Coraggio Consulting
Loudoun County School Board, Curriculum and Instruction Committee Meeting, Thursday, June 6, 2024

Date: Thursday, June 6, 2024
Place: Loudoun County Public Schools / School Board meeting (see BoardDocs / LCPS-TV)
Length: 1h 50m (video)
Official meeting video (Vimeo / LCPS-TV): https://player.vimeo.com/video/954584175?rel=0
BoardDocs (School Board): https://go.boarddocs.com/vsba/loudoun/Board.nsf/Public

Machine transcript (speech-to-text) produced by Coraggio Consulting. Not an official county record. Names and numbers may be misspelled; check the video at the timestamp before quoting.
Speech-to-text: whisper.cpp, model large-v3-turbo. Produced 2026-10-21. Timestamps are [HH:MM:SS] into the meeting video.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

[00:00:06] - Good morning, everyone. I'd like to call this June 6th, 2024 meeting of the Curriculum Instruction Committee to order. My name is Lauren Chernoff, and I am the chair of this committee. I'm joined by my esteemed colleagues, Dr. Deans and Dr. Rasheed, and we appreciate your presence here today.

[00:00:22] Before we proceed, we are going to have public participation. We value the public input, and if there are three speakers today, and if you wish to address the committee, We ask that you keep it to three minutes, and so we will open up the floor to Ms. Tracy Lane.

[00:00:49] Am I not loud enough? I was using my teacher voice. Oh, okay. Hello, I'm Tracy Lane. I teach English at Loudoun County High School. I would like to request that this committee meeting be made accessible to educators by changing the time to after-school hours or by LCPS funding coverage for educators who wish to contribute.

[00:01:17] I became an educator because I wanted to contribute to the growth and development of the leaders of tomorrow. As a high school English teacher, I have grave concerns about the impact of current LCPS policy on the futures of our students. Specifically, the four-grade, reassessment, and late work policies are having a negative impact on the success of our students post-high school.

[00:01:43] Colleges and employers do not give credit for showing up, much less a guaranteed 50%. Colleges and employers do not allow students to reassess because they didn't make the desired mark when they didn't do the work to prepare themselves for a successful final product. Colleges and employers do not allow for late submission of work.

[00:02:03] Speak to our colleagues in higher education and business. Ask them how these policies are impacting the success of this generation of students. And that's pretty much what I want to say. I did complete the survey that you guys had sent out about that, and I didn't feel like that survey was adequate to express my concerns about this.

[00:02:24] I teach high school 9 academic English and 9 honors, or 12 academic English and 9 honors. And I've been teaching that for the last three years, and I've had students, when I tried to explain to them that when they get to college, the colleges are not going to allow them to turn in work past the due date.

[00:02:43] They're not going to automatically give them a 50% because they showed up. They're not going to allow them to not show up. And the students were like, well, that's what they told us in middle school. So they are leaving high school expecting that they're going to have the same engagement with their college classes and with their employers that they have in high school now.

[00:03:03] And one of the things that I have done is I have friends that teach and are professors at different universities throughout the East Coast. I have friends that own small businesses. And I now have some of those individuals come into a Google Meet with my seniors at the end of the year and talk about what they can expect when they leave high school and they go into a college classroom.

[00:03:22] And I will tell you right now, my students are shocked. So I get that we want to be responsive and support the students that are in need, but those kind of policies should not be blanket policies. They should be accommodations for those that need those exceptions.

[00:03:41] They should not be for every student that walks through the door. I have students that literally will figure out the math so they know which marking periods they need to ace and which ones they can do absolutely nothing. And they do that.

[00:03:57] They're not getting what they need when we have these types of policies. And even with nine honors, you know, I have students that are making those decisions. I'm going to go teach class now, so thank you very much. Appreciate you. Next, we have Beth Visna. Did I say that right? Visna.

[00:04:22] Good morning. I'm Beth Visna. I am a mom of a first grader and a fourth grader at Emmerich, and I teach at Freedom High School. I teach AP Psychology and run the Leadership Academy program, so I work with some of the high-performing students and low-performing students, and I really am here to kind of echo exactly what Ms. Lane just said.

[00:04:42] there's no question that dr. Spence and the school board and upper admin have students best interest in mind and I think the policy was developed with students best interest in mind everything student-centered it's based in research the goal is to focus on growth mindset and to make sure that students have the feeling that they can't fail from just one experience but the problem is we we function in an extrinsic grading policy and students come in to take assessments asking when the reassessment is and they have they're

[00:05:18] coming in with low self-efficacy because they they know that there's a second chance and then they intend to come in for extra support and review and class continues and their other classes continue and they're involved with sports and jobs and families and then all of a sudden they either don't take the reassessment or their reassessments don't improve I know in the February meeting it was discussed that there's primary goals of the policy homework's an extension of the day the 50% floor is so students can't dig out of a hole reassessments are for growth mindset and I know dr. Ellis had expressed that the

[00:05:56] the primary goal is to make sure that that dr. Ellis expressed that kovat impeded the implementation of the policy and change is difficult and it takes time but thinking that teachers aren't open to change and that this is not working because teachers are resistant that makes us feel unheard and dismissed because we're experiencing it day in and day out and it has been several years and the the impact that it has it's not bridging the divide between the most successful students and the least successful students I work

[00:06:33] with the most successful students and they are showing signs that perfectionism continues and they want to do everything they can and they're not affected by the reassessment policy and some of the lowest performing students are depending on it and their grades indicate that they are thriving when in reality I don't know if they're great indicates that they do understand things and have mastery with my data collection I started collecting data to compare my students initial test grades with their AP scores versus their grades for the

[00:07:10] year and there's a drastic disconnect their first assessments are a far better indicator of their performance in class and I always believe very strongly that people who didn't agree with the 50% floor were resistant but one of my colleagues yeah I have further statements please send them thank you Thank you so much. Next we have Sandy Sullivan. Good morning. I'm Sandy Sullivan, an elementary school teacher who currently serves the members of the Loudoun Education Association as their president. Andrea Weiskopf, a virtual educator, would have delivered remarks today, but she's currently teaching and is already taking personal time tomorrow to attend the L. A. and P.

[00:07:47] committee meeting, so I share the following on her behalf. There needs to be district support for requiring BDL students to use LCPS computers. LCPS is rolling out Lightspeed and it is an amazing tool, but in one class only two students were on LCPS devices.

[00:08:10] Lightspeed is pointless if students are not on LCPS devices. Now for my remarks. Your educators look forward to your meetings next year being scheduled so that they and the general public who have regular work hours will be able to attend and participate. I do commend the committee for bringing forward topics that they have heard concerns from their stakeholders, from stakeholders.

[00:08:32] Ms. Chernoff, I specifically thank you for placing on meeting agendas the elementary school special schedule and grading policy. Clearly it's an issue. You have two show up today to speak about it. I urge the committee to continue your work through these, to work through those items that have been brought to the forefront again.

[00:08:47] get your questions answered get the stakeholder input that is critical to making meaningful decisions that benefit our students and educators our students and educators are counting on you thank you so much thank you for everyone who provided comments your input is valuable to us all right now we will move on to the approval of the minutes and from the last meeting it is my understanding that there is an amendment that needs to be addressed mr. Slevin thank you

[00:09:18] One item that has changed since we last met was it was announced a new business in the May meeting that C&I would start in August on the first Wednesday from 5 to 6 p.m. We're actually going to be meeting from 4.30 to 6 p.m.

[00:09:34] And so the minutes will need to reflect that just so that the public is informed of that. Okay. Has that amendment been – is it already – we can still approve the minutes, correct, with the amendment if we make a motion?

[00:09:50] Yes. Okay, so I move to approve, I mean, I move to amend the minutes to make the change for when the start time meeting will be for the Curriculum and Instruction Committee when we come back from recess in August. Instead of 5 to 6 p.m. on the first Wednesday, it will be 4.30 p.m. to 6 p.m.

[00:10:08] Do I have a second? Yes. I second. Great. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? All right. With that, I will move to approve the draft minutes for the May 2, 2024 meeting.

[00:10:24] do I have a second second all in favor aye any opposed all right the minutes are approved now we will move on to our agenda we have item 4.01 which is a overview from social and science social science and global studies spotlight and an update on the crosswalk year here to present today we have supervisor of social science and global studies Danielle Graham and the director of Teaching and Learning, Jeff Roundsley, and we welcome you and the floor is yours. Thank you.

[00:10:59] So I'm excited to talk to you all today about the standards update for social science and global studies, as well as just some of the work we've been doing. So with the standards updates, we, just like the other core content areas, have some changes going on. The 2023 standards were approved and this coming year will be a crosswalk year. So with that, we will be kind of updating our curriculum documents, getting teachers familiar with it, but full implementation is not expected until the 2025-2026 school year, and that is when our standards will also be assessed both in the

[00:11:34] SOL test and, from my understanding, the state performance tasks. Next slide. One difference with this set of standards was that the VDOE provided a recommended sequencing. Previously, while sequencing was provided for K-3 from Virginia Studies on, that was left up to the districts on how they divide that up. The new 2023 standards include sequencing that is different from Loudoun's current sequencing. Our current sequencing has a local curriculum with U.S. geography in fifth grade, U.S. one in sixth grade, U.S. two in seventh grade, and eighth grade is civics and economics.

