Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan school district enters Q Comp program
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: |
Contact: Joe McQuillen |
ROSEMOUNT-APPLE VALLEY-EAGAN SCHOOL
DISTRICT ENTERS Q COMP PROGRAM
~Becomes 35th district to undertake professional development and achievement-based pay system~
Rosemount – Commissioner of Education Alice Seagren announced today that the Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan School District will be implementing Minnesota’s nation-leading Q Comp performance and professional pay program. The district will receive a total of $7,286,240 in revenue for the 2007-08 school year for implementation efforts.
“The addition of such a large district shows the strength and versatility of Q Comp,” Commissioner of Education Alice Seagren said. “Congratulations to everyone who has worked so hard to come together to implement this program.”
In 2005, Governor Pawlenty proposed and the state legislature approved Minnesota’s Q Comp program. Q Comp provides up to $86 million for districts that join the program.
Q Comp is designed to advance the teaching profession by providing structured professional development and evaluation, as well as an alternative pay schedule that compensates teachers based on performance, not just seniority. The program brings together career advancement, professional development and compensation linked to academic achievement. It includes a locally agreed-upon peer evaluation process for every teacher that is based on skills, responsibilities and student academic growth. This plan is voluntary and will add up to an additional $260 per student in participating districts.
The Q Comp program gives participating school districts the flexibility to meet local needs within a comprehensive model of improved teaching and learning. Administration and teacher representatives have agreed to the following:
COMPONENT #1: Provide career ladders or career advancement opportunities for teachers. The district has eight existing positions supporting professional development. The career ladder also includes four positions which are specific to Q Comp. The Q Comp positions are:
District Educational Improvement Planning (EIP) Committee Member: The committee will be made up of one board member, five district administrators, three building administrators, five representatives of the teachers and one representative from the district professional development committee. The committee ensures alignment of district and site goals; implements training for peer review teams; administers process for the peer review team; establishes communication with peer review teams; evaluates peer review model; reports to the professional development committee; approves site goals; acts as the appeals committee for individual growth plans (IGP). This position receives release time as compensation for their role.
Site Educational Improvement Planning (EIP) Committee Member: Reviews IGPs to check alignment with school and district goals; plans professional development in the building; conducts Q Comp orientation; determines how the site will spend unearned compensation. Chairperson will serve as a liaison to the EIP committee. Each teacher member receives a $200 stipend as compensation.
Q Comp Coordinator: Supports probationary teachers; implements performance appraisal system; coordinates peer leaders; designs peer leader training; refines peer leader program; researches mentoring programs; assesses probationary teachers; ensures inter-rater reliability; observes teachers three times a year, including conferences to support teacher learning; completes evaluations for teacher compensation; reviews IGPs; documents progress toward IGP and certifies compensation benchmarks. Full-time release and compensation for additional services outside of the school day and year at the contract rate of $24 per hour will be given as compensation.
Peer Leader: Supports and assesses probationary teachers; assists with performance appraisal; observes teachers three times a year, including conferences to support teacher growth; refines peer leader program; instructs teachers in developing IGPs; participates in spring evaluations; reviews each teachers’ IGP; documents teacher progress toward IGP and certifies compensation benchmarks. Full-time release and compensation for additional services outside of the school day and year at the contracted rate of $24 per hour will be given as compensation.
Job-embedded professional development: The district focus will be to provide a curriculum that reflects best practices, provides quality instruction and uses assessment data to increase student achievement in language arts or mathematics. In alignment with this goal each site set a goal that is linked to teacher performance pay. Each of the site goals are as follows:
• Cedar Park Elementary School will increase the percentage of students scoring at or above the state proficiency level on the MCA II reading and math assessments in the spring of 2007 by at least two percent in each grade level tested.
• Deerwood Elementary School will increase the percentage of students scoring at or above the state proficiency level on the MCA II reading assessment in the spring of 2007 by at least one percent in each grade level tested.
• Diamond Path Elementary School will again make adequate yearly progress (AYP).
• Echo Park Elementary School will continue to make AYP on the MCA II reading and math assessments.
