23-7-18 Work Session

001Cheryl all right everyone welcome to our work session this is our one and only for July and welcome Dr Bridges hope your first couple weeks are going smoothly I've had a chance to meet with everybody except you know I'll be here tomorrow so it's been good they are a great team and course Rod welcome officially I'm happy to be here full time so we have one item on our agenda um this evening afternoon and that is our Dei assessment findings and that is through the office of equity affairs with Dr Chavis as well as some we've got uh Teresa Caswell and Sarah Stevens from his office and then Megan Doyle from RTL y'all come up we're all ready foreign can't always hear us very clearly Dr Chavis thank you good afternoon if you're excited to

002be in front of you all today and excited to talk about the Dei assessment that was conducted within the last eight to nine months of this school year of this I guess starting in the 22 school year and going into this school year as well um we were here we came to you back in April of 2023 at a student committee meeting where we talked about the diversity equity and inclusion we will use Dei for Shores assessments and at that time uh Dr Doyle from RTI gave us some context around the assessment and what we were what we endeavored to do with the assessment some of you were a part of the kickoff meeting that occurred back in December to help set vision for our di diversity Equity inclusion assessment itself alongside other essential Partners

003in our organization So today we're excited to bring back findings from that assessment for you to hear that in Greater detail thank you thank you and for us to give you thinking about today being like the the start of a series of presentations our desired outcomes today is for us to show you alignment with the assessment and its findings to the Strategic plan and how we are working to operationalize policy 1150 that is our Equity policy you'll get a chance to hear again those findings to include the strengths of the findings and areas for opportunity and then last but not least you'll get a chance in smaller groups to discuss the findings and to go a little bit more in detail and have some conversations again in smaller groups led by facilitators I am joined

004by Dr Megan Doyle of RTI who you will hear from primarily today again from our findings of the assessment and again this work was in partnership with the Strategic plan RTI has been the organization that we have partnered with for both strategic planning and for the equity policy and the equity work you'll also hear from my office Teresa Caswell who will help facilitate small group conversations who's the senior director in our office and Sarah Davis who is a senior administrator here in the office of the area of superintendents and who's interning with us so without further Ado I'm going to go ahead and pass it to Dr Doyle as we start to think about and unveil the findings of the Dei assessment and then talking about how that's in Partnership and in concert with our

005Strat plan and policy good afternoon chairman Vice chair members of the board superintendent appreciate being here and as I said last time very humbled to be in front of you and to support the great work that you all are doing to support students in Wake County Public Schools um a great deal of the work with the Dei assessment was really making sure that we used the equity policy to organize the assessment of the district for your point of view as you all were going through the Strategic plan and kind of assessing the district from that holistic position we were using this policy to kind of do that assessment as well and it was a great centering document and provides direction for the district in terms of both the outcomes that you all expect in this

006policy it indicates that you will make Equity a key feature of the Strategic plan which you have done and so what you will find and hopefully you've seen if you've reviewed these materials is that a great deal of what was found is not new to you because it's also what came out of the Strategic plan there are some opportunities however for continued work but this should align because you created a strategic plan that centers Equity that makes Equity a key feature with the Strategic plan goals and the strategies so uh this is a slide that we have presented each time we've had a great deal of interaction with your staff to include not just the focus groups that were conducted and just a reminder we conducted 19 different focus groups with students and their families

007and then we conducted six focused staff information that we learned from those focus groups and the Strategic plan has been front facing as we've gone through this work one thing that's been a little bit complicating in this in a good way has been that as you all were working towards the final adoption of a strategic plan as particularly at the end when the aims were added that also added some additional work on our part to make sure that we're truly aligned this work does not benefit you all if it's not aligned with your strategic plan and definitely with the policy and so you can your goals all of this is information that you've seen before again just mentioning that the aims around each of the four priority areas and the pillars has been something that's

008been important to us to make sure there's a real clear connection to and that there is the work of the DBI assessment complements the Strategic plan and makes the data and the next steps the actions that staff will take much stronger as we've said the Strategic plan has been centered as well as the equity policy and as we've looked using the equity policy as a lens and use the Strategic plan and the pillars and aims and the goals that are sought by that we've could come up with themes from the Dei assessment the way we've organized going through that assessment with Wake County Public Schools being the largest District in North Carolina and being the 15th or 16th depending on who's counting District in the country has been a very large task with the number

009of staff and the number of students although we would like to talk with every single person in the district and every person that benefits from your work and Leadership that's not possible in the time frame and the goal was to make sure that we can start moving to action and so that's what we've really tried to make sure our timeline matched we've looked at these um kind of components of the system thinking about leadership and Leadership from the point of view of the governance of the district the superintendent and board leadership as well as the superintendent's cabinet and then school-based leadership which also is a critical alignment structure to achieving the district strategic plan goals thinking about that strategy specifically around the Strategic plan and school Improvement plans looking at a Workforce of course the

010key beneficiaries of our work students families and partners really focusing there on students and families and then thinking about what operational processes really are critical and have the highest leverage in changing student outcomes as we mentioned the last time and I apologize for the way that those have moved when this was changed I guess to a PDF but we've conducted this engagement of focus groups and interviews from the beginning of February until the very end of April and very quickly we had to transition to creating and starting to work to create a framework so that for the 2023 and 24 school year the district had a framework to begin working and taking action to improve um we talked with approximately and these are on the low end 129 students 113 family members and engaged virtually