[00:12:11] The VDOE recommended sequencing would push U.S. one down to fifth grade, U.S. two in sixth grade, civics and economics in seventh grade, and world geography, which is currently one of the options at the high school would be pushed to eighth grade either as a middle school course or a high school verified credit course.

[00:12:30] The VDOE did provide in their standards that school divisions are encouraged to adopt the sequence, but it is not required, and they've emphasized since then that that is really a district decision on whether they adopt it. Next slide. And so we actually gathered a lot of data and brought this to the CNI committee in December 2023, and based on data, we came with the recommendation to keep our sequencing as is.

[00:12:57] For really the following reasons, with U.S. History 1 currently in middle school split between, well, U.S. History 1 and 2, split between 6th and 7th grade, the teams are able to speak to each other. Since you do have a stopping point in 1865, that is something helpful.

[00:13:15] If we were to push U.S. 1 down to 5th grade, that would mean that students aren't only coming from a couple different classes, but a couple different schools and picking up in the second half of U.S. History in middle school. Additionally, we have limited time in elementary school for social studies, and so to do that to support a U.S. History I course would be a challenge for teachers.

[00:13:37] And also, currently, fifth grade teachers have students being assessed in three of the four core subjects for some level of accountability. Adding U.S. I would add a SOL replacement performance assessment, well, two of them, actually. And so this would mean that those fifth grade teachers would be responsible for accountability in all four core areas.

[00:13:57] We also pulled reports from HRTD to figure out the licensing implications. And there are some licensing implications, as many of our middle school teachers are either licensed K-6. Some of our teachers are licensed in just history, which means social science courses like world geography and civics and economics does not fall within their license.

[00:14:14] Or we have ones that are licensed for middle school. And so that also has implications if we were to offer world geography. We also gathered feedback from our teachers and our principals. So we asked our elementary and middle school principals. We asked world geography teachers, middle school teachers, and fifth grade teachers what they thought of this.

[00:14:35] And the overwhelming majority of teachers and principals asked that we keep our sequencing as is. And so we went before the committee in December, and they chose to support the decision to keep our sequencing as is. So our plan for the next year to support the implementation of the standards, we actually provided teachers already with the VDOE crosswalk, So that shows kind of the cross out of what the current standards are and what the new ones will be.

[00:15:02] We are updating our curriculum and resources to support instruction of the new standards. There is a good bit of new information in there. So we're ensuring that our teachers have the resources they need and the background knowledge they need to implement them. And we've also started to survey them on when they would like that professional learning.

[00:15:18] Given all of the changes in the other content areas, we've overwhelmingly heard, please not fall. And so we were looking at spring and fall 2025 to really support that implementation, with secondary maybe getting a little bit of the introduction in fall 2024. Next slide.

[00:15:38] And so I'd love to talk about some of the work that we've been doing in social science and how it supports the strategic plan. I know you've received some updates about this, but as far as empowered students go, this was the very first year that the Loudoun International Summit has returned in person since pre-pandemic years.

[00:15:54] I was actually a sponsor back in my days in the building when it got canceled. and so we had 70 international students from over 12 countries participating in this event at six of our high schools the event is both a cultural exchange they get to go to DC they also engaged in some local history field trips with Loudoun Freedom Center and then the students work together to kind of build a project to address one of the sustainable development goals and that culminates in what we call the global fair so they take a global issue and talk about how they would address that in their local community.

[00:16:30] Additionally, and actually right after this, I'm headed to Freedom High School. The capstone projects from the African-American history courses have really generated some incredible things. Students are expected to develop products or solutions that address issues in the community. Our Freedom High School students, and actually Discovery Elementary School students, have been drafting language for historical markers for the Loudon Freedom Center.

[00:16:54] Another interesting thing that came out of these projects last year was we had a student that realized that our local Monopoly games didn't include a lot of African-American history, and they wanted to address that in their project. And so they developed what they called Freedomopoly, and Loudoun Freedom Center loved it and is supporting that going into circulation, so we're really excited for that.

[00:17:17] Another thing we've been doing to really provide rigorous instruction and opportunities for students is the implementation of performance assessments for locally awarded verified credit. So for a while now, middle school students have been able to do SOL replacement performance assessments as well as third grade students.

[00:17:33] A couple years ago, the VDOE opened up that opportunity for high school. It's a little different, though. It involves the rigorous writing tasks designed by the state as well as the submission of a portfolio of work. And so we're in year three of implementation, and we are looking at most of our schools going with full implementation, meaning that our students won't be taking standardized tests, but we'll be developing this portfolio of work that includes evaluating primary sources and writing.

[00:18:05] Also very proud of our staff and the opportunities we've been able to provide. We have had awards. We had a Teacher of the Year last year. VCSS, two of our teachers won awards this year. Laura Brown won the VCSS, the Virginia Council for Social Studies, Teacher of the Year Award.

[00:18:23] Eric Sasek won the Civil Rights and Liberties Awards. Both of those are teacher leaders of ours. And then I won the Virginia Piedmont Heritage Association's Public Educator of the Year for the work I've been doing with historical organizations. And I'll talk about that a little more in just a few minutes. We've also really encouraged our teachers to lead the work.

[00:18:42] So we've had teachers presenting at our National Council for Social Studies Conference, as well as the Virginia Council for Social Studies Conferences. We have been really trying to cultivate this growth mindset and learning in groups and trying to meet, to find what teachers are interested in and really offer them opportunities there.

[00:18:59] So we have multiple cohorts of teachers going to support growth in implementation of inquiry-based assessments. We also have had a lot of engagement with Project Zero, which is Harvard's Project Zero, Creating Cultures of Thinking Cohort and WSIC Conference, so we brought teachers to both of those and had them observe each other and implement in the classroom.

[00:19:19] And then we had a good group of teachers go to the Virginia Council for Social Studies Conference as well, which has opened up some incredible opportunities. Just this week, we had the Virginia War Memorial at Simpson presenting students with World War II artifacts. We had the civil rights activist Joan Mulholland come talk to students at Cardinal Ridge.

[00:19:38] So there have been just some really incredible opportunities that have come from that. as enriched division on one work that we've a lot of work we've done has been creating frameworks for teaching sensitive and controversial content um the frameworks in and of themselves i think are helpful for teachers but also the conversations that we get to have in coaching has been something that they felt very appreciative of um from what we would call like basically hard history which sensitive topics that would be something that teachers are nervous about approaching to ones that might have a multitude or a range of perspectives on, teachers have really been looking for guidance.

[00:20:17] They want to do it well. They don't want to misstep. And so we've been not only developing frameworks for that, but also going in and working side-by-side with teams to support them in that. Additionally, we've had requests for fully built-out lessons to address some of these topics, and I'll talk a little more about that in a moment.

[00:20:33] But these are topics that are in our standards that our teachers know they need to teach. So as far as engaged community, we, in developing those frameworks, gathered a lot of feedback on policies that have been developed, the guidance that we've developed, even that sensitive conversations one that was on the previous slide.

[00:20:53] We've gotten feedback along the way from student equity leads, MSAC, different parent groups, different community groups to really support implementation of that. Additionally, I'm sure you all saw a little bit about the Together in Remembrance Memorial Day event. The social science office supported that through, while the first graders were building flags, we had sets of lessons for the week for K through four with fifth graders going in and supporting first grade. Topics ranged from the meaning of the flag, origins of Memorial Day, the meaning of Memorial Day, and how do we honor people who have sacrificed. One thing that's been particularly rewarding

[00:21:31] is the collaboration on developing lessons on sensitive content in the standards. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is in the World History 2 standards, and knowing all the attention this was getting in the fall, we decided to develop a set lesson for teachers so that they felt comfortable.

[00:21:47] What we did is we actually engaged both our Jewish community and also members of the Palestinian community to provide feedback along the way. They provided feedback on the framing of the lesson, resources used, language used, and then after we got the lesson built and out to teachers, we provided time for principals to come in and meet with these groups so they could hear what they need to think about when they're approaching these topics or when these topics come up in their school.

[00:22:14] And this process was really inspired by something we'd done with elementary school previously. We had, by principal request, they asked us to develop lessons on things like enslavement and reconstruction. They wanted their teachers to do it well. Their teachers admitted they're not content experts.

[00:22:31] And so we developed these lessons with teacher curriculum teams and then gathered feedback from community groups. And so that's been something that the teachers have been very appreciative of. This year, we were very excited to engage with a William and Mary professor who specializes in Asian American history and bring her in to talk to our teachers about how to include that information, how to approach that information, to kind of build our teacher content knowledge there.

[00:22:59] And we've also had a lot of collaboration with our local history programs. And I'll talk about that a little bit more on the next slide and just the groups we've engaged with. We've engaged with our local historical organizations in so many different ways. The obvious one is providing, they provide field trips.

