Blueprint for Excellence Good morning. (Good afternoon.) As you know, our school has chosen to participate in the Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence assessment process. I am confident this process will help us in our mission to help every child under our care learn and grow to their full potential. The process begins today and a 10 minute presentation will help you participate efficiently. Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence, Inc.

Our Children are our Greatest Natural Resource “Children First and Always.” Bart Teal, the founder and CEO of the Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence, has always had the philosophy that the best educators always put children first. Our Children are our Greatest Natural Resource

Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence Looking at all that the school does to make it a better place for students Designed for all schools Everybody works together to make the school better The process for the Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence begins with a comprehensive school assessment, that is, looking at what the school does to make it a better place for students.. The assessment uses criteria modeled after the U.S. Department of Education’s Blue Ribbon Schools Program as it existed from 1982 to 2003. The assessment has been designed in such a way that it can be used for many different types of schools, including public, charter, private, and career centers. I am confident that it will assist us in developing a school-wide action plan that will ensure increased student achievement and general school improvement through our working together with the entire school community.

Blue Ribbon Lighthouse Schools Results Action Plan: Blueprint for school improvement Success for teachers, schools, and districts Shared Best Practices The results are a clear blueprint for improving our school. It promotes success for all of us. There will help us share best practices through networking with other successful schools. It will put us in contact with regional advisory teams that will help us focus our own needs and help us with the means to fulfill them.

Blueprint for Excellence ESSENTIAL COMPONENTS OF SCHOOLS There are the nine essential categories around which our school will be assessed.

Challenging Standards and Curriculum Student Focus and Support School Organization and Culture Active Teaching and Learning Challenging Standards and Curriculum Professional Community Technology Integration Each one of these is an important component of any successful school. School, Family, and Community Partnerships Leadership and Educational Vitality Indicators of Success

1. STUDENT FOCUS AND SUPPORT SAMPLE QUESTION 1. STUDENT FOCUS AND SUPPORT 1.A.1. There is a comprehensive system of needs analysis based on the school’s vision/mission statement. In other words: The school knows the needs of its students. Exemplary (A) Strong (B) C. Needs Improvement (C) D. We Are Not Doing This E. I Do Not Know Here’s a sample question from the category “Student Focus and Support.” The statement is: There is a comprehensive system of needs an analysis based on the school’s vision/mission statement. Administrators, teachers, and parents respond to that statement using the rating key below. The statement that students respond to is what follows after “In other words”: The school knows the needs of its students. Any time the wording of a criterion differs for students, it is always given below the primary statement. It’s important to for you to see the questions your children will answer.

Rating Key A. Exemplary Our school does this extremely well throughout the entire school. B. Strong Our school does a good job on this throughout most of the school. C. Needs Improvement Our school needs to improve substantially in this area. D. We Are Not Doing This Our school does not do this. E. I Do Not Know I don’t know whether or not our school does this. Here’s the rating key for the process. A. Exemplary: It’s like getting an A. Our school does this extremely well throughout the entire school. B. Strong: This rating is like getting a B. Our school does a good job on this throughout most of the school. C. Needs Improvement : This is like getting a C. Our school needs to improve substantially in this area. D. We Are Not Doing This Our school does not do this. E. I Do Not Know I don’t know whether or not our school does this.

Easy Online Assessment Assessment completed individually Answers are personal perceptions Completely confidential Individual responses revealed to no one Responses compiled by category To maintain integrity and confidentiality, do not share your login or password The assessment is done online and is completed individually. It is better for the process if you do not discuss your answers with other people before you submit them. The answers to the statements are your perceptions. They are completely confidential. No one, including the principal and the Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence staff, will see individual responses.

Easy Online Assessment Go to http://www.assessment.blueribbonschools.com/ Click on “Participant” (in the side menu ). To begin, you simply go online to the assessment site for the Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence at www.assessment.blueribbonschools.com. Then click on participant.

Easy Online Assessment Enter your unique Participant Login and click “Continue” On the Participant Login page, type in your unique participant login and click continue.

Easy Online Assessment Begin the assessment. After reading one, select your best answer from the list provided then click “Submit Answer.” You will have an opportunity to provide comments and suggestions at the end of the assessment. You may also “Skip” a question or check the “Mark for Review” box and come back to it later. To go back to any items you have skipped, click on “Review.” Click on the “Save Answer” button to continue on to the next item. Easy as a way to do the assessment used to go to the “full screen” on your Internet browser. In Microsoft Internet Explorer, click on view in the menubar and selectable screen. In Firefox, click on view to decrease the text size with the same result. For each item in the assessment, select the answer that best fits your perceptions and then click “Submit Answer.” If you need to think about an answer and want to come back to it later, you can click on the “Review” button. Write down any comments or suggestions as you go along so you can put them in the comment box that appears at the end of the assessment. NOTE For Internet Explorer users: Press the “F11” key at the top of your keyboard to change the view to full screen (or in the menu bar click “View” and select “Full Screen”). This tip helps to eliminate scrolling the page to see the buttons at the bottom. For Firefox, go to view and decrease the text size for the same result.

Easy Online Assessment You may stop at any time and start again at the place where you quit. Any responses that were submitted are saved. If the system logs you out for any reason, you may log back in to finish. Your responses may not be submitted until you have answered all the questions. You can stop at any time and come back later without losing anything. And if you get logged out, you can simply log back in. Any questions marked for review must be answered before submitting your responses.

Blue Ribbon Schools of Excellence Thank you for your participation and involvement in this school improvement initiative! This process is very important for our school. I hope you will take it seriously and answer the questions honestly. Thank you very much for your willingness to participate in this process.