011with teachers student support services staff assistant principals principals and classified staff um and also interviewed 12 different individuals in leadership again those selections were made not to make sure that we covered everyone because again that wasn't possible but to really hit on those themes that kind of emerged from families and students so with regard to strategy obviously the strength is that the board of education has adopted a policy and there is actions directed by that policy as well as a strategic plan where Equity is a key feature and that strategic plan was adopted I believe at your main meeting and so that serves as an orienting document to the district's work opportunities for improvement are organizing for Equity as the board thinks about this brand new strategic plan particularly after the pandemic and all of

012the impacts that that's had on the system on teaching and learning and on the Staffing of Wake County Public Schools and really every District There's an opportunity now to think about how are we organized and are we organized to achieve the goals of the Strategic plan you have three priority areas each of those has an excellence and Equity goal and measures that go along with that are how are we organized and how are we organized to meet those goals in the most effective and efficient manner um and then how do we allocate resources our resources allocated based on everyone gets one or based on where the needs are prioritizing where resources are going school and Department accountability and responsibility for Equitable outcomes this really is about are there straight lines from what's happening in classrooms

013all the way up to the board strategic plan as the board has just adopted a brand new strategic plan how will school Improvement plans be adapted to align to those to that strategic plan and then how will Department plans be aligned to that strategic plan and as you all adopted in the aims portion of the Strategic plan some of those things begin to be outlined as things that you're aspiring for the district to achieve through Meeting those goals so systematic are we regularly reviewing our Improvement and the data to inform continued Improvement and systemic is everyone taking consistent action to develop Implement and monitor those strategies that are going to result in the highest performance for all students and every student group reducing disparities as as much as possible in leadership the strengths are a

014board and superintendent that are committed to equity and this is not just the current board although that is definitely noted but this is a historic commitment in this system to achieving outcomes that are the very highest for your students are you there yet no in fact your Equity policy acknowledges that respectfully you have an office of equity Affairs which is not just ensuring that Equity is a focus of the district but it's also ensuring that the protections that are required legally for Title IX title six are being delivered to students and staff to so that they can be safe and achieve their Highest Potential um and it would be remiss not to acknowledge that the talent in Wake County Public Schools is probably unequal um and I'm saying that as a previous leader of a

015district myself knowing that there's a great deal of talent here and then there's an opportunity to really leverage that talent to achieve the best outcomes and there's a collective will there's not one person that we talked with that doesn't want to achieve the outcomes that the board has set in the Strategic plan the opportunities for improvement really do acknowledge that Wake County is a very large district and how do we achieve alignment while also respecting that there has to be autonomy in each of the different regions in Wake County Public Schools there is a unique community and a unique population of students and families that are served and principals have to be free to ensure that they can take action to solve problems and make sure that the students in their building are taken care

016of and are achieving their Highest Potential but that looks different from school to school from Level Elementary to Middle to high school and from area to area and Wake County Public Schools so autonomy is critical to success but there has got to be alignment again back to those strategic plan goals and what we measure and the data we're collecting to use for continuous Improvement and again the way and that's what this work is really designed to focus on how do these themes from this Dei assessment can form the creation of actions that the district will take collectively to improve outcomes for students you'll see at the bottom of each of these slides that there's a connection to specifically the Strategic plan section that um is related to each of these areas students families and partners

017strengths that were really themes that came out were a lot of the family engagement practices that are facilitated by the office of equity Affairs are practices that parents families called out the opportunity to be engaged and to have a say at the school level but also at the district level are critical you all saw that in the passage of the equity policy but you also see it in many other processes and in presentations that are brought to the board but the community is brought to bear but the some of the work that's being done by the office of equity Affairs has been called out also the center for international enrollment is a strength in this District as a district with a wide diversity of first generation Citizens first generation to the United States students and

018their families the center for international enrollment is a real Touchstone for your students and their families to navigate the system and the system being Lake County Public Schools but also the system being what is public education in the United States and how is it different from where I am coming from and then student Equity teams although they are not at every school they're definitely something that as we interviewed students we can see a real difference from their engagement in all of the work that's going on on their campuses but also it was identified as something from staff that was a powerful opportunity for us to listen to The Very people that we're trying to work on this system and improve it to serve opportunities for improvement are around Equitable student and Family Partnership so really

019what is partnership with families mean I think I shared this the last time but um one of the things that we heard from parents was particularly when there's a language manager there are things that students are learning that are Way Beyond where their parents are and their and their learning which could be just language based but it could also be the subject area how do we really partner with families so that they can be equally supportive of our work at schools when they're at home obviously this was emerged as a critical theme during the pandemic when students were sitting alongside their family members to be able to access education how is their systematic and representative student voice we heard in one of the opportunities that we provided for feedback on this information one of your

020staff members mentioning the facilities process how do we design schools that are really responding to the differing needs that students have as Learners today but also match what's happening in the world of work that they're moving towards and so how do we engage students in that process in an appropriate way but so that we are creating efficient and effective facilities that are fostering and facilitating the learning needs of students and again kind of coming back to that system systemic support in some places across the district the families are very very consistent about how well engaged they felt how consistent translation services were provided and their ability to help make decisions around their students education and all the supports that are needed to make them be successful but in other places it seems somewhat inconsistent and

