Student Support Curriculum

 

An ongoing priority has been the development of a Student Support Curriculum.  The idea is that kids need both academic and social support and that a set of baseline services should be available to all children no matter what school they are attending. Although we offer some support programs in every school, these offerings are not consistent across the district. The work we've done in the development of a districtwide connected curriculum serves as a good model in this new endeavor.

 

District staff began by finding out what kinds of academic and social support were offered at every school. Here's what we know.

 

Community Support

We have an exceptionally generous community.  More than 400 community and business volunteers work with students one-on-one and in small groups through our VIBES volunteer program.  A Bellevue congregation has adopted one school and will add another. It sends about 70 volunteers each week to tutor and mentor children. The Overlake Service League is providing lunches during mid-winter and spring breaks.  Congregations for Kids outfits hundreds of students with backpacks and school supplies each fall. Bellevue Schools Foundation has a special fund called Bridging the Gap to support schools with the greatest need. Local PTA members also give countless hours to support schools and students.

 

Consistent Behavior Expectations

We are implenting a coordinated behavior management program across the district.  It's called the Safe and Civil Schools Project and it aims at creating consistent behavior and discipline standards and productive schools.  The idea for getting involved in this project came from counselors and special education staff, who saw differences in standards among schools, inconsistencies in the ways discipline was being used, and a decline in civil behavior among students. The program addresses bullying, isolation, cliques, harassment and lack of basic good manners.  To change school climate, the program emphasizes the need to set firm and clear limits, and clear and consistent expectations for all students.  The program's creator advocates treating all students with dignity and respect, sharing frequent, positive feedback on behavior and academics, correcting misbehavior in a calm manner and having all adults in a school take responsibility for making schools safe, civil and productive.

 

Academic Support

Academic support comes in the form of 30-minute tutorials within the school day, after-school homework and tutoring help, support classes within the school day, and programs to engage parents in their children's learning.  

 

With Bellevue Schools Foundation funding, all middle and high schools offer AVID courses (Advancement Via Individual Determination). Ten elementary schools have piloted the inclusion of AVID strategies into their regular fourth and fifth-grade curricula.  AVID was featured on "60 Minutes" several years ago because of its tremendous success in getting kids into college who might otherwise have fallen through the cracks.

 

The program targets students who have a GPA between 2.0 and 3.5, are underachieving, come from groups generally underrepresented in college populations, have desire and determination, and are the first in their families to attend college.

 

AVID  consists of a daily one-period course that emphasizes

 

• Writing, Inquiry, Collaboration, Reading
• A particular method of note-taking used on many college campuses around the country
• Public Speaking
• College and career information
• Test preparation and test-taking skills
• Research skills
• Homework assistance through tutoring
• Written summaries of what students are learning.

Even though not all students participate directly in AVID, elements of the program are being shared throughout the schools in a number of cases---to the benefit of all kids. Their experience has given them the confidence to say that AVID will increase schoolwide performance. The program has such wide-ranging results because it encourages all staff to feel responsible for schoolwide student performance, focuses on spreading best instructional practices across the entire school, and encourages and fosters teacher collegiality around strategies to improve student learning,

According to fomer district AVID coordinator Dion Yahoudy, “AVID has packaged many of the strategies we know to be effective in a way that leads to powerful improvements in student achievement and school cultures.” 

Much of what we're doing has been effective in reaching kids we might not have reached in the past.  Here is a quote from one of our teachers  who is teaching a support class.  She says, "I have watched kids who were previously struggling begin to improve.  I have literally seen the 'light bulb' go on in their heads.  What a joy to work with a small group of students having difficulties day by day, see their improvement, and then see them graduate, because they no longer need my help.  Then others come to replace them, and the cycle begins again. I am beginning to receive feedback from students that they feel comforted in the fact that they know support is there for them if and when they need it.  Due to these support classes, we have pushed more students into the success zone."

 

Other Steps

Other steps in creating a district Student Support Curriculum have been to determine what should be common to every school at every level and to ensure that all schools are implementing all the common elements. We can now say to parents and kids, "You can expect this level of service no matter which school you are attending."