• Glacier Hills Elementary School will have 80% of students score at or above grade level on the mathematics MCA II assessment.
• Greenleaf Elementary School will show a three percent increase in the total percent proficient for each grade level tested in both reading and math.
• Highland Elementary School will have 85 percent of the students in the limited English proficiency (LEP), special education, free and reduced lunch, black, Asian Pacific, American Indian and Hispanic populations for the grade levels tested score at the proficient level or higher on the 2007 MCA-II reading assessment.
• Northview Elementary School will show a two percent per grade level tested increase for both the math and reading assessments.
• Oak Ridge Elementary School will have 69 percent of the LEP, special education, free and reduced lunch, black, Asian Pacific, American Indian and Hispanic student populations in the tested grades score at the meets or exceed standards levels of the reading MCA II assessment in 2007.
• Parkview Elementary School will have an increase of three percent per grade level in the percent proficiency results for reading and math in all tested grades.
• Pinewood Elementary will have 75 percent of the LEP/ELL, special education, free and reduced lunch, black, Asian Pacific, American Indian and Hispanic students in the tested grades score at the proficient level in reading and math by the spring of 2007 on the MCA II.
• Red Pine Elementary will have 90% of the students tested score at or above level two on the reading and math assessments for the MCA II by the spring of 2007.
• Rosemount Elementary School will continue to make AYP as measured by the MCA II in the spring of 2007, by showing at least a one percent increase in reading and at least five percent increase in math for the total percent proficient at each tested grade level.
• Shannon Park Elementary School will have the third and fourth grade students show a one percent increase and the fifth grade students show a 10 percent increase in the number of students scoring at the proficient level on the math MCA II assessment by the spring of 2007.
• Southview Elementary School will have at least 83% of the tested students score at the meets or exceeds standards levels on the MCA II math assessment in the spring of 2007.
• Westview Elementary School will have a one to three percent increase in the percent proficient for each tested grade level in reading and math on the spring 2007 MCA II.
• Woodland Elementary School will have each grade level show the following total percent proficiency results in reading and math on the spring 2007 MCA II:
• Grade three: 96 percent in reading and 86 percent in math
• Grade four: 98 percent in reading and 92 percent in math
• Grade five: 90 percent in reading and 82 percent in math
• Black Hawk Middle School will show a five percent increase in the percent of students scoring at the proficient level in each grade level tested on the 2007 MCA II reading and math assessments.
• Dakota Hills Middle School will have an increase of at least three percent in the percent proficient for all tested grade levels in both reading and math.
• Falcon Ridge Middle School will have a three percent increase in the percent proficiency for each tested grade in both math and reading.
• Rosemount Middle School will show a seven percent increase in the total percent proficient for each tested grade level in both math and reading.
• Scott Highlands Middle School will show an increase in the percent proficient for all tested students of at least three percent in both math and reading.
• Valley Middle School will have a three percent increase in proficient results for each grade level tested in both reading and math.
• Apple Valley High School will make AYP and will decrease the number of special education students not making AYP.
• Eagan High School will increase the percent of special education students scoring at or above proficient on the 2007 MCA II reading and math assessments by 10 percent.
• Eastview High School will make AYP in reading and mathematics as measured by the 2007 MCA II results; 90 percent of students taking the April 2007 ninth grade GRAD writing assessment and January 2007 tenth grade BST writing assessment will pass at a minimum of a level three; and by the end of the 2006-2007 school year the following goals will also be met for student achievement:
• A 10 percent increase in the number of students earning a score of three or higher on advanced placement tests
• A 10 percent decrease at each grade level in the number of “zeros/missing assignments”
• A 10 percent decrease at each grade level in the number of unexcused/unknown absences
• A 10 percent decrease at each grade level in the number of F quarter grades
• Rosemount High School will decrease the number of special education students not making AYP on the spring 2007 reading MCA II assessment; the percent of students who score proficient on the 2007 MCA II reading test will increase by at least three percent; and the percent of students who score proficient on the spring 2007 MCA II math test will increase by at least five percent.