[00:23:16] But we also have them engaging with student projects, very similar to what's going on with the Capstone projects. We bring them in to meet with teacher leaders so that teacher leaders can have that contact and facilitate relationships with their teachers. They offer professional development. Our local historians have come in and done content-specific sessions for our teachers.

[00:23:34] We do collaborative program planning. So at the Virginia Piedmont Heritage Award, Waterford Foundation also won an award that night. We had collaborated on a seventh-grade program to address reconstruction. Waterford is a fascinating case study for that. And so that's just one example of the collaboration we do.

[00:23:53] We had several meetings, helped them work out logistics, content. And they've also provided curriculum resources. So our historical arts are very rich in resources. We've added those into our curriculum. I also serve on the Loudon 250 committee, which is the American Revolution, the 250th commemoration of the American Revolution, which includes all of our historical organizations.

[00:24:17] And recently we've had questions about aligning language so that the language that students are hearing in the classroom is also what they're hearing in their community. And so just to give an idea of all of the historical orgs we interact with, next slide, there we go. These are just Virginia Piedmont Heritage Area, Morven Park, Edwin Washington Project, Waterford Foundation, Loudoun Freedom Center, Loudoun Museum, George C. Marshall Center, Nova Parks, Oatlands.

[00:24:42] we piloted a courthouse tours program for civics this year and the heritage farm museum and these are just our historical orgs we're working with this also expands if we were to add in all of our community groups thank you can i just give one danielle went over real fast but her recognition as the public educator of the year by the piedmont heritage area is i think really exemplifies the relationship the social studies office social studies science and global studies office has fostered it's a culture that exists in that office led by danielle and the relationship

[00:25:20] she has with the community really has helped us navigate many of the real world topics that are pressing up against our schools so i just want to publicly acknowledge the work danielle has done and the amazing leadership she's displayed in that position so we are happy to take questions or comments on this presentation i'm glad you highlighted that because she just sort of glossed i see her everywhere in the community so i'm very very pleased about that any other questions or discussion thank you miss graham for that awesome presentation i really appreciate that it really

[00:25:59] brought light and it's really exciting to to see um its continuum um i just had a question it went by a little quick when you said with world history one in eighth grade you said it's not required but you said um that it's an option right now um or it will be an option um how would that handle with transfer students or do you see any challenges with students coming from outside the county to loudon so it's world geography was the one that was in the recommended sequencing um the region four in particular but also all of the state supervisors do meet uh the majority of districts

[00:26:35] are planning on keeping current sequencing um the exceptions would be one that might already have something like that Arlington for example has something very similar to the video e-sequencing already and it's a minor adjustment but like Fairfax Prince William and all of them do plan to keep their sequencing as is which matches ours right now thank you and then another question I had for the sensitive topic or content that you proposed is that incorporated in the textbooks or is that just something that the teachers kind of review with the students the topics that are listed there in the standards so they some of them are

[00:27:12] addressed in the textbooks some of them teachers might be pulling in additional resources on like one example can be in 2021 20 the other school year 2021 2022 we had the addition of african-american history standards into the standards and the video we provided a list of resources but that wasn't necessarily updated in our textbooks so we wanted to make sure the teachers were equipped to teach some of those topics because they did hit on some things with indigenous people in african-american history that might be something that teachers were a little more uncomfortable teaching so thank you I just wanted to make sure that it was like factual based and not just any and just somewhere or rather that it

[00:27:52] was more resource based absolutely and that is a fundamental piece of our approach is to ground it in resources and really give students ownership of that process and just kind of be there to support as they explore because that kind of allows for them to go at their own readiness - thank you I'll actually actually piggyback a little bit off of that with my question and I know that you guys I'm it's no secret that we live in a pretty polarized world country county and so I appreciate you navigating this because I know that there is a lot of fear from teachers in terms of I need to teach what

[00:28:29] the standards tell me but there's also so much bias and opinion and different sides and these are young children so I would ask that either you or Mr. Slevin I know we've had a lot of conversations about the development of policy 5420 which directly addresses sensitive and controversial topics as they're being taught sort of not just as an accountability back to those groups in the community but even more so as an accountability because this is part of teachers jobs and sometimes I think there's public perception that they are just adding this in

[00:29:04] because for fun not that anyone would but it's it is part of the current day standards these topics and looking at the historical context of different causes that have arisen in our history and so that is a fine line but we have done a lot of work as a county to counterbalance with this policy so I would just I mean I've had a lot of background on that so I would love if you could just give an overview and speak specifically to that because I do think it's important that our families and the public understand that we are trying to keep it factual um bias is a part of history and honoring

[00:29:43] a balance of those biases or different sides if you will i don't like that terminology but um i think i've said enough so i think you can answer the question so thank you mr schernoff i'll start and then i'll see if ms graham or mr roundsley want to add anything and i would begin by saying the topic of controversial and sensitive curriculum and policy and our approach and support for teachers would warrant a whole presentation at CNI and we would love to spend some time maybe in the fall revisiting our support for teachers and our approach and getting some feedback from this committee as when we did that policy it was the previous board and I could say that it probably

[00:30:21] took over a year to get that policy done there's a large amount of public input trying to get people to understand what we were trying to accomplish with this policy but at the end of the day your acknowledgement of the world kind of crashing into our classrooms like that is what our teachers are dealing with on a daily basis and it's not just the curriculum while that's a big part of that and Danielle mentioned a few of the curriculum items we have students that are living their lives also coming into their classroom and they bring their experiences with them and they bring their perspectives with them and so teachers have been asking over and over again like like how can we make

[00:30:56] sure we're creating learning environments that they feel successful in but also students feel safe and acknowledged and they feel like they belong to and that coupled with increased scrutiny is what led us to the development of the policy that you referenced 5420 I think this term kind of simplifies it too much but essentially we we think of it in terms of guardrails for teachers like how do we make sure we're we're hitting the content that we are required to do so allowing students to explore it in a in a safe way but do it in a way that doesn't go too far to the to the right or

[00:31:35] the left so to speak so that's why I use the term guardrails the supports focus on keeping students at the center of the learning and balancing perspectives and then of course supporting students after learning about some really tough topics in our history and the last component of the policy really heightens family engagement and involving parents communicating with parents letting them know being open to their feedback that is something that we we heard from the community was really important to include in this policy we do have regular training there's always more opportunities for training but we also

[00:32:11] know how that's going we now have this policy to measure our curriculum against so in the absence of this policy we had our sensitive teaching tips and we you know we use that as a guidepost but with this policy it helps us make decisions about curriculum development and then most importantly at least for someone in my position is when issues do occur because the issues do occur we have something to respond with we could say okay we less course correct here what could have we done we could have coaching conversations with teachers and schools but okay this is this is how we approach these type of situations in our

[00:32:48] in our schools and I think that our educators have appreciated that and the last comment I'll make is at least anecdotally I've been in this position for a number of years and Ms. Graham and I talked about this we have observed an increase in teacher efficiency you'll see on this the last line is if you have any questions seek out support like we call that the phone a friend line now what we want our teachers to do is slow down think about what they're putting in front of their students think about the approach that they're having and and make sure you know they get a perspective different than their own when they're

[00:33:24] trying to navigate some of these sensitive topics. So slow down, be thoughtful, and like I say, phone a friend. So Danielle, would you add anything or Jeff? Yeah, I think another point just to make is yeah, with Mr. Slevin, like I do think that we really have appreciated the coaching opportunities, but also using this framework to ground conversations with parents who might reach out, principals who reach out, the community has provided that opportunity to share what the approaches and also even engaging with them in building some of these lessons has provided I don't want to say transparency we were always transparent but more opportunities for open lines of communication of what is in the

[00:34:02] curriculum how does the curriculum work and so I think that's been another benefit of the work we've done with community engagement as it provides more of that open line of communication I want to thank you for that because it is important I think for the public to understand that if there's something thing that you see particularly with your own child or another you know mom's talk so that just doesn't sit right with your pings on that scale of like this just doesn't feel right that there are lines and channels of communication through the district and policy to hold that accountable

[00:34:39] that has been that work has been done and we're not always going to get it right and there's a lot individual variables when it comes to teaching and so we there's grace there and there's accountability and so I think the policy really allows for that and I just wanted to make sure that people understood that because even just recently we've had some curriculum things that have come up in terms of assessments and things at the end of the year especially as we're shifting to more portfolio work and less just standardized testing where we might have more control over some of those guided questions and I just wanted to make sure

[00:35:14] sure that people understand that if that is troublesome to you or you feel that that that line of communication and the guardrails are in place to have those conversations and we welcome that I don't think I'm speaking out of turn when I say that so I just wanted to highlight that moving on I have one just logistical question and I forgive me for my naivete in this but what happens with SOL testing if we don't align with Virginia is it like a database where you click the box and say these sixth graders are doing this instead of this and they send you the right SOL? Is it that simple or is there more involved in not following the VDOE guidance? The tests