021so that was an opportunity to figure out how can we be more systemic in providing those services but also when the languages are not some of the more predominantly second language in Wake County how are we serving those students and those are these are problems that are broad-based problems that don't have a specific answer in a specific place it's really the work of this system and your staff and Leadership that's going to help to really figure those questions the answers to those questions out Workforce it's interesting because we list as a strength the district size but we got some feedback that we're not always sure that the district size is a benefit and in Workforce it really is you all are the largest I'm not telling you anything you don't know system in the state

022of North Carolina you have access to every employee in the state because Wake County being the largest employer and probably one of the largest employers in this County there are people that left my district in the past to come to Wake County and I'm sure may have left your previous districts to come to Wake County so with that size and with that recruiting potential you also have an opportunity to really think about the profile of an educator that you want and recruit on that profile to achieve those highest outcomes so your strength is your size is a strength how are you leveraging that size to really benefit not just Wake County Public Schools but also be an example for how it can be done in other places and the Personnel Resources that are here are

023really um second to to none and it shows in the overall results of the system um of course you all know and the data also demonstrates that they there's still gaps that remain but your Personnel Resources the ability to provide social workers in each School the ability to provide Counseling Services psychologists services and many other things the center for International Education and enrollment excuse me those are services that really set you apart and really help your students and their families to navigate this system at a higher level and so it removes barriers that would otherwise really inhibit students ability to be successful opportunities for improvement in the area of Workforce are coaching for equity and excellence and although Workforce kind of talks makes you reference human resources it also does talk about how we train

024our teachers and staff to be effective in their work there are there you have a plethora of coaches in Wake County Public Schools and each of them is providing a very very important function the question is are they all though kind of operating off of a the same kind of broad sheet of music when it comes to are we all working towards providing strategies to make sure that students are going to be proficient and accomplished and graduate and have access to all of the options that we would want them to have access to when they graduate so is there consistency around how we are talking about how to make those improvements for all students all schools in all areas of the district and then Workforce excellence and Equity again this is an area of focus

025for your strategic plan and absolutely matches the work that you are doing there um how are you beginning to think about matching your Workforce more to the citizens that are residing in Wake County Public Schools who also send their children to this district and so when we think about you know our Democratic structures it we'd have a school system that's a public school system and it's composed of the students and the families that live in this County how can we more represent them in our total Workforce in leadership there are there are many examples for that diversity but as you get closer to the classroom and in front of students that diversity is less and less evident to students and again there's a great deal of research that supports the matching of student racial and

026ethnic group two two teachers not for every teacher and not for every subject but that a assist students in really seeing their full potential in themselves it's really about what they see in themselves as they navigate our school system and then operations again not telling you all anything that you don't know about your school system your magnet program is a significant strength it is recognized nationally it's also something that your staff is mentioning on a regular basis as something that's important to them your students are mentioning it as something that's important to them the very first school that we went to was a magnet school and those students were so proud of not just the programs they had access to but the teachers who were teaching them um that magnet program is the one way

027that Wake County Public Schools is continuing to try to achieve balance in enrollment in the system and the more this District grows the more Transportation becomes a barrier the more of that is um not as successful in helping to create that balance but it's definitely something that recruits people and not just individual students and their families but whole companies to this District um and then there's an operational commitment to equity and when I say operational I mean every person that we talk to is committed to this work and when we say equity here but really everywhere it's about making sure that every student and every student group has that same very high achievement that should be indicative of Wake County Public Schools but everyone is trying to make sure that what they're measuring and what

028they're monitoring is helping to achieve that end the opportunities for improvement we heard a great deal from students and their families about how extracurricular access in particular this that was the largest area is a barrier if there's not access to transportation and in some regards it's not just Transportation it's also the outside obligations that many students who are socioeconomically disadvantaged have to their families or to work and so in addition to the fact that they may not have transportation to get home after an extracurricular event or to participate in a club or athletic team they also may have to work which precludes them from participating in those activities which we again know help to keep students connected to school um culturally responsive instruction and behavioral support were listed also as strengths and I want to

029elevate that often we heard that the exceptional Children's Program was a strength in this District often we heard that the curriculum that was being used particularly at the elementary level was a strength and everyone has I mean again from my experience everyone doesn't think that every curriculum program is perfect there's no one is saying that but definitely that the access to resources that match and Elevate all of the students in a classroom was definitely something that was called out by staff and by students um and how are we really making sure that we are being culturally responsive and how we communicate behavioral expectations but also how we administer consequences when there are infractions obviously um again those challenges remain um the integration of equity across departments um the board has passed an equity policy which

030makes Equity the responsibility of every single staff member in the district and again when we say that are we making sure that the achievement of every child in my classroom if I'm a teacher for you or the service that I provide to every student on my bus is the very highest how are we making sure that happens for every single person and how do we make sure that the office of equity Affairs is not the only person who owns this responsibility and that's really hard it's really really hard but it really does start with the work that you all have already done in creating a strategic plan where those goals are front and center and public facing and then figuring out because when we start disaggregating data there becomes lots of it and you all

