Board MeetingDecember 2015

LITERACY

• Literacy Plan and Assessment Framework Now implemented in ALL regions

• Levelled Literacy Intervention (LLI) 15 additional schools being resourced & trained to

enhance supports for students with literacy challenges

• Benchmark Assessment System (BAS) kits 2015/16 Kits: 60 BAS 1 and 60 BAS 2 distributed

Approximately 600 kits throughout the District

• Continued Professional Development PL for BAS 1 & 2

Grades 1 and 4 ongoing this year

Grade 2 & 5 in 2016/17, Grades 3 & 6 in 2017/18

Literacy

A new draft K-6 Report Card was used for the Term 1 reporting period in K-6.

After Term 2, the District…• will be seeking feedback on draft report card. • will undertake a survey of K-6 schools.

Potential feedback mechanisms still being reviewed

Before the end of this year, we will provide to schools a draft report card for 2016-17.

K-6 REPORT CARD

Spotlight: Turning Points

• NLESD – focus for Grade 7 students.

• Fifth year for Eastern.

2014-15: 50 schools w/ approx. 3,000 students

• First year pilot for other regions.

Central: 3 schools, 347 students

Western: 3 schools, 350 students (including 1 FI class)

Labrador: 2 schools, 155 students

An initiative of The Learning Partnership, the Turning

Points program is a character awareness and literacy

program that asks young people to think about their

fundamental values.

Numeracy

• Dreambox

30 schools, approx. 3,000 students

• Resource videos:

Grade 8 videos (103) are complete

Grades 7 (English & French) & 8, and 1201 videos uploaded to new Math NLESD YouTube channel

Development of 2201 resources ongoing, expected early in the new year (approximately 100 videos)

Approximately 30 self-assessments per course

16 end-of-unit self-assessments per course

Numeracy

Grade Level Grade 2 Grade 3 Grade 4 Grade 5 Grade 6

Students 1370 1344 155 65 70

Numeracy

https://www.youtube.com/user/nlesdmathdevelopment

Numeracy

• Google Apps for Education (GAFE)

Since Sept - PL offered in all regions

- Approximately 140 schools

• Hour of Code (December 7-13)

Notification to all schools

30 schools intending to participate thus far

Innovation

Academic Optimism

District Expectation:

Academic processes are in place for all schools & all grade levels for the academic year.

Review & Intervention Process:

• ADs work w/ SEOs – review data/ensure interventions implemented at the school level.

BAS assessment results, provincial assessments, public exam marks, reading records

• Administrators/schools – use internal & external data to identify students at risk

Spotlight: Academic Interventions

Review & Intervention Process (con’t):

• Staff collaborate to develop teaching/learning strategies

• Individual student interventions identified for students at risk

Pre & post reporting periods (process may look somewhat different at each school/for each student)

Spotlight: Academic Interventions

SAFE & CARING SCHOOLS

• Mental Health

PL plan being developed to June 2017 (admin & staff)

Mental health first aid being rolled out (JH/SH admins)

Two Dr. Kutcher sessions held in Nov. (SJs & CB)

approx. 90 participants

• Review 360

Live in October, roll-out continues

Full implementation for 2016/17 school year

Safe & Caring Schools

• LGBT Training

Completed end of Nov/early Dec (SJs & CB)

Two sessions, 50 educators trained

Train-the-trainer

Goal: PL for all educators to occur over the next couple of years

Priority Junior High & High School, and other schools identified by Programs staff

Safe & Caring Schools

Spotlight: Restorative Justice

This supports our goals of Positive Behaviour Supports and encourages strong and healthy relationships.

Some schools, such as Coley’s Point Primary, are already using techniques like ‘talking circles’ and report positive results.

Other consortium members include: the Provincial Government, the Provincial Advisory Council on the Status of Women, NLTA, Thrive and the Coalition Against Violence.

Dr. Vaandering explains the Restorative Justice Consortium

The District has joined a consortium on restorative justice led by Dr. Dorothy Vaandering of the Faculty of Education.

ORGANIZATIONAL EFFECTIVENESS

• Policy First edition of the Policy Post to be made available

to staff in January.

• Communications Twitter statistics continue to grow. Below, an

overview of the last two years.

