Wausau East High School: Creating an Effective and Practical Response to Intervention Program

WHERE TO START?

Wausau East High School:Creating an Effective and Practical

Response to InterventionProgram

Wausau East High School

Wausau, WI; population: 39,106 Number of Students at East: 1050 Demographics:

2.5% American Indian 4% Hispanic 5%African American 18% Asian 71% White

International Baccalaureate School

The Beginning…

High performing students and system which met student needs

Evolving student population System not meeting changing needs Teachers struggling to meet needs of all

students Budget restraints Frustrations began to build Needed to do something…but what? Began exploring options

What We Had

East HS Common Intellectual Mission:21st Century College and Career Ready

Gather Analyze Synthesize Understand Create

Focus of year-long, staff training and collaboration

What We Had

Academic Enrichment Program Identified students at-risk of not graduating

and/or not being successful at East Involved 9th- 12th grade Small class size (8/teacher) Worked with students on homework Success in making connections with some

students Gut feeling’ identification- Struggle to find

‘right’ students

What We Had

Supportive building administration Research and Design Committee

Teachers, administrators, counselors- ‘problem solving’ committee

Caring staff Realization that things needed to

change

What We Needed

Stronger impact on ALL students Efficient use of existing data Effective System to identify at-risk

students earlier Time, money, resources…..

Began to research what was out there

Our Search

Other schools Staff Development Books Conferences Online Resources

Needed a plan to pull everything together…

Turning Point

Team from East attended workshop: WI RTI Framework: A Systems Approach to RTI Regular Education Teachers (English, Science,

Math, Social Studies), SPED, School Counselor & Psychologist, Assistant Principal

Met helpful DPI staff (Jill Koenitzer) Introduced to the Early Warning System Began to identify biggest struggles Began to develop a plan

Starting Out

LOTS of questions! Where do we begin? Could be identify what was/was not

working? Could we get people to change? Who was going to be involved? Where would we find the time? How could we use the information from the

conference effectively?

More questions than answers…

Developing Our Plan

Created East RTI Committee Involved in Early Warning System

(EWS) Academic Enrichment program changes Resource Center changes Stronger communication between all

parties Hard and honest look at data-

East RTI Committee

Participants: Kelly Rohr(English), Hope Cameron(Social Studies), Julia McMahon(Math), Darlene Beattie(Science), Lou Livingston(SPED), Manee Vongpakte(Counselor), Joe Svitak(AP), Chris Budnik(AP), Rich Ament(School Psych), Sara Boetcher(District RTI Coordinator)

Meeting Time: 2X/Month (Collab Time) Administrative Support: VITAL Staff Buy-In: Communication was crucial Early Warning System: Putting it in place

EWS

http://www.betterhighschools.org/EWS_imp.asp

Implementing the EWS

Worked with DPI Pulled data together- Focus on one grade- 9th Educate staff on EWS How do we use the data? 1st year discoveries

EWS: Year 1 Results

Year 1 Evaluation

Resource Centers- Use of commons, LMC RC assignments

Academic Enrichment- Use of Data- Coordinator- Staff Buy-In VITAL

Resource Center Changes

Full-time Math RC teacher Full-time English RC teacher Assigned students to RC

EWS students D/F students (Progress Report/Quarter grade) Teacher request- Intervention Forms

Stronger teacher involvement RC Binder

Communication

Academic Enrichment Changes

Developed Curriculum Guide Student, teacher and parent expectations Identified specific skills necessary for success Academic Seminar (2015/2016)?

Focus on 9th and 10th graders Use data to identify students Goal setting Self advocacy Communication Scheduling

Use of Data

EWS At-risk identification Quarterly results Semester results Results drive meetings

Lexile Testing School SLO All freshmen tested (Fall, Winter, Spring) Teacher use of scores

RtI Coordinator

Planned for .8 position (.2 AE) Scheduled in English RC AE connection Monitor EWS students Coordinate RCs Staff Development Schedule EWS students And…and…and…

Staff Buy-In

VITAL! Tier 1 Instruction and Support (Collab time)

Disciplinary Literacy Formative Assessments Academic Vocabulary Lexile Use Differentiation RC Expectations Student Motivation

Patience Results

Communication

Tier 1 Intervention Form Tier 2 Academic Intervention Plan RTI Background Form Tier 2 Teacher Response Form Articles Training Opportunities

Year 2 Reflections

Staff Buy-in Administrative Support System Change- TIME Data Retreat Literacy Coach Additional Training LOTS TO DO Next Steps…

Questions?

Contact Information

Kelly RohrChris Budnik

Wausau East High SchoolWausau, WI 54403

krohr@wausauschools.orgcbudnik@wausauschools.org

(715)261-0652