031are data Rich absolutely there's a great deal of data in Wake County Public Schools but what are the key metrics that we can look at in short Cycles to improve learning before students take a high stakes test and so that they know as students that they are growing and developing throughout the school year so their parents know and understand what they're understanding and what they need to do better what they need to learn better what we as teachers need to change and how we're approaching our instruction so that students can improve their level of knowledge and proficiency so again what are those key measures and does everyone have access to them in a systematic way across the district so that they are all thinking about what learning looks like in some consistent ways at each

032grade level for each subject which again is really hard stuff this is work that is going to be continuous in this system and any system and then results again these results mirror everything that you saw and heard in the work that you did with the Strategic plan you know that school and student performance is among the leaders and largest districts in the state which is saying something because when you take the large District that Wake County Public Schools is and go to the next District we're talking about almost a difference of a hundred thousand students that's a huge difference when you think about the fact that wake is at the top of that group 115 school districts in the state of North Carolina and then across the country um and and reviewing some of the

033the press and the the perceptions of this system from outside um there's a real feeling of the potential of Wake County Public Schools but also the leadership of the school system a gambo as the policy references there are opportunities for improvement in school achievement there's a real difference in how schools are achieving based on attendance area which you can also get down to the demographics of those areas and the access to housing which again was an issue that was called out by multiple staff that you know the access to affordable housing in each area is not the same and so that is going to change the patterns of where people move and where their children end up going to school um achievement in specific areas is an opportunity to improve for black students for Hispanic

034students for students with disabilities for students who are um first generation to this country multilingual students students who are Foster or homeless students are all students who are not performing at the even at the average of Wake County Public Schools and definitely have opportunities to reduce that Gap and then results in out of school suspension as well those results mirror what we've said with attendance I mean with achieving with achievement with significant differences in out of school suspension around students of color and definitely students who have disabilities and that's an area that the district continues to work from that data we came up with eight themes ideally we'd love to say there's one thing that you can do and it's going to fix everything and the fact of the matter is in any place that's

035not the case we want I think inherently to keep things simple but quite frankly um this is a complex system and our work the work that we do as public Educators is through and by people with the outcomes being in people's current and long-term potential and lies and there's not one person in this District that doesn't take that seriously and so we tried to make sure that we prioritize those things that as we consider translating these themes into a framework for actions that staff at these classroom level at the staff level bus drivers clerical staff and leaders at the school and District can take these are the themes that kind of emerge so we talked about organizational structure at the beginning how can departments and District processes be organized and in some regards integrated to

036ensure that one Department who's working on a central process that touches several different areas that that communication is happening but also that those reporting structures make that communication easier to have that's tough again in a district this size but as we think about um and I'm just going to use examples here but as we think about right now where magnet programming is organized how does where magnet program is supervised by how does it help to achieve the district's goals and how does it um maybe create some barriers how is the connection between academic services and academics and the magnet program how are they working together in concert and again these are all opportunities to think about as the district leadership is transitioning but also as the board has adopted a new strategic plan school and

037departmental accountability and responsibility you all call this out in the aims of the Strategic plan but we would take it a little further and say it goes all the way to the school Improvement plan School Improvement Team level how are our school Improvement plans organized and aligned to ensure that they're matching at the school level the goals of the Strategic plan at the district level to move the district forward individual schools have to move how are we coaching for Equitable outcomes we talked about that aligning coaching support so we have mtss coaches we have behavioral coaches we have academic coaches we have leadership coaches but what central um themes and behaviors should all of those coaches be helping teachers and staff develop to achieve these Equitable outcomes around for example of the analysis of data

038in their respective areas of responsibility in how what strategies they use to achieve better outcomes for students in continuous Improvement professional learning communities it really touches every process um Workforce excellence and Equity how can we achieve a Workforce that's representative of the Wake County Community specifically our student population and oriented to achieving the district's strategic plan goals what is the profile of Hawaii County Public Schools educator staff member or employee that's aligned with the vision mission and goals that the board of education has established and then making sure that the workforce is fully staffed to support the needs of all students and student groups and this is obviously an issue you know as Transportation has be been a challenge in making sure that bus drivers are sitting in front of students but also making sure

039that's the best school leaders are at the school that's going to have them leverage their unique strengths for that unique community and folks these things again are working through and for people and it's it's not a perfect science academic and extracurricular access how are we removing barriers and honors and advanced coursework that's something that we didn't touch on as much but that's definitely a barrier we have students tell us that they are the only person of color in their math classroom and that that is a very lonely place to be and and just in terms of feeling like they belong in that classroom and their capacity and confidence in doing well in that classroom can be impacted by not having those connections um to their fellow students which obviously we know we're going to develop

040with in great classrooms and there's that's going to happen in every week classroom across the district but some kids are going to need more and quite frankly those honors and advanced courses don't represent the diversity of our student population whether it's at the school levels diversity or it's the district's diversity um and then extracurricular and co-curricular activities how can we make sure that we are engaging our multilingual students at the same high level and are socioeconomically disadvantaged students at the same high level and this one you know this really this access issue crossed every group that there are students in every group and generally impacted by social economic status who are not able to participate in the full and Rich experience of Wake County Public Schools just because they just don't have that access some

