neutral doesn’t work: Black males’ achievement, engagement, and school climate perceptions. Urban Education, 57(7), 1259-1287. Grissom, J. & Loeb, S. (2011). Triangulating principal effectiveness: How perspectives of parents, teachers, and assistant principals identify the central importance of managerial skills, American Educational Research Journal, 48(5), 1091-1123. Hill, H. C., & Papay, J. P. (2022). Building better PL: How to strengthen teacher learning. Determining What Works in Teacher Professional Learning. annenberg.brown.edu/sites/default/files/rppl-building-better-pl.pdf Irby, D., Green, T., Ishimaru, A., Clark, S. P., & Han, A. (2021). K-12 equity directors: configuring the role for impact. Chicago, IL: Center for Urban Education Leadership. Retrieved from http://urbanedleadership.org. Ladson-Billings, G. (1994). The dreamkeepers: Successful teachers of African American children. New York, NY: John Wiley & Sons. Lewis, M. M., Modeste, M. E., & Johnson, R. M. (2023). The rise of the school district chief equity officer: Moving beyond mimetic isomorphism and promoting anti-racist systemic change. Educational Administration Quarterly, 59(1), 1-36. McKinney, S. E., Haberman, M., Stafford-Johnson, D., & Robinson, J. (2008). Developing teachers for high poverty schools: The role of the internship experience. Urban Education, 43(1), 68-82. Office for Civil Rights (2021). Education in a pandemic: The disparate impacts of Covid-19 on America’s students. U.S. Department of Education. Retrieved from: files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED619629.pdf Robinson, V. M., Lloyd, C. A., & Rowe, K. J. (2008). The impact of leadership on student outcomes: An analysis of the differential effects of leadership types. Educational Administration Quarterly, 44(5), 635-674. Schmid, R. (2018). Pockets of excellence: Teacher beliefs and behaviors that lead to high student achievement at low achieving schools. SAGE Open, 1-10. Weiler, J. R., & Stanley, D. A. (2023). Driven by justice: Exploring the work of school district equity directors. Journal of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies, 7, 1-22. Wiggan, G. (2007). Race, school achievement, and educational inequity: Toward a student-based inquiry perspective. Review of Educational Research, 77(3), 310-333. Wil Greer, Ph.D., is the director of the Department of Equity and Targeted Student Achievement in San Bernardino City Unified School District. Agyei Green is a math equity program specialist, Roxanne Williams is a reading equity program specialist and Francine Blacksher is a Pacific Islander student equity program specialist for the Department of Equity and Targeted Student Achievement in the San Bernardino City Unified School District.