001All right, we are ready for our report this evening, which is an AVID update. Um, and I am very pleased to invite uh well, Dr. Swift, would you like to introduce our um our folks who are presenting this evening? Thank you. Thank you. Um it's such a delight to be able to bring forward an AVID update this evening. Um, AFID is something we talk about equity and opportunity and access for students often. And when we talk about AVID, that's one of the systemwide uh programming opportunities, tools, whatever uh word you would put in that blank. It's one of the ways that we really approach serving all students. And so we're really proud of this programming and especially proud that as we shared at our last board meeting in uh we will be a fully implemented
002AVID district. So we have three amazing leaders with us this evening doc Dr. Hotsteadler uh Miss Green and Dr. Miles. uh they represent a team of avid committed educators and I'm going to just give it right away to them and let them uh work us through uh this update. members, because you heard so much about it, I asked uh Miss Dunn to also attach the April 21st presentation, which was the showcase uh that we presented for districts from all over Kansas. Those districts were in to Sunflower and Southwest. And so we included that presentation and then also uh cooked up something specifically for you all. this evening. Uh, Dr. Hot Stettler. Good evening. I'm Dr. Sarah Hostettler and I support AVID for the district. I'm here with my colleagues, Dr. Carissa Miles and Mrs. Green,
003principles of two of our incredible buildings, Southwest Middle School and Sunflower Elementary. And so, uh, the document that was included in the the board docs was a set of slides from a presentation that we made as part of our AVID showcase. I know some of the board members were able to join us uh for that event for which we're grateful. So, thanks for inviting us to come back this evening and share a little bit about uh the work that we've been doing in two of our schools. Um so, we have an essential question to start tonight. Our larger goal for today, our larger essential question is how are we growing AVID implementation for student success here in Lawrence public schools? And specifically, we have three goals. first to provide a brief review of AVID. We
004know that it's familiar to many of you. We think sometimes it can be helpful to just reenter ourselves with a a quick refresher. I will share just briefly a little bit about the history of AVID here in Lawrence Public Schools and the why for districtwide implementation. And we're going to share two case studies. So, a little bit about what AVID looks like in two of our buildings. All right. So, AVID review. What is AVID? AVID is an acronym that stands for advancement via individual determination. Oftentimes people think of it as a a program or a curriculum, a a set of guiding ideas. I like to think of it as a larger system. It's a system driver. And uh we have our students focusing on uh wicker which is another acronym which stands for writing, inquiry,
005collaboration, organization and reading for college and career readiness. If you have been in any of our buildings, you likely will see posters to the effect of AVID college and career readiness. Um, if you were to ask some of our of our students, it's an easy uh it's an easy framework for them to to call to mind when we think about AVID. And AVID is a lot of things. It's easy to think of AVID uh through this particular acronym because that's what it looks like in practice. Wicker. And lastly, how does it benefit our K12 learners? Um, from elementary, we have AVID schoolwide, which means that you'll see AVID in all of our hallways, all of our classrooms, in various spaces throughout the building in our AVID implementing spaces. And then for secondary, we have AVID
006schoolwide and the AVID elective class. And so when students hit 7th grade all the way through 12th, they have the option of taking an elective class that is very specifically scaffolded um a space for academic supports. Um one key piece to that and you'll see a little bit of that in our Southwest presentation is that's tutorials. We ask our students to take rigorous challenging coursework and of course we need to provide supports for them to be successful when they take on that challenge and that's where we see that kind of support that tutorial support in our AVID elective classes. So in the district we adopted AVID in 2012. It started in our high schools the two principles at the time championed the integration of AVID in those two spaces and started to build it in
007our district. In 2015, AVID implementation at our four middle schools. The same time we launched that and then in 2018 we have what I would call the staggered implementation at elementaryaries. Um every few year every few years we've brought on um interested buildings and I am excited to share with you to echo what Dr. Swift shared earlier is that by 2026 all traditional buildings in the district will be avid implementing schools. And of course, a little confetti because AVID is all about those extras to entice and uh to be excited in learning. I'm going to invite Dr. Miles to share a little bit about the framework. Good evening. Thank you so much for having us. Again, I'm Dr. Miles. I am the proud principal at Southwest Middle School. I wanted to talk to you a
008little bit about the framework. So, Dr. Dr. Hot Titler talked about how AVID is a systems driver and AVID's philosophy is really looking at what are the skills that students need to be successful no matter what their trajectory is and then looking at what are educators doing to ensure that those needs are being met and ensure that our students are going to be college and career readiness. One of the things I love about Lawrence public schools is really the K12 alignment and that's where we see the framework and the power happening. We're going to talk about that more in a little bit, but really we want to talk about how we're activating what students need across the board throughout all of our schools. Thank you to drive. Here we go. Excuse me. All right. So,