041of it is you know not in our control but some of it is are things that we can try to remediate or at least bring down some of those barriers for access student and Family Partnership systemically and systematically making sure that students and families have the opportunity to inform policy and process respecting the autonomy so aligned autonomy that facilitates efficiency and Effectiveness in a district this size but also aligns key District processes to achieve the goals of the Strategic plan and then providing systemic so across the district culturally responsive instruction and Behavior Support that's informed by respecting the unique staff and student diversity um and make sure that the materials that students see and the information that they receive allows them to see their full potential in the classroom in their curriculum and in their

042future so with that I will just once again come back to this graphic which really um connects to the two documents that really helped us to get to these themes and then turn it over to think Dr Chavis I want I wasn't so one more thing I apologize um really just want to make sure that we keep hitting home this connection between the the Dei assessment themes which is what we just presented to you here oh and this does not go backwards this does though these themes with what will become the equity focused practices that's the pillar that you all have in the Strategic plan which will Encompass a full framework and its connection to those equity and Excellence goals and priorities that the board has in its strategic plan in developing the highest possible

043student Knowledge and Skills so that students can be successful regardless of their path after leaving the Wake County Public School System to minding and cultivating the behavioral health of students as they move through our system so they can be their best selves when they're sitting in front of their teacher and receiving that high quality instruction and then effective operations services and Facilities that match the expectations of the citizens of Wake County Public Schools in terms of using their tax dollars at the highest possible level but also making sure that they are getting the results that they are putting those funds in which is the highest student performance that they can achieve with every dollar that's spent so um we also made sure that we made the connection to the aims that have already been created

044by the Strategic plan um the work of staff to create these aims really does demonstrate the collective will of the system to achieving the outcomes of the equity policy but also to the Strategic plan because in every aim you see a connection to the equity policy and so in each priority area you see these are the equity focused practices that are specific to that pillar aim for which is eliminating over representation and under representation aimed 10 over representation when it comes to student discipline referrals suspensions and absences as well aim 13 creating that Equity framework which is what we're here to talk about and then aim 14 thinking about how we allocate resources human financial and material to provide Pre-K 12 students with Equitable access to high quality teachers and principals and sufficient Support Services

045again this is part of the document that you all have already adopted as we start thinking about how each priority then has a pillar that's connected to it you can also see that Equity is embedded in each of the other pillars as well so again there's a great deal of alignment that was already present in what we did with the Dei assessment and what was being done in a parallel way the board and the leadership team on creating a strategic plan because these themes continue to emerge culturally responsive and inclusive curriculum resources instructional practices using performance data making sure that professional learning is provided to all staff and that they're comprehensive hopefully allowing them to be the most successful educators Empowering Families to partner in children's learning and honoring their perspectives and unique needs for

046priority two seeing the alignment there and I won't read all these to you but you can see the areas that are involved really do align directly to what we found in the Dei assessment with student dispositions and well-being and then effective and efficient operation services and Facilities again seeing those aims that really match the themes that we saw emerging from the Dei assessment so now I will turn it over to Dr Chavis and we will engage you a little bit further in some deeper discussion about these things thank you Dr Doyle all that context as to the EI assessment and the findings so at this point um I want to I want to think I want you all to think about the work to this point as a triangulated approach right we have the Strategic

047plan that was approved um the last year in the end of last year October I believe and then we had the approval of policy 1150 the equity policy and now we have our Dei findings right so thinking about how all of those areas and Arenas intersect with each other and I want to bring your attention back to policy 1150 as we talk about the notion of equity being both a noun and a verb both actions and outcomes and we see listed on this particular slide as we think about the outcomes of equity and Equity Equity being achieved thinking about the Excellence component how we eliminate the barriers the opportunities and the pursuit of equity and Excellence across all groups but particularly those that we know we have predictive associations based on their identities and their

048backgrounds and anything about Equity as in action is this notion now of moving doors and from the Dei assessment and the findings that we discussed today to an equity focused practice or practices if you will has embedded into the Strategic plan so as we work through this and we think about the findings today there's an opportunity for us to come back to you all to start to think about like our Equity focused practices and that essential pillar of our plan but I want to again highlight aim 13 that specifically calls out implementing an equity framework and what that will be to serve in service and in connection and Partnership of all the DI findings presented today so there is an advanced word and continued work that lives in this Arena so I want you to

049see this uh slide one more time you're going to get a chance in just a moment we're going to place you into different groups small groups for you to take a look at the descriptions that you see on this slide um also the document that was shared with you previously of each of the DI bindings to include context notes notes field and research have additional copies for you today for you to think about those components you won't get a chance to think and consider all eight themes a day but you will get two to three components and themes to unpack in smaller groups facilitated by other members of the office of equity affairs so we have already assigned you groups our first group organizational structure you'll be looking at organization organizational structure school and Department

050accountability and responsibility and autonomy so that's Miss Caulfield Miss Johnson hostler and Dr Ing and that will be led by Dr Doyle and you will stay and remain at this table the second group Workforce excellence and Equity coaching for Equitable outcomes Edmonds Mr hegarty and Mr Swanson you will be to my left hand side over here that will be facilitated by Dr Caswell and then finally our last group Mr Hershey Miss Mahaffey and Miss Waters you will be looking at those three Arenas or areas culturally responsive instruction and behavior academic and extracurricular access and student Family Partnership and you will be to my right hand side over here in this area and that will be facilitated by Stevens what you'll do once you're in your group you'll take a few minutes to just review those