[00:35:53] have always been designed for the course and we're down to only two tests once we're full implementation of these performance assessments. It's fourth grade which is Virginia studies which is still what it's slated for in the VDOE recommended sequencing and my understanding is when whatever year students get civics in economics it's the same SOL test so whether they're in seventh grade or eighth grade it would still be a civics and economics sol test similar to high school like different high schools have different course sequencing and if a student's in ninth grade taking world two or tenth grade they're still taking the world two sol test any other

[00:36:28] questions or discussion well we really appreciate you miss graham and mr roundsley for being here mr slevin for your extra context and hopefully maybe we will i will take note of you know your request to look at the work that's been done maybe more in depth if that's something that the community would like to see so thank you so much for your continued efforts all right with that as we transition we will move to item 4.2 which is a presentation on professional learning and school support updates and we have miss Tina howell director of professional learning who's going to

[00:37:06] present for us the floor is yours good morning I always enjoy talking about professional learning so thank you for this opportunity I'm going to talk through some changes and reorganization that is going on within the division of professional learning so there are really two buckets there in LCPS there's professional learning and there's also talent development professional learning lives in the Department of teaching and learning and talent development lives in HRTD and so when thinking about these two professional learning and talent

[00:37:45] development how they're alike and different it made sense to establish a primary point for tasks related to aligned professional learning required trainings and talent development so the decision was made to move leadership development and mentoring and coaching to the talent development side in HRTD And really the thinking behind that was we want to expand mentoring and coaching to more than just beginning teachers, really to all of our staff, and then also leadership development for all of our staff as well, rather than just instructional staff.

[00:38:26] So the Division of Professional Learning is now becoming the Division of Professional Learning and School Support. and the decision was made to rename the division of professional learning to add school support because we really want to make sure that we are providing that school facing support and closely collaborating with the Department of School leadership to find out what supports to schools need and how can we support them and then also ensuring alignment with other divisions in the

[00:39:04] department of academics for example the other side of teaching and learning also the office of research and assessment and school improvement and then also the department of student services so although we already work closely with these offices this new reorganization will allow us to work even closer to make sure that we are aligning our work specifically around the content and curriculum our team has been working closely with teaching and learning on the development of the instructional framework we will continue to work

[00:39:41] collaboratively not only in the continuation of the development of that instructional framework but also in support of professional learning for teachers and staff so we were being responsive to principal feedback we heard from many principals that when it comes to instructional facilitator programs within the division of professional learning is is the division instructional facilitator program we call them diffs and principals were saying we want a full-time diff and so we were being making sure that we were being really

[00:40:19] responsive to principals in addition we heard from principals and teachers there are so many resources how do we access them how do we make sure that they're aligned how are they better for teachers to be able to immediately implement in their classrooms and so we are going to work to make sure that we are identifying and providing those necessary resources for teachers so we have established a couple new offices within the division of professional learning and school

[00:40:55] support we have established an elementary office of professional learning and school support and a secondary office and then we have also established an office of instructional design and innovation and I'll go through what those are the one office that has not changed is the office of instructional technology which Mike Henrickson will be presenting on that next so this is the new organizational structure there you can see the director and then Jennifer Miller is the supervisor professional learning and school support at the elementary level because there are obviously more

[00:41:33] elementary schools and there are secondary schools she has an instructional facilitator supporting her. She will also oversee and supervise all of the elementary division instructional facilitators. Courtney Williams will be the supervisor for secondary and so she will oversee the secondary division instructional facilitators and support all secondary schools. Just so you know we currently have 15 elementary division instructional facilitators and 12 secondary. Amanda Kim will be the supervisor of instructional design and

[00:42:09] innovation and she has two instructional facilitators working with her and then the instructional technology office did not change. So within the offices of professional learning and school support there are a few key objectives. We want to make sure we align efforts with the school improvement process and LCPS strategic goals. By working closely with the school improvement office and the level offices we will know what schools need and we will be able to provide support and professional learning so the supervisors will supervise the instructional

[00:42:48] facilitator program they will also collaborate closely with the school improvement office it is really important that we make data driven decisions so looking at the sip knowing the data intimately of each school what do the schools need and then being able to provide it and so one portion of that is the division instructional facilitators but there's much more than that if in that they see there's a trend let's say there's a trend among elementary schools then they can support with providing professional learning to

[00:43:25] enhance teaching and learning or if they are seeing that there is a trend among secondary schools then they can bring groups together to provide that support so as I've stated there is one portion of their of their supervision which is the division instructional facilitators when this program started in 2016 we only had 10 instructional facilitators and they all supported multiple schools we now have 27 and we have heard repeatedly from principals

[00:44:00] it's this is great resource and they're not here enough we they're spread too thin we need a full-time instructional facilitator and so next year the division instructional facilitators for will almost all be assigned to one school we have two who will have two schools one it's two very small schools and the other one is Hovater and Henrietta Lacks and that is just because this is obviously we think any new principal and especially opening a new school should have an instructional facilitator and this is a very new

[00:44:39] structure the LCPS has never had before where we have the split of the primary and upper elementary and so the principals are actually the ones who asked can we please get this support for next year so we'll be providing that support for them next year this was a very collaborative decision to figure out where we wanted to place the diffs we met with the Department of Academics we met with level offices we met with the research office we really looked at the data to determine which schools will get a diff for next year and so not all

[00:45:18] schools will receive one obviously we only have 27 so not all schools will receive a diff which is also why we did the restructuring because now those supervisors will be able to still provide support it's not that they don't get any support we've let principals know you can reach out to these two supervisors if you need support but it really it really was data driven and a collaborative process so within the office of instructional design and innovation that office will work very closely with the content offices they actually already do that and provide a lot of support to the content offices

[00:45:55] but they'll help with aligning the curriculum development process the LCPS instructional framework and they'll also focus on increasing teacher capacity supporting teachers with instructional support redesigning the curriculum to meet the diverse needs of all students as you know the instructional framework was created to promote clarity and coherence around quality instruction so they will really help especially with professional learning around the instructional framework and I said this before they're also support teachers with knowing how to access the abundance of resources that are available to them

[00:46:34] and then how to utilize those resources effectively and then they will support with professional learning in regards to curriculum and then they will also support teachers with planning engaging and assessing instructional practices so because you're going to hear from the instructional technology team I won't go over too much about that but that is another office within the division of professional learning and school support so a big aspect of our job is that we support multiple events I will say that I have an incredibly talented team and

[00:47:13] every event that they do is just world-class it is very very well done and so that won't change so these include the countywide staff development days lead Loudon which was formerly ought launching your leadership we have a beginning teacher Institute welcome one inspire Loudon among some other events as well that won't change we'll continue supporting these events we also have developed quite a few cohorts because we know that educators want support and so we support a cohort called profiled practice where they

[00:47:51] spend a year learning how to embed deeper learning practices into their classrooms these are all teachers and at the end they do a project about deeper learning we've gotten amazing feedback from teachers about that cohort new for next year we have a national board cohort we just realized that we don't have a lot of nationally board certified teachers in Loudon and so we saw that as a need and so we are creating a cohort to support teachers go through the national board process new this year was what's called a beginning teacher

[00:48:26] cohort and that is where beginning teachers meet once a month with a a cohort of other teachers who either teach a similar grade level or subject area. We also had two new leadership cohorts this year, aspiring administrators for teachers who would like to become administrators and the aspiring principal cohort for assistant principals who would like to become principals.

[00:48:50] We also have a principal induction program for new principals and an assistant principal induction program for new assistant principals. we're always looking forward and seeing how we can improve and so I just wanted to talk through some things that we're really thinking about for next year one is how do we streamline professional learning and we really want to make sure it's beneficial to teachers and then it's meaningful to teachers we also want to innovate within existing tools like Schoology and PowerSchool and make sure

[00:49:27] teachers know how to utilize those we also want to make sure there's alignment across the division when it comes to professional learning. For example there are several different departments who offer professional learning on classroom management. We want to make sure that they're saying the same thing that they're not giving contradictory support to teachers.

[00:49:49] We also are working very closely with school improvement. One thing that the school improvement office does is they will tell us here are some trends of what we are seeing that schools are putting in their school improvement plan And so we can provide some professional learning based on that.

[00:50:09] And then we are also have been trying to define, we have created a definition of what high quality professional learning is and developed a workshop around how do you design and deliver high quality professional learning. And then finally, we are getting feedback from teachers.

[00:50:26] Professional learning is actually under a program evaluation this year. And so we have met with five focus groups from five different schools right now where you have one more to do. And we are gathering feedback from teachers on how's it going with professional learning?

[00:50:44] What do you need? How can we support you? And so we are gonna gather that feedback. We're gonna share it with the research office, ask them to please analyze it, and then we will make decisions moving forward on how to make professional learning better.

[00:51:02] Thank you. And what questions or comments might you have for me? - Thank you so much. Colleagues, do you have any discussion or questions? Are we becoming too specialized in terms of the levels, all the levels of supervision and responsibilities, and are we becoming too specialized?

