Sharing Best Practices

Advance Illinois shares best practice from Chicago turnarounds with districts from around the state

On Thursday, February 17th, Advance Illinois hosted Sharing Best Practice Day, a day of tours and presentations at two successful Chicago turnarounds. The 24 attendees, which included teachers, administrators, local union presidents, and a board of education member, were encouraged to network with others at the high performing turnaround schools and borrow effective, best practice.

Three districts eligible to apply for the School Improvement Grant (SIG) were represented: Decatur School District 61, Springfield School District 186, and Meridian School District 101. In addition, representatives from the Illinois Federation of Teachers and the Chicago Teacher’s Union were in attendance. “The goals of the day were for districts from around the state to see effective practices in place within the Chicago school turnaround world and expand their personal networks in this field”, stated Jim O’Connor, Project Director at Advance Illinois and organizer of the tour.

The group started the day at Phillips High School, a school in its first year of restart run by the Academy of Urban School Leadership (AUSL). AUSL is a district partner with the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) that currently runs 12 schools in Chicago. Presentations at AUSL were lead by Don Feinstein, Executive Director; Jarvis Sanford, the Managing Director of Elementary Turnarounds; and Terrance Little, Principal of Phillips High School. The team presented on Human Capital: Selection, and Development; The Role of School Leaders in the Development of Positive Climate and Culture; and Improving One’s Teaching Practice.

The next stop was Marshall High School, a school in its first year of school turnaround lead by the Office of School Improvement at CPS. Participants were able to choose from the following Table Talks over lunch: Using Student Data to Drive Achievement by the Achievement Network; Building an Effective Performance Evaluation System for Teachers by the Consortium for Educational Change; How School Climate Survey Data Can Help Transform Schools by the Consortium for Chicago School Research, and Establishing and Improving Your Teacher Mentoring by the New Teacher Center. At the end of the day, participants toured the school and attended an internal Performance Management Session.

The Office of School Improvement is an internal CPS office that oversees 17 CPS schools. The CPS team included presentations by Donald J. Fraynd, Chief Officer, Office of School Improvement; Randel Josserand, Director of High School Strategy & Execution; and Glen McCarthy, Manager, Family and Community Engagement. The CPS team presented on Tracking Implementation through Team Discussions and Family and Community Engagement.

One attendee shared, “The best part of the day was seeing the schools, and visiting classes. It gave me a sense of what my school could look like!” The participants left the day with many ideas and the more of a network. One said, “The day gave me a lot of ideas that could be implemented with or without the SIG grant. The tours also made me realize the radical changes that could really take place at our school.” When surveyed, 100% of the participants stated that they are interested in touring a CPS turnaround school again.

If you are interested in joining a future tour, please email Jim O’Connor at joconnor@advanceillinois.org