051components again again to research the context and the notes from the field we'll give you a few minutes so you go ahead and review those again and then we'll just engage in some conversations about what are the things that you notice about those respective Dei findings and what are some things that you wonder what are some things that Wonder before we get started Dr Chavis so I know that some board members may have some questions so before we get into this open the question for you or maybe perhaps Dr Doyle absolutely yes was there anyone who had questions at this time Miss Waters oh I just would like to thank you for the work this critical to the success of our students in the district I have some questions about slide number eight um about

052the partner engagement and the focus groups in the individual interviews there we go go there this one yes I was just kind of wondering about the numbers that I think about 129 students and 113 families and just wondering statistically as with the district as large as ours do you feel like that was a significant number of participants to be able to build out a plan like that considering the size of the district statistically what do you typically look for in terms of the sample size that you can really face the information that you receive and feel confident that is reflective of the thank you for the question I think the there's a quantitative set of data that we reviewed as well that represents the full component of Wake County Public School students the goal of

053interacting with focus groups from the student and family groups really was to make sure that we added lived experience to the data we were reviewing in but quantitative as well as the documents and the processes so the approach we took based on the parameters that we received to gauge in this work really was to divide the district up by its natural areas and so in each of those areas we selected a high school to engage with students in focus group and a Elementary or middle school to engage with families and so although we did not talk to every single you know student or family member in Wayne County Public Schools we did make sure that there was representation from each area as we tried to add that context to the quantitative data that we reviewed

054as well and then there's certainly no based on 129 that you did talk to every every student but I'm just wondering what what did that makeup consist of in terms of the demographic the demographics it just seems to me like such a very small number and I know this is complex work but I think this is so important to get it right and to be able to build out a plan that is going to help um really break down some of the systemic barriers that generations of students have had and I just feel um like I need more understanding of these numbers so um this information was presented also with the previous presentation that we made in terms of how we decided the diversity of each of the groups that were invited for student focus

055groups and for families and it was based on the demographics of each School making sure that we ensured that underrepresented groups in terms of student performance or even disciplinary outcomes were elevated in those groups so every group that has a label for a lack of better words in the student information management system was identified based on race ethnicity gender also there are some groups for which the policy covers that are not identified in your student information management system but we asked principals or they're protected and so when we didn't want to identify them if they didn't want to be a part of the group but we asked principals to try to identify students who would be willing to also represent students with disabilities who represented students of different gender identity or or sexual orientation to

056be a part of those groups as well and so principals helped us to identify those students based on the racial ethnic gender breakdown of their demographics of their schools and that's what composed each group and so we ended up having very diverse groups in each of the school settings for both students and Families I have a follow-up similarly well two questions actually one is what was and you probably did tell us this last time what was what was the member in the quantitative data set like what was the original data set number in terms of the student achievement data so all of the all of the quantitative data that you look at so in terms of the quantitative data we reviewed student performance in state accountability measures and tests right so take a picture or

057we looked at the full data okay for I mean the full 2021-2022 data set we looked at all of that data and then my follow-up question is the the examples you gave which are no surprise to both of us at this table especially around students of color the example you gave was the only math student only student of color in their math class were those examples from this 129 students yes and it closed which and you can say I don't know this my of course outside this is someone who had that experience with B it would be reflective in our quantitative data and since you looked at all those data sets would you say that's roughly true or was this or would you oh absolutely and your your staff have already created a report that

058documents that that disparity exists and that's the data we use so we use existing reports to inform this work as well and so you did a report recently and I can't call the exact date please forgive me I wouldn't either were you assessed were you assessed um the um enrollment of students in honors and advanced courses and that was a component of that report questions um yes I'm still kind of formulating though um thank you for the presentation while I appreciate language um the opportunities for improvement How uh I'm trying to think how to say this how do we express that in a way that it is clear that things have to change because I read opportunities of improvement as kind of like sugar coating whereas we have some real deficiencies it must change and

059so I think that goes with the aligned autonomy part it really is coming upon upon your leadership and your staff you all appoint a superintendent and they organize the district and hold folks accountable on their leadership team all the way down from their leadership team to the through the chain of command to schools and so that's where this alignment of the goals that are expected to be achieved through school Improvement through the evaluation process that accountability comes from that that space and so you all really have taken a step and I I acknowledge and recognize that this is work that's been going on for a long long time but ultimately that work through people by people in this system has got to come from the accountability of those structures and processes that are in place

060both what you've created in your policy as well as the current evaluation system and the expectations around processes School Improvement plans and the measures that you're holding folks accountable for um and so once again appreciate all the work and I know the word operationalize was used and that is sort of the goal how have you been able to kind of Step Back From operationalize to normalize to see how this information is being received because we are looking at this document but for me it doesn't really talk about some of the very strong opposition that we hear about regularly to the work around Equity so can you speak to sort of the normalizing phase where people are getting comfortable having these kind of difficult discussions and what that looks like and really kind of owning the