[00:51:36] With the reorganization? Yes. I don't think we're becoming too specialized. I think what we're doing is so before we were supporting k-12 all together and I think now we're going to be able to look at trends at elementary and say what what does elementary need we'll also be able to look at trends at secondary I have actually set up weekly meetings with my team because for next year because I want us to not become specialized and say your only focus is

[00:52:11] elementary but it's k-12 and how are we aligning to make sure what we're doing in elementary school now is going to support teachers and students in secondary school. Can I add to that? I would only add one of the pieces of feedback we received from principals but also in working with Dr. Spence in the reimagining of our school improvement process is eliminating the mystery of who do you go to for support and so while we do have an elementary focus on one supervisor in the office of professional learning and school support

[00:52:50] there are still going to be components of that that there needs to be a level of awareness of what's happening k-12 our tools like Schoology like power school those are all k-12 tools so there'll be collaboration under Tina's leadership but really came down to an additional what Tina shared knowing where to go to for support we have 60 elementary schools 60 principals AP's facilitators and those people need to be engaged in conversation someone needs to pick up the phone when they're need something and so while my hope is that our supervisors become expertise and as you say in the level it also is about

[00:53:30] making sure people are there to help our school based staff so you had another comment other comment was do we not still have content building level people over science math social studies so how would that help or interfere with their oversight so with the new office of

[00:54:07] school innovation and thank you instructional design and innovation they work very very closely with the content offices so it will be more of a collaboration to say what what do those building levels need and how can we support you I would add to those we are very thankful for our department chairs and we are very thankful for our middle school subject area lead teachers and our elementary subject contacts but there's also a limit to what those folks are able to do you know with our in our high schools those department chairs do get a release period for our core

[00:54:44] content but outside of our core content department chairs have the same level of planning that a typical teacher does they do receive a stipend in middle school there's no release across the board and so while we're super appreciative and they're a vital part of our strategy and supporting our supporting our teachers there there is interest at times from principals to increase the capacity of those people to help us as well so I just want to note that we do have we have heard feedback from principals and teachers in those positions that hey we need some attention and how could we have to be more impactful in our position with this and cooperate the instructional

[00:55:23] facilitators in de a office would it come under so we when miss house talking about the division instructional facilitators that's a specific work group and those facilitators are assigned to schools and they're they're supervised and supported through the division of professional learning and school support we do have facilitator positions in other offices I think there was a picture in the slide earlier of a collaboration between professional learning and school support and DEIA I don't know what that meeting was up there in the top right I think that's so we have regular collaboration and touch

[00:56:03] points you know similar to the content offices we are collaborating consistently with the DEI office I meet regularly with dr. Ellis Williams and so we're separate departments and divisions, but we still have a lot of similar work that we can enhance for each other. Does that answer your question? Yes. And let me just share my concern. My concern is the lines of supervision of those instructional facilitators that go out to the schools.

[00:56:34] Are they, are they, are their daily responsibilities accounted for? Or are they accountable to a person in order um to ensure that is shared a shared concern amongst um myself super the supervisors the principals and that's partly how we ended up in this structure um tina alluded to principal feedback at the beginning of this presentation um in the past uh the division instructional facilitators were assigned to multiple schools upwards of did we have anyone

[00:57:11] at four last year so three in the past they've been up to four and so by assigning them to one school they're going to be accountable to the supervisor but also to that principal the principal is going to know exactly what they're doing every day we do have some other facilitator groups such as our elementary reading and writing facilitators knowing that principals want really focused support this year when it comes to our elementary literacy roll out those folks are going to be more centrally managed accountable to miss Neil or elementary reading and writing supervisor and the other group I would mention in teaching and learning is our computer science instructional

[00:57:49] facilitators those are also being focused more tightly on particular schools where schools actually express interest and they'll be assigned to three schools and so we have tried to make and there's probably more steps we could take with that but we have tried this year to really tighten the the lanes of where these people support so that the support can feel more impactful and targeted to the schools I do want to acknowledge though just that we have amazing people in these positions many of these people are in their positions because they were our top teachers and so they are really talented educators and

[00:58:27] we want to make sure they're being utilized most impactful it's not about their ability to support it's just structures we're it's the structures we're putting them in to make them impactful because I do appreciate the facilitators and the role they play in our division um I just wanted to be clear does the facilitator lighten the load so to say for the teachers yes they they primarily support teachers and as I've been going out and doing these focus groups I just hear consistently about how amazing the facilitators are as a matter of fact what focus group that I just went to recently I said you

[00:59:07] know what's your best professional learning or what's going well and they all said the facilitator is the one and they they said that they love coaching that's another thing that the teachers have been saying consistently we want coaching they will go to a professional learning and then we come back we need help and how to do it and so the facilitators support with that they can co-teach they can model they can provide professional learning they support with the CLTs and so they we've also heard from principals like they're my thought partner they're the person who helped and they're non evaluative so they get the trust of the teachers because the teachers know they're truly there just

[00:59:47] to support them and they're not there to evaluate them yeah that's a very important I just wanted to make sure there was a difference between and there obviously is between a TA and a facilitator a huge difference I really appreciate how the principals expressed the need to have these facilitators for the teachers time and time again it's just a big concern for me when I hear that the load just gets higher and higher I mean we come up with these wonderful programs and we look at the curriculum and you said we look at the trends but we also have to see the trend of you know the support system for the teachers especially the fact that you know we're thinking about salaries we're thinking about you know living in northern Virginia so thank you for that

[01:00:25] thank you I can speak personally obviously being a facilitator in this County was one of the greatest joys of my career. I loved that role. And although there, I think that, I think what I would like to ask is, is this a work in progress? Because there are, there are some changes, but when we leave school, principals advocated, right, for wanting a diff. I think some principals now are like, wait, in advocating for that, now I lost one and I'm not getting it. So that's a tricky thing because we don't have the bodies to do the work and so is this I would just

[01:01:05] like to say is this a work in progress and what would that expectation to meet that requirement of all the schools to have a diff I'm guessing that that's a budget implication would need to be a priority that's probably something that we should consider if that's what principals need so if you could just speak to like where we are in the journey and how this plans to evolve I know we don't have all those answers but a little bit going forward I would definitely say this is a this is a work in progress and we are open to and are receiving feedback from our principals who are no longer getting dip support and we are working to make sure that they feel supported but we do I do want to

[01:01:45] just mention that we are focusing based on academic need like we do have some schools that are going to need support from the central office they're going to need additional resources based on their goals of their school improvement plan And the decision for the placement of the resources we have also was very much aligned to that, as Tina mentioned.

[01:02:03] I would also say that the board has been generous in continuing to support differentiated staffing. And you're seeing many schools use their differentiated staffing to develop school-based instructional facilitators. And we are building supports around those folks because those positions are really aligned and are intended to do the same thing when it comes to helping principals and CLTs meet the needs.

[01:02:26] I would imagine this is going to come up in the budget process when principals bring this up again. And I would also imagine that the board, rightfully so, is going to say, well, show us that it made a difference. And so we're thinking about how to show metrics, how are people feeling about the use, how are these people using their time.

[01:02:43] Because if we want to expand, say, to another group of schools, then we need to show the board and the public that this is a useful resource that has an impact. With the assignment, those schools who are on Federal Watch do have them, right?

[01:03:05] Yes. So it was driven by, first we really looked at literacy trends. So schools that were displaying either with growth or achievement, we focused on literacy. That's a big area of focus for us, obviously. We then looked at math, looked at math achievement scores and growth.

[01:03:23] Then we looked at subgroup data, and we also looked at science at the end of the day. But really, it's the schools that are indicating need that are getting this support. And so if a school is receiving, you're speaking specifically, I think, of Simpson and Forest Grove, those schools are getting division instructional facilitators are also likely getting, I don't want to speak to it, but they are probably evaluated for math support.

[01:03:51] And so I could give you those details, but I don't want to just make it up. Okay. That's what I was looking for. They're definitely centered in this conversation. schools have sort of been on my desktop since I heard about it I have one last question as it relates to the diffs and the spiff so sorry the district district instructional facilitators and school-based instructional facilitators it is my understanding that several of the diffs have been placed at schools that already have school-based instructional facilitators so just want

[01:04:26] understand one how are those two like I didn't see mention of how the school based instructional facilitators are gonna operate is it the same role as a diff is it different so that's my first question and my second question is why not spread the love if you will like they really I know there's high needs schools but leaving schools without any support seems like an interest I would just like to know the thinking behind that so there's definitely was a lot of internal debate around that and I think there's a that's really an exception rather than the rule I think we have limited number of schools where there's both a school-based facilitator and a division instructional facilitator but

[01:05:04] to answer your question about alignment our goal this year is to align those two work groups be transparent in that in the past there may have been some misalignment and the school-based facilitators this and the principal had a lot of autonomy and how that position was used however if we want these resources and positions to really focus on our school improvement goals and align to what's happening at the division we need to get in conversation and a relationship with the school-based facilitators in the division and structural facilitators so we'll be bringing those groups together we'll be having trainings together we'll be bringing in outside content areas for

[01:05:40] example to do some collaborative work and they'll be having a relationship with Jenny Miller and Courtney Williams in the offices of professional learning school support. The handful of schools that have both really comes down to like really high needs in literacy and really high needs in math like I think that would be my my prediction and so one maybe would be really focusing supports on math needs and then even science like we do have some some gaps in science that's going to continue to be a trend going into next school year and so it really came down to there are just some schools in critical need of support and so we