December 2013 December 2014 December 2015

Followers 2,429 6,760 9,817

Tweets 192 1,792 4,864

Following 143 257 358

Organizational Effectiveness

• Communications Development of a new mobile-friendly responsive District

website is ongoing – will include a staff section ‘The Staff Room’

Intention - both sites operational early in the new year

Organizational Effectiveness

DIVISIONAL UPDATES

Operations

Grades 4 to 6 school (Gander) - Brook Construction awarded contract. ($15.3 million)

St. Peter’s Junior High (Mt. Pearl) extension & reno - First Canadian awarded contract. ($7.2 million)

Design contracts:

• Paradise and Witless Bay/Mobile area: new middle schools - Architecture 49 Inc. ($1.9 million)

• Paradise: new high school - Stantec Architecture Ltd. ($1.6 million)

Recent Announcements & Awards

Design contracts (con’t):

• Shoal Harbour, Riverside Elementary: classroom extension and renovation - SNC Lavalin Inc. ($644,500)

• Conception Bay South: extension to Villanova Junior High School - Fougere Menchenton Architecture. ($552,900)

Tender called for Virginia Park Elem construction

Operations

Human Resources

• Performance Appraisals electronic format

Added guidance and IRT this year

• PGP Member Services linked to Performance appraisals

• SDS upgrades-payroll access, seniority lists,

• Smartfind Pilot

Expanded to GFW, with plan to continue beyond.

Existing Administrators

Enhancing meetings to include a conference component of PD

Additional PD each year

New Administrators & Existing Assistant Principals

Two-day summer institute will continue

Aspiring Leaders

School year PD (online and in person) for approx. 75

Four-day summer academy for approx. 25

Human ResourcesThree Development Opportunities

Finance and Admin• PowerSchool

Still on target to be completed by June 2016

New report cards added as of Nov. 2015

• Web Access/Connectivity

Upgrades made to 7 schools (6 in Lab, 1 Central)

Piloting accelerator technology (St. Lewis Academy & William Gillett, Labrador), awaiting hardware delivery

Since these pieces added, no connectivity issues have been highlighted

Broadband – 12 schools remain, to be completed in stages by June 2016

• Server protection

Piloting Next Generation Firewall for enhanced security.

INTERESTING INITIATIVES

Central – St. Paul’s IntermediateThe staff of 103 Search and Rescue Squadron visited the school for Remembrance Day with one of their Cormorant helicopters.

They landed on the field with a full crew to answer questions and offer tours.

They participated in the Remembrance Day assembly and laid wreaths with students.

Western – J.J. Curling ElementaryStudents at J.J. Curling Elementary School in Corner Brook celebrated welcomed fall and celebrated school spirit recently by hosting a Scarecrow Festival.

As part of the festival, students were invited to show their creativity by making a scarecrow to be accompanied by a riddle to help identify their scarecrow from the others.

Labrador – HotShots takeCHARGE

Late last year, it was announced that Menihek High School in Labrador City, St. Paul’s Junior High in St. John’s and Xavier Junior High in Deer Lake won the top prize in their regions for junior/senior high category of the HotShots Initiative.

View Menihek’s winning video here.

The initiative, which aims to raise awareness about energy efficiency and conservation among students, had a total of 69 entries for the 2014-15 school year, with the winning entries receive an iPad for each team member and 10 iPads for their school.

We are partnering again with takeCHARGE, which is a joint initiative between Newfoundland and Labrador Hydro and Newfoundland Power, to help promote and encourage our schools to get involved.

More information can be found online and is also being shared among our Twitter feed.

Labrador – HotShots takeCHARGE

take

char

gen

l.ca

Eastern – Holy Heart of Mary High

In partnership with Eastern Health, students and staff of Holy Heart of Mary High School are helping many older residents of our province keep memories alive.

The St. John's high school recently put out the call for donations of new or slightly used iPods to help populate the program's supply. They were aiming for 100 devices and were pleasantly surprised with the response they received – 125 iPods collected in total!

Provincial – ‘Student Vote’ Initiative

Approximately 50 schools registered to participate.

Those schools represent 31 electoral districts.

More than 4,000 participating students.

www.studentvote.ca/nl2015