061fact that there are a lot of people who don't feel like this work is needed and that's something that's been called out by the I think in some of the interviews and the focus groups that there is an understanding that there's opposition to this work and and so that is another area where again not to simplify but the equity policy it's kind of the rationale for why you needed to have an equity policy is that we have a expectation from the very top of our organization that we're going to achieve these outcomes that you have now put into place in a strategic plan um and I'll turn it over to Dr Chavis to speak further about what that operationalizing needs yeah so I think in your question as well there are several things that I'd

062like to lift up is um Equity policy 1150 has 10 reflective questions in it typically our policies don't have that that's asking teachers individuals in the organization to think about their beliefs their backgrounds perspectives both at an individual level and at a systems level so those questions or designed to really get to where are there areas for improvement support next steps um alignment to the work that exists and so it is my understanding that multiple people across our organization to include the SLT superintendent's leadership team we were looking at those questions every time we're around at a table making decision that's the expectation moving forward with Educators across our district I think it's also important to live without that and you'll see later in the presentation that this work has been done in partnership in

063the collaboration with the steering committee made up of different Educators across our organization that include the superintendent's leadership team to include those that are in the classroom setting to include students so it was really important that we lifted the voices of all of these essential Partners as when we talk about the DI findings and then we go into the equity focused practices that this wasn't done just by RTI and the folks that you see listening there's even additional folks that were involved in this process and it's a very comprehensive and it was a robust process that we went through in order to I think the last thing that I'll offer you is that as we look into the 23-24 school year and our emphasis and focus is on equity and Excellence how our team and

064oea is supporting other departments and divisions and schools into what we will have and develop as a framework how that would be pivotal in our work and is spread it throughout different parts of our organization to include the what professional learning principles and others are are getting this year how that is integrated on a regular basis how we'll reflect from that and how we're going to set the stage as early as the summer Leadership Conference is going to happen so I think we have some processes some protocols some some theoretical underpinnings if you will research and all other things to provide to our staff at large to help normalize this work right to move from this word and I think that's the important part of the equity policy they lose our work from Invitational to

065expect it we hadn't had that before and so now it's our responsibility as we operationalize this word and we provide our partners with us with the resources that they need in order to do this work and we know that this work is going to take some time so we have a planned rollout that will guide us through what is step one what are the things that we need to consider as far as Equity focused challenges are in front of us and we may not be considering because we have some our own perspectives and biases that may prevent us from seeing what those challenges are so we I do believe that that were that comprehensive word at all levels of the organization helps us to normalize a word instead of just kind of having it serve

066as what could be or would or has been Invitational thank you Dr Chavis for letting us interrupt for a moment I think we're I don't think we got to the meat of what we're going to be doing on slide 25 or notice and wonder protocol so we know our groups okay um so if you are in group one um with organizational structure you'll stay at this table and Dr Doyle will facilitate group two Workforce Excellence I believe that is Dr Caswell you'll be over here and then the final group will be over here so we'll get our instructions once we're in the group yeah so my question was kind of cool is [Music] that I don't know that's what we said we were like yeah thank you so much thank you I've been sitting all

067day do you know what to stand up moving to your brain because I know that it's pulling somewhere else she puts me away who are going to receive special education services that was the discussion at our group and it could have been expanded to many different processes in the district um the lack of a solution around busing and how the reflection that there's a noticing about where the policy is with regard to student assignment and how busing kind of intersects with whether it's that bussing process is effective at truly achieving Equitable outcomes that was a notice um another notice was um why is the need so much bigger now in terms of special education in terms of the significant challenges that special needs students are bringing to schools and how to help support those students

068at a high level wonderings how does and this we didn't necessarily say this so board members please correct me if this is wrong but what I translated it to was how does old policy impact present practice in terms of multiple policies and then what what is our model for magnets in terms of the instructional program but also maybe the process to identify magnets just being clear about where we are today um another wondering is um how do we gain more of the expertise from the bottom of our organization to the top as opposed to top down and then why I'm wondering this is probably a universal why why do we have over representation for specific groups in exceptional children for example or in specific disciplinary consequences suspension expulsion or under representation in certain other areas

069board members anything else that I missed you want to add we keep talking so good job all right thank you group one and Dr Doyle group two Workforce and coaching I think that Dr Caswell LED that group yeah so for um for course excellent centered around you know confirming the need for retention recruitment systems overall similar to the state task force which reinforces you know the um the kind of portable thinking of this prioritize down there the Wonders are around what tools and resources are available to us to support representative detention and a specific wonder about the uh the last study noted in the research section about teacher prep programs and the makeup that the candidates as modern core diverse as we know the post-secondary post-secondary veterinary responses um for our students um historical and

070communities and then for coaching for Equitable outcomes notice that there is not a specific cooking structure noted that there is not a specific coaching structure realizing our accountant yet and that it's not mentioned as a strength and that's mainly due to perception of either not knowing that there is coaching available or what that could look like is also validated and confirmed about what was thought to be happening within our district in terms of lack of alignment approaching the schools and or School Improvement chairs and teams and I wonder is how School Improvement plans are developed by school and how they intersect with a strategic plan Equity practices and District apartments thank you group two of Dr Caswell and finally group three Miss Stevens so um in terms of culturally responsibility [Music] um a couple of