[01:06:18] wanted to make sure they had the abundance of resources we'll evaluate that as things continue but that's really the rationale for the few schools that have both thank you I would just like we differentiate for our students I would ask that as these two groups sort of come together that we really think about what training they've already had or haven't had and appropriately fill those gaps and and build that collaboration and communication and especially as there are going to be some schools that are in that unique position of having both maybe having some conversations about clearly defined roles just so that you know some of these school base have been there a long time and now you have

[01:06:56] someone new coming in and I think there's just some some feelings around that so I appreciate that context colleagues is there anything else all right thank you so much and we will move on to our last information item 4.3 instructional technology update and we have Mr. Henderson here who will be presenting um as the supervisor of the department good morning thanks for having us here to share a little bit about our work and i'm excited to um just give you some updates on some

[01:07:27] recent projects we've been working on and uh share a little bit about our team absolutely yep and and mr smith here is here as well uh to participate as part of the conversation just in case we need my apologies it looks great looks great on my screen over here all right so this morning we are going to spend a little bit of time just giving an overview of the instructional technology

[01:08:05] Office and the work that we do and the supports that we provide for schools. We'll be talking about some specific projects that we've been working on around helping schools identify and select online resources that they use to support instruction and talking about a little bit of our work around artificial intelligence.

[01:08:26] So we wanted to start this morning just by giving a little bit of an overview of our office and so you can see here some of the strategic plan connections, the way that our work connects to both the core values and the strategic goals outlined in the strategic plan.

[01:08:42] And then I think it's important to start any conversation about instructional technology with a little bit of level setting around definitions, and what are we talking about when we're talking about instructional technology. A lot of times when people hear instructional technology, the thing they've jumped to first in their brain is the things, right, the tools and objects and things that plug in in classrooms.

[01:09:02] And those are wonderful technology tools. And instructional technology, though, is about application. It's about an application of an understanding about how to use those tools to get to a desired learning outcome. So our work really isn't about nouns. It's not about the things that are available in classrooms.

[01:09:18] It's about what we do with those. Our work is about verbs. So it's a good kind of level set to keep in mind as we're talking about the rest of our topics this morning. And when we're thinking about technology in classrooms, you can go to the next slide there, Neil. Thank you.

[01:09:34] When we're thinking about technology in classrooms, technology is used instructionally in classrooms in a wide range of ways. Technology in classrooms ranges from low-tech to high-tech, right? So when we're thinking about the technology tools available in classrooms, scissors and glue are technology tools that are available in classrooms, and VR headsets and 3D printers are technology tools that are available in classrooms.

[01:09:57] So we have one that's an incredibly wide range of the types of technologies we're talking about And then the ways in which they are used or are represented across that bottom axis there. And it ranges from just, you know, automation of tasks and consumption of resources all the way up to solving authentic, challenging, complex, real-world problems.

[01:10:17] And you heard Danielle reference some of those examples in her presentation earlier. And so when we're thinking about the ways students are using technology throughout a given school day, they're sliding all over this matrix. Or ideally, they're sliding all over this matrix. They're using low-tech tools, high-tech tools.

[01:10:33] They're doing some of that automation and consumption tasks and doing some of that solving complex challenging problems and engaging in a range of activities using technology in any given school day. So here are some examples of benefits or things that technology provides to our students.

[01:10:55] I'm going to just zoom in on a couple of them because there's lots of things that we could talk about here. But one is -- one we'll zoom in on a little bit is access. So when we're thinking about technology and what supports they provide or those tools provide for students, one thing that they provide is access to a rich world of resources and content and materials that help support student learning.

[01:11:21] So when I was in a classroom teaching second grade 20 years ago, the materials that I had to use in my classroom were constrained to the physical environment around me. books I could get my hands on, whatever videos happened to be on the shelf in the library, whatever things and materials I could get to in my classroom, and I was really constrained by what I could or could not do with my students based on the materials I had access to.

[01:11:43] And now, through technology, our students have access to just an incredible range, and our teachers have access to an incredible range of materials that can be used to match the right material with the right instructional need at the right time.

[01:11:59] And those materials can be accessed not just during the school day when a student happens to be in the physical classroom where those materials are, but they can also be accessed at any point when the student needs them. If they're at home and they're working on something, they can access resources and materials that may have been shared by the teacher during the school day and things like that.

[01:12:17] The other one I want to zoom in on briefly is thinking about flexibility and how technology tools can really support students who have a variety of learning needs and how technology tools can remove barriers for students and allow them opportunities to engage with content.

[01:12:36] So if we're thinking about physical materials, if I've got a page in front of me, the materials or the text on that page is kind of locked in. There's not a whole lot I can do to adapt that material to match the learner that's using the material. If I have that material in a digital format, I have a whole range of options.

[01:12:53] As a teacher, I would have a range of options, and as a learner, I have a range of options as well about how I could use those materials. I could make the text larger or change the contrast or change the font. I could use things like text-to-speech tools or I have tools available to me where I could click and get a definition for a word or all kinds of wonderful supports that are available by having resources in a digital format that increases that flexibility and that usability for the learner.

[01:13:25] So we'll share a little bit about our office, what we do and the supports that we provide for schools. So our mission in the Office of Instructional Technology is to maximize the impact of instructional technology on student learning. We really exist to help teachers make the most out of the tools and resources that they have available to them to maximize that impact on student learning, and we do that in a number of ways.

[01:13:49] So we can see some of those buckets there on the screen, working as an advocate for the power of instructional technology, developing and delivering professional learning experiences for teachers, setting a vision for what technology or what instruction can look like and how technology supports that, collaborating with other teams across the division to find ways to integrate technology into things that they're developing and curriculum and professional learning opportunities, and then communicating with others about what resources are available and what learning is available and what that use of instructional technology in the classroom can look like.

[01:14:25] So some of the things that we provide directly to schools, we offer a range of professional learning opportunities directly to teachers. We offer access to cross-curricular tools. So our office provides and supports a number of tools that can be used across content areas, across grade levels, to support curricular goals.

[01:14:47] We are collaborating with other division-level teams to think about as they're designing curriculum or designing professional learning to think about how technology and instructional technology is represented inside of that work. And then we provide job-embedded, or we provide job-embedded just-in-time support for teachers through our school-based instructional facilitators for technology.

[01:15:10] So we can see here some of the competencies that describe the sort of capture the role or the support that IFTs provide to teachers in schools. These competencies are defined by VDOE.

[01:15:27] VDOE provides guidance to divisions about how these positions should be used. And these competencies are based on that BDOE guidance, and they base their recommendations on standards developed by the International Society for Technology and Education.

[01:15:43] So these are sort of representative of the ISTE standards for coaches. And you can see the wide range of roles that an IFT fills inside of a school and the skills that they have to have to successfully support teachers. So if we look at what that looks like in practice, here's some examples of things that you would see IFTs doing inside of classrooms, working alongside of teachers every single day.

[01:16:10] And so they're doing that co-planning, that modeling, co-teaching, creating resources, designing professional learning, developing professional learning, supporting teacher reflection, that wide range of job embedded support that makes professional learning so powerful.

[01:16:28] So we're gonna move now to talk a little bit about how our team supports schools with the identification and selection of online resources. And so we'll start with a little bit of background. Online resources in general, when we're thinking about online instructional tools, over the past 10 to 15 years, the number and types of instructional resources that are available to teachers and students online has just exploded.

[01:16:56] There's a variety of reasons for that, but there's just a wide range of tools that are available to teachers, that are marketed to teachers, to help support instruction in classrooms. And there's a lot of benefits that come with these online tools.

[01:17:11] There's incredible range that's available. They can be accessed through any device, not just locked into something that's installed on a particular device in a classroom. There's a lot of flexibility in how these tools can be used to support students and specific student instructional needs.

[01:17:28] And they provide access to really rich tools, many of which are tools that could be used by, that are used by professionals in their fields. So we have this wonderful world of resources. We also have some risks that come along with using those resources. Data sprawl, you know, how many different places are data about our students going?

[01:17:49] How are we complying with our responsibilities under FERPA? How are we supporting this wide range of tools with people that have problems or need help? How are they getting that? And then how do we avoid confusion for end users where we just have so many tools they don't know where to go for what, right?

[01:18:06] So there's a lot of risks and a lot of benefits to this world of instructional resources. So we use, we've developed and used an online, sorry, a review process that helps us support schools with the identification and selection of online instructional resources.

[01:18:25] And that review process is looking at tools through these particular lenses. These are the things that we're looking at when we're thinking about these online instructional resources.

[01:18:42] So a little bit of history. We had a review process for software that teachers wanted to install on laptops. We're thinking prior to 2017 when we first started this work and began to iterate on this process.

[01:18:57] We had an existing legacy review process, but that was really geared towards software products that would be installed on a laptop that were owned by the division. So if I wanted something available on the cart of laptops that was in my classroom, there was a process that I could go through to have somebody review that to figure out if that was something that would work technically with the hardware in the schools.