• Dakota Ridge School will have 43 percent of the students in grades nine through twelve pass the BST written composition test or the MN GRAD test of written composition by 2011. Beginning with 2007, 10-12 percent of students will pass these tests. All students, by their senior year, will pass the state writing test.
• Alternative Learning Center will increase the percentage of students that score at or above the proficiency level on the 2007 MCA II reading test to 40 percent and increase the percentage of students scoring at or above proficiency on the 2007 MCA II math test to 20 percent.
In an effort to provide teachers with instructional strategies and other practices, each site has created teacher teams. Teams will focus on modeling instructional strategies, demonstration teaching, team teaching, mentoring, analysis of student work, peer coaching, content coaching and other data analysis.
Performance pay: A teacher’s compensation will be based on the following factors:
1. 5% or $100 with the approval of the IGP entailing a goal, action plan and means to measure implementation of the goal
2. 5% or $100 if the student achievement goal in the IGP is met (tier two pay)
3. 85% or $1,700 after three successful observations and the attainment of the IGP (tier three pay)
4. 5% or $100 if the site meets the goal set in component 2 (tier four pay)
Objective and comprehensive teacher evaluation: The evaluation process is a research-based process and is designed around Charlotte Danielson’s Framework for Teaching. In this framework, teaching is divided into 22 components clustered in four domains of teaching responsibilities; planning and preparation, classroom environment, instruction and professional responsibilities.
Teachers will have three observations with pre- and post-conferences throughout the school year which are integrated into a professional growth process. Probationary teachers will be observed a minimum of three times by an administrator, as well as informal observations by content coaches and peer leaders. Tenured teachers are formally observed three times by district-wide peer leaders, as well as informal observations by content coaches and administrators. The evaluation includes results from three formal observations, as well as evidence or indicators of other processes used to measure achievement and professional development.
Probationary teachers meet with administrators and peer leaders; tenured teachers meet with the peer leader by the end of the third observation to discuss his/her IGP and the observations. They determine the level of performance using Danielson’s rubric and through review of professional growth and the IGP. Teachers must have reached the developing or basic category in all IGP components to receive tier three compensation.
Alternative professional pay schedule: The district has begun reforming the salary schedule by incorporating the various combinations of performance pay awards into the salary schedule. Teachers are placed on the schedule according to their years of experience, the degree they hold and the number of credits they have earned. Teachers move within their level based on the performance pay that they achieve. Each teacher has the opportunity to earn up to an additional $2,000. This initial salary schedule does not constitute complete “reform” of the salary schedule pursuant to Minn. Stat. 122A.414.
In order to comply with state law, the district and exclusive representation of the teachers have developed a comprehensive timeline to develop a fully reformed salary schedule onto which all teachers will be placed by July of 2012.
“We believe we already have some of the best teachers in the state and are excited about the additional professional development and support that Q Comp will provide to them,” said Superintendent John D. Currie. “This is a great opportunity for our district that will benefit students with even better instruction that is focused on student needs and aligned to site and classroom achievement goals.”
Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan is the second Q Comp approval for the 2007-2008 school year. Three Roseville schools were approved earlier this year.
School districts that started implementing the Q Comp program during the 2005-06 school year:
Minneapolis ● Hopkins ● St. Francis ● Mounds View ● St. Cloud ● Alexandria ● Fridley ● La Crescent-Hokah ● Marshall
School districts that began implementing the Q Comp program during the 2006-07 school year:
Grand Meadow ● Albert Lea ● Alden-Conger ● Brainerd ● Wayzata ● Eden Prairie ● Red Rock Central ● International Falls ● Le Center ● St. Louis Park ● Osseo ● Lac Qui Parle ● North St. Paul-Maplewood-Oakdale ● Clearbrook-Gonvick ● Proctor ● Burnsville ● St. Anthony-New Brighton ● Minnetonka ● Delano ● Centennial ● Pine River ● Brandon ● South Washington County ● South Saint Paul ● Farmington
Several school districts have indicated to the Department of Education they are planning to submit an application for the 2007-08 school years.
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