071wonderings that came up in our group were how do we prepare teachers um to be culturally responsive in the classroom we had a great discussion about the importance of sneakers to get a student Earth how do we get teachers to see and learn what's important to students so that that then becomes part of the curriculum and the instruction s around academic and extracurricular access there were some noticings around the continued discussions of transportation and access to Advanced coursework and um and then within student and Family Partnership a noticing that really stood out for our group was that students voice in focus groups and Innovation for those Educators who were taking action to build relationships and that that was directly affecting their their academic outcomes and so one of the wonderings that came up was how

072do we ensure that and the report specifically lifted up counselors as well and so one of the wonderings was how do we ensure that Educators in those roles such as counseling continue to that role and not and not tasked with additional things that prevent um and then a couple of notice slash wonderings were around just the continued um uh kind of continuing what Dr Doyle said around um alignment and that uh would be a continued discussion around inconsistency within each of the themes and that um and then the other one was kind of a revisiting of a question that was posed earlier around how direct are we being are we direct enough so that changes thank you Miss Stevenson group three so thank you all for engaging in that protocol and having some discussions about

073the Dei findings um so there are obviously implications for your continued work as the Board of Education and policy 1150 and not be recommending processes but also some of the questions some of the notices and wonders how that is supported by staff and how we can continue to socialize what's happening in our next steps in the work so thank you for sharing all of that in those three buckets and containers of the findings so with that said last few slides that we want to present to you there has been a lot of work that's been going on as it relates to the DI findings and then the subsequent work I'm going to pass it off to Dr Doyle we'll talk about these teams really quickly and then our next final steps in this approach so

074um as we translate the findings of the Dei assessment into a framework and actually also throughout the process of generating the findings we've engaged different groups in the system and they are referenced on this Slide the equity Affairs work group obviously is your office of equity Affairs and the staff that is there and we met mostly weekly but as we got a little bit closer towards the end it began to be bi-weekly I think starting in May um but there was a regular touch point for us um and really even though it was bi-weekly it was still a regular touch Point um around this work and making sure that we were um listening to and accessing all of the information and data that we could within the confines of the project scope also we engaged

075a very large group at the beginning of this project and then engaged them again in early June in a smaller group setting and that was the kickoff team over a hundred Wake County Public Schools Educators leaders who are also Educators community members board members some were participating in that and Community Partners were engaged in that kickoff team and also participated to receive these findings and inform some of the direction around how we translate that find those findings into action and so informing the framework development superintendent's leadership team has been engaged pretty continuously as well as Dr Chavis sits on that leadership team and has provided updates every time he's been called upon and has access but in position you'll see in a minute that has ramped up as of late and then also we engaged

076with a kind of cross-functional steering committee who began to engage with us monthly through the end of May to help us really look at the data that we're receiving and interpret it make sure it was being interpreted um accurately at least from the point of view of a diverse group of Wake County community and staff members and that's helped us to get to the point that we are today and will help us to kind of get this document which is going to be the framework ultimately over the finish line uh you can see that we have really tried to translate these themes into the equity framework the office of equity Affairs once we kind of have these themes identified began to work with us to start translating them to action that work began and we

077started to get feedback on it first from the steering committee in May then from going back to the kickoff team on the sixth and 7th of June also again with this student or the superintendent's leadership team on June 5th so a couple of interactions with them and then coming back to the superintendent's leadership team on June 26th the very next slide really does represent the engagement of the board's interests in the Strategic plan as we worked for several several different engagements to make sure that this framework as it's going to be finalized is aligned to the Strategic plan and is not seen as something different from the Strategic plan it is a component of a compliment too and so that that's been happening throughout but uh it really happened in Earnest with Dr Robinson and

078his staff to really review those framework components and to consistently revise them to make sure that they've really met the intention of the board's policy to make Equity a key feature of the Strategic claim um so from that our next steps are and I will turn that over to you thank you Dr Doyle so lots of work as you can see until from today's presentation so our next steps is to come back to you all August 15th for the last session and then bring to you what we have as our Equity framework so that will include both the equity focused practices as an essential pillar of the Strategic plan that was generated and derived from the findings that you had a chance to unpack today and read through on last week next item will be

079to review alignment of those Equity focused practices which all of the with all of the pieces and components of the Strategic plan including priorities and things we've taken a lot of time to ensure as Dr dool said alignment and connection and partnership was there the strap plan and the equity focused practices and also ownership I've heard that today as a theme coming from the board how do we make sure that everyone feels responsible making sure that the superintendent's leadership team is really truly engaged and on board with moving these practices forward to action yep I think so the last bullet there is to review the actions associated with the equity focused practices so going back to the question that was asked on this Waters earlier about how do we take the steps in making this

080become our thing our North Star in partnership with the Strat plan so taking a lot of time to really think about what those action steps will be across our organization to ensure that Equity not only is a key factor and pillar component of our strap plan but it's realized that we take active steps on a regular basis to ensure that the equity Works days first and foremost and it pushes us and challenges us to do what's right for all of our students so with that being said we will come back August 15th with this information and we are happy to take any other questions that you may have and I want to take my cue though from Orchard my happy well we run a little bit over our our time and not that you know

081this was good work but we do have to do some closed session information we look forward to um seeing you again in August and folks have questions they can email you directly yes um make sure to do that so thank you time is there a motion to go into closed session for reasons updated on the regular meeting agenda so moved all right we have a motion in a second all those in favor please say aye aye any opposed name