[01:19:18] And what we discovered as all these online resources began to pop up and schools were interested in using them to support instruction, that that existing process didn't really align with how we would review and the things that we would look at when we're thinking about online resources.

[01:19:36] So in 2017 we developed this review process and we also developed what we call the EdTech Catalog, which is a catalog of applications where teachers can go and see which things have been reviewed and what guidance has been provided about how to use those resources safely and effectively in the classroom.

[01:19:53] So the review process always starts with a conversation with a school-based instructional facilitator for technology. We want that IFT to be that first level support for a teacher who's looking to solve an instructional problem.

[01:20:10] And so here's an example of what that conversation might look like. A teacher identifies a particular instructional need. Here's this challenge I'm having in my classroom, not exactly sure how to solve it. I have this thing that I heard about that I think might solve it, but I'm not really sure if it's the right solution.

[01:20:26] So they have a conversation with the IFT and they'd start to think about, all right, what are the tools and resources or strategies that we could use to address this instructional need. And our goal and our hope is that we can point teachers towards existing tools, existing resources, and steer them towards the wonderful collection of resources and strategies that we already have access to that are already available to our teachers and students.

[01:20:53] And then if not, then we give that IFT a pathway to initiate a review to say, hey, this is something that our teachers have identified. We think it's gonna solve an instructional need. And here's how we're imagining that that's going to be used.

[01:21:09] So the review process-- if we can go to the next slide, Neil. Thank you. That review process involves multiple teams across the Department of Digital Innovation, the Department of Teaching and Learning, and the Department of Student Services.

[01:21:25] And each team kind of looks at the title through their own lens and then gives feedback on that tool as to if and how that tool could or should be used to support instruction in classrooms. And so when something is reviewed, when a review is complete, and we put that title into the EdTech catalog to let teachers know that, hey, this has been something that's been reviewed, we apply a designation based on the results of the review.

[01:21:54] And up on the screen there, you can see some of those designations, or you can see the list of designations for how we classify resources after one of those reviews. So, this is an iterative process, we're always trying to improve and make it better, make it more streamlined and more responsive.

[01:22:17] So one of the things that we've been working on recently is a draft regulation related to policy 50-45 around the identification and selection of supplemental instructional resources. We're working on a regulation tied to that policy specifically about the identification and selection of online resources.

[01:22:37] And that regulation really just outlines in depth the existing review process as it currently stands. And then it also thinks about how do we iterate and improve in some particular areas, specifically around off-boarding titles.

[01:22:53] We spend so much time thinking about how do we bring all these things into our ecosystem, now we're starting to think about how do we be strategic about identifying when things need to move out of the ecosystem. So that's part of what we're trying to capture in the regulation. All right, so now we're going to shift to sharing some of our work around generative artificial intelligence.

[01:23:18] So we have convened a cross-departmental team to explore some questions and opportunities and challenges around generative AI and how it supports student learning and the work of our school division. And so this cross-functional team includes team members from all different departments, So not just teaching and learning and student services but digital innovation and HRTD and facilities and support services, all kinds of teams are represented here.

[01:23:52] And as a team, here's an overview of some of the things that we have completed, are working on and are upcoming. So we've developed an informational website that gives just a high level information about what generative AI is and that website is available to students, to teachers, to the community. It's publicly available. We've developed a one-pager for staff that just gives them some things to think about as they're beginning to learn about artificial intelligence and beginning to wonder about how it might support their practice. We've developed a set of guiding principles and we're going to share a little bit more about that in the next slide. And then some

[01:24:28] things that are in progress. We are working on really focusing in on resources that are going to help teachers support conversations with students in classrooms. So we're working on some language around original work and how do we define that when we're thinking around thinking about generative artificial intelligence. We're working on resources that the teachers can use with students to provide guidance about if when and how using generative artificial intelligence is a good choice for the student and to support their learning. We're working on resources that are going to help us evaluate tools as we're thinking about what tools we we might want to provide to teachers or students to bring generative AI into their

[01:25:08] practice or into the division. We're working on some tools to evaluate those, some consistent ways to evaluate those tools. And then some upcoming work is developing professional learning resources, developing skill progressions so we know what students and different stakeholder groups need to learn about generative AI and how those skills might progress. And we're working on some lessons for students that teachers can take and use or schools can take and use to help build their understanding and awareness of generative and artificial intelligence.

[01:25:42] So the guiding principles we've developed as a team, you can see this is a high-level overview. We have in board docs there is the complete document with the artificial intelligence guiding principles that you're welcome to review. You can see that each of the guiding principles is connected to one of the strategic goals out of the strategic plan.

[01:26:04] So on this table here, you can see the strategic goal, holistic support, for example, sorry, the core value, holistic support, for example, and then the guiding principle around artificial intelligence that supports that core value.

[01:26:25] And with that, we will take any questions or engage in any conversation. thank you mr. Henderson I brought this up to mr. Slevin as a potential topic just because I receive a lot of feedback about technology use from parents and teachers too but I think post pandemic we sort of we got in this mindset of like wow there's all this digital when we had to go everything digital it doesn't mean that we necessarily have to stay all digital and there's some fine lines I think in terms of what's developmentally appropriate in terms of technology use and particularly with our youngest students you know there's a lot

[01:27:05] of parents get a lot of feedback from pediatricians and you know about the research about being on devices too much and you know now we're talking about extended periods of time where kids might be on devices and just one thing I want to talk about is how this is interrelated with some of the other topics that we've talked about like we have a lot of assessments and we've talked about assessment at length and I know we're going to continue that dialogue but when you as a teacher but say a first grade teacher who doesn't have a TA have to deliver one-on-one testing throughout which they're lengthy that a lot of times you might walk by and I'm not criticizing teachers for this

[01:27:44] at all I want to be clear but you'll see kids on devices for long periods of time just so that they can get that testing done and that's a requirement from LCPS or from the state and so I want to know if we have guidelines around what is appropriate technology use in terms of hours eyes on screens also in terms of literacy we have a lot of programs that read books to kids that's not independent reading time if you're having a story read to you now if you have an accommodation for an IEP or a 504th that's different I want to be

[01:28:17] clear about that seems crotty in the audience but I I have concerns around not just the nouns and the verbs but the why and I don't want to get to a place where we have to have teachers proving every reason why they do everything that is not what I'm asking but I want us to maybe have a conversation about what is the appropriateness level and what is the justification behind it and how do we toe that line so if you could speak to some of those guidelines I think that would be really helpful sure we don't publish specific guidelines for teachers as far as the number of minutes that students should or should not be engaging with

[01:28:54] screens during any given school day we provide teachers a lot of freedom to make the instructional choices about what is going to work best for their students in their classrooms and if you look at guidance from like the American Academy of Pediatrics for example they in in lieu of giving hard screen time guidance as far as number of minutes on a screen what they talk about is thinking about the the range of activities that students might engage with on on a device and the and and and sort of the cognitive load or the the the level of

[01:29:32] thinking required as in related to that so instead of giving specific numbers of what is appropriate in terms of number of minutes or number of hours they say it's important for parents to be thinking about balance and the types of activities that students are engaging in and what sort of cognitive level are they are they engaged at so not not all activities with technology are created equal as far as the amount of thinking required on the part of students and and the ways that students are engaging with the content and materials so so that's that's that's that's where we are at the moment and I do think it's important for us to think about as a school division how do we support

[01:30:09] teachers with making informed intentional choices about the technology they're using in the classroom and we are fortunate to have instructional facilitators for technology in every school and I think they play a role in that conversation as well and I'll see what other thoughts the rest of the team might have I appreciate mr. Anderson's thoughts on that but I also hear your feedback and much of what he shared could be communicated to teachers in the beginning of a some kind of guidance or thinking or philosophy around technology use and I think that's what you're getting at like how can we tease out

[01:30:46] what do we believe about the use of technology in our classrooms and I think that's what I'm also hearing questions from the community about and board members about so that's something we could definitely take under advisement and see see what additional guidance we can provide our teachers on this topic I'm wondering too if it would fit in the instructional framework in terms of the resources portion you know doing some thinking about best practices around technology I don't know if that's a perfect fit but I know that that's an umbrella that we're looking at so yes dr. Dean's just the question about when

[01:31:24] you talk about screen time earlier in a presentation somewhere we talked about light speed and the fact that in that classroom that was observed at a given point in time most of the students were on their own devices versus lcps devices how do you is there going to be any policy that relates to them being highly recommended to use lcps devices

[01:32:00] versus their personal devices uh so thank you for the question um right now lcps has about a 98 take rate on chromebooks so that means about two percent of students choose to use a device other than that so it really gets into what is the instructional what is the learning outcome that's intended for the device use we see a lot of things like Mac books in high schools that those students are using to do elevated things that they may it may be more of a struggle on their Chromebook to use those devices so we really don't want to limit them or box them into a 13 inch screen with a on a Chromebook in order to use those tools that they're using so

[01:32:39] that leaves about 2,000 students you know about 2% that do that choose to use something other than an LCPS device we also have pushback from parents who prefer their students to use those devices versus the ones that LCPS provides so right now I would say we're in a position of offering those devices but it is not a mandate that those students have to take that device it's not a mandate that they can't use another device if that supports their learning and a more effective learning outcome so that's kind of where we're at right now. Okay, and along the lines of what Ms. Chernoff was saying, what about the

[01:33:16] eye strain? Do the Chromebooks have some kind of, I don't know the word, some kind of light protection for the eyes of those young students? So I'll have to go back and look to see if there's something specific that we can call out to that. All of our devices meet certain federal and state and all the regulations that we have to abide by in order to procure those devices and deploy them to students.

[01:33:45] But I'll go back and ask our vendor if there's anything specific regarding that, if they have any guidance. Dr. Rasheed? Thank you so much for that presentation and for giving that information. My only concern was, obviously with any digital instructional-based material that we have to provide to our students from the teachers, it's the amount of training that they have to do in terms of learning before they provide any type of instructional base to the students.

[01:34:15] So, you know, again, it's the load that I'm concerned with. I think I mentioned this before to Ms. Howell. But it's a concern I have for the teachers because they already have enough load. So how often, if any, are there new instruction that they have to present in regards to, like you said, AI or anything that has to be, I guess you can say, virtually related or anything that has to deal with, you know, the Chromebooks.

[01:34:42] How often is that, I guess, new or how often do they have to teach something new to the students before, you know, how often do they have to teach themselves before they teach it to the students is what I meant. So I'll start. So first of all, that is a wonderful plug for the importance of school-based coaches and facilitators.

[01:35:02] So thank you for that, Dr. Rasheed. I know that was not intentional. But thinking about the role of AI, we know next year AI is going to continue to be something we need to support our teachers with. We also know we can't pull them out for full-day training. And so in our early conversations about the professional learning model for artificial intelligence, we're really going to be leaning into those instructional facilitators of technology to provide in the ongoing conversation and coaching cycles that they already have, support and training on what to do when it comes to introducing a new tool for artificial intelligence that they have access to that being said there are some times where a big change

[01:35:41] happens I think about the recently was schoology for example school is schoology was a sea change a number of years ago it feels like a long time but probably wasn't four years ago but like that was the focus that year and so I would equate artificial intelligence that but even with schoology we really use the school-based staff to help that rollout as opposed to pulling people out so I'm sure if that answers your question or if mike you would add any additional yeah so i i would just reiterate the the importance of the school-based instructional facility i'm sorry the the school based instructional facilitator for technology and the level of support that they're able to

[01:36:18] provide and that job embedded just in time i'm a teacher i've got an instructional need i need to fill i need somebody to be there with me to support me as i'm addressing that instructional need uh that that is is the best way to to help people bring new tools or new resources or new strategies into their into their classroom and so we rely heavily on on them and and a lot of times when we're thinking of the technology tools in some ways there's some there's some learning curve involved there but in other ways we're also perhaps making some things for teachers easier depending on the tool and how it's used so it could streamline for teachers it could potentially take

[01:36:56] some of that load off if we're being strategic about how we use some of these tools so there's there's it's it's a complicated issue with with lots of kind of faceted conversation but it's an interesting one I just was I'm just hoping that that's enough like that would be enough for the teachers that's all but the facilitators and it's some it's supporting themselves that's my main

[01:37:16] concern but thank you for that thank you dr. Deans we have resources that are available for parents who want to learn more about how to use the platform we have a website on that's available or resources available through our website online that that schools can direct parents to or parents can find on their

[01:37:53] own and I haven't looked at the up the uptake of those resources recently but the use has been fairly fairly strong for those resources and we don't get a lot of questions from from parents we don't get a lot of calls coming through our support center for example where parents are asking for support trying to figure out how to use the the tools inside of Schoology to support their students so I think we've got good resources in place but you know we're always open to suggestions for how we could improve that level of support and one other item just to add to that we do partner with schools so things like parent view we will go to after hours or coffee morning coffee events where they

[01:38:32] will invite parents in and we'll walk them through how to use some of these tools I think that's one of the reasons we have you know a very high usage rate of these platforms 99% of our students have at least one active parent in in parent view which is a huge number that other districts when we talk to them that's not even close to what they're looking at for for for those type of tool usage so i think leaning on those partnerships really being at the first few weeks of school we are in schools after hours providing pd sessions helping parents because that's a big part of it i hope you have grandparents too because i'm the i'm the person i'm the person for my 13 year old her mom never gets to get on

[01:39:15] thank you i want to close with one thing and i'm really not trying to like make a big thing when we're running over time but i have seen a trend where we set guidelines for certain things and then we realize rapidly that we need policy and i am really i want to be an advocate for beginning the development if my colleagues would agree of getting ahead of ai i think in terms of plagiarism and some of the the issues that are going on and reading through your guidelines i'm like this screams policy to me so that our teachers have backing through policy and accountability back

[01:39:51] to their students and vice versa. I think that that is a path that we should go down. I believe that with personal device use, we are way behind in terms of cell phone policy, and I'm glad we're doing it now, but I do not want to get in that situation. I want to be the voice for being proactive, for saying that AI is here, and it is going to be a bigger issue than I think we anticipate in our classrooms, starting at our lowest, youngest learners, who are a new generation.

[01:40:18] So I don't know if we need like a straw poll or just to give guidance, but I think that that work in this committee should begin in terms of developing based off of the guidelines that are being developed to, in conjunction with that, get a policy in place for AI. I agree.

[01:40:35] Can I speak for one second to that topic? So we are in this work group, and we've met in March, April, and May. in the first hour of those meetings where all of the amount of change that has happened, tools being released, so the market is so disruptive and so fast moving right now that that's one of the struggles about putting your arms around it.

[01:40:56] By the second you write a policy and it goes through three months or four months of board review and getting finally approved, the entire landscape has shifted of what those tools, what is available, what's in the market. So that's one of the challenges we've had is like really the rate of change is faster than anything we've ever seen before.

[01:41:12] And so I think that's where we're leaning into finding original work matters across the board not just tool specific so that's been the approach of the workgroup so far and that would be my approach and policy is to kind of find some defining lines of things that we foresee might be issues in terms of accountability discipline and using that maybe for instruction might be a regulation that would come later but I would like to begin the work so as you and I discuss agendas for the fall we could definitely bring this back I realize it was only a 10 minute portion of a larger presentation and we can take a deeper dive on the work that has happened so

[01:41:50] far for example the the citing the work and then we can start the discussion with what might be in a policy where we might go and we could start the process when we kick off the CNI meetings in August because I do think this is going to continue to grow and in interest is that that we would revisit in August in terms of what we would like to see in a policy and give some guidance towards starting the agenda setting with you as the chair and so yeah there'll be a lot of things we've got to tackle in the fall I know the list is getting long I

[01:42:27] would appreciate that and it seems that my colleagues agree so we will ask that that you know the ball get rolling on that I even wonder about even a level of training for the board in terms of some of the tools that are happening with AI like that's something I would talk to Dr. Smith about and chair Mansfield like there is a lot coming we're going to be working with our teachers and and i know the board likes to stay ahead of things like that as well yeah maybe we could ask chat gbt to help us draft it just kidding um that was just for fun all right we are going to their new business is not on the

[01:43:01] agenda today um so that's fine but i just want to make note that we will reconvene after the recess on august 7th correct yes oh yes go ahead we don't have new business on the agenda but you the straw poll I think we need to look at that grading policy yes so that needs to be on that August agenda also dr. Ellis would you like to speak to the timeline because it is coming soon yes so I did just want to let the committee know that we are gathering feedback from multiple stakeholders so we have

[01:43:40] gathered feedback from students through the student superintendents advisory committee through a thought exchange we started gathering feedback from teachers in the educator cabinet which as you might recall is a small group of educators dr. Spence and i meet with quarterly we then expanded that thought exchange to the teachers superintendent's advisory committee and then we expanded that feedback that those two thought exchanges to all middle and high school teachers so those thought exchanges are currently open to all middle and high school teachers We asked principals to push out the message with links to those thought exchanges a couple weeks ago.

[01:44:19] We noticed that participation was a little low, could be just the timing or whatever, so we pushed out them. Yeah, there is no time. They're grading. So we then pushed out a message through the community engagement office two days ago.

[01:44:35] Participation has increased, so we've received a lot of feedback. those two thought exchanges will remain open through June 11th to allow teachers time to respond over the next few days we are focusing on the 50 floor retakes and homework those are the three topics that we hear about the most and I think you all probably hear about the most as well so trying to narrow the focus of the feedback to those three topics while we are gathering feedback Neil and Jeff's team is working to clarify current policy and regulation to support teachers and administrators

[01:45:10] next year so while we can't make policy changes overnight we can provide clarification around practices and we plan to do that for next year as we begin the review process so the policy is up for regular review in 2025 which will mean we will begin the review process in the coming school year thank you so much all right so we'll see everyone again on august 7th at our new time we've heard you at 4 30 p.m and with that this meeting is adjourned thank you for your time

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Coraggio Consulting · aguyonx.com