009like Dr. Hotsteadler said, we had implemented AVID at Southwest Middle School. We started with 12 students. Um, one of the things I love about AVID's philosophy is it changes with time. It adjusts. And so in the beginning um when you might have heard about AVID, you might have heard about um being targeted towards our historically marginalized students. That philosophy has changed over time, but that's where where we really got our springboard, our starting point. Um teachers were really interested. I was one of the baby coordinators here in the district. I really appreciate my own leadership opportunities through that. Um and then um as we saw so much success with our eighth graders, we realized if we start this earlier, we can get more bang for our buck. The kids are going to come in and
010they'll know their strategies. And so a few years later, we added seventh grade in all four middle schools at the same time. Now, COVID happened, as we recall, and that did um create some challenges around our programming. It's really hard to go on field trips and bring in speakers when we were standing six feet apart and not able to travel. So, we had to be really mindful of how do we bring students back on board and get them re-engaged with AVID and all that it has to offer. At Southwest, we did a few things. We got a new coordinator in place and we really focused on providing direct support to to students through the tutorial process. So students could go into any classroom and if they were to walk out with a question, they had
011an immediate support in place throughout their school day. That was important. It was tangible and that is how we quickly rebuilt after COVID. Um we've continued our work also with staff trainings. Um we've added in an AVID sixth grade kind of an intro class. We call it a little Avid light class. Again, really looking at how we are aligning our systems from kindergarten on, making sure students have all the skills that they need to be successful. Excuse me. That's okay. There we go. That's me. Good evening. My name is Amanda Green and I am the proud principal at Sunflower Elementary. Um, and I feel honored to be um up here with these amazing AVID leaders. Um, and I am just here representing our fantastic Sunflower staff um, and teachers that do the phenomenal work. Um,
012it really is a system that allows us to build collective efficacy, which is when we all believe in the same thing that students can do the hard work, right? And um, that has been a huge driver for success for us at Sunflower. Um, a lot of times you might uh hear, "Oh, well, kindergarteners can't learn to take notes or first graders can't um organize with a binder or fill out an agenda." That seems like things for for bigger kids, right? But um at Sunflower and many of our other buildings across the district, we believe that students absolutely can do that rigorous work that will help them be college and career ready even though we're talking about just kindergarten first and beyond. So um that is a huge part of our sunflower story is that we
013had um a phenomenal collective belief that we can do this work and it will better our students in our school. Um so using that systems approach we really um dove in and connected to the familiar that we have at tier 1 as well. Um, and always thinking about how can we be specific and intentional with our focus for the things that we really wanted to focus on with our students within that AVID system buildingwide, common language around high yield instructional strategies, increasing student voice through cooperative learning, um, embedding AVID in all we do by creating those community partnerships. Um, we did not plan for Miss Brown and our Sunflower Scholars to be here tonight at the exact same time that we are providing this um, presentation, but what a great opportunity to see um, their
014speaking and listening skills and their advocacy for um, you know, supporting the community and learning from others, not only in their Eagle Bean um, project um, but also and through their fundraiser and creativity. All right, we have several points of pride at Southwest Middle School. At Southwest, going along with that common philosophy, common belief that all students can be successful. We really think about how we are providing opportunity knowledge to all students. And so that shows up at Southwest in a variety of different ways. We have a pretty successful career day every December where we look at um students interest and then we bring in people. So, at the middle school world, if you haven't had a middle school for a while, I'll just remind you, everybody, not everybody, a lot of people think that
015they're going to go to KU and be professional basketball players, which is a great goal. However, there are so many opportunities out in the world, and we really want to showcase those to let them know what exists outside of our four walls. Um, so we do things like career days. We have school clubs that are aligned to different um career pathways and opportunities. We think about how we're taking kids on field trips and what do those field trips look like and what are our goals around those field trips. Again, really addressing the opportunity knowledge is one of our points of pride at Southwest Middle School. And that actually aligns to our new mission statement. We also think about rigor. How does rigor show up in the classroom? And so, we monitor that in a variety
016of different ways. But one of the things that I think is really successful about AVID is it gives you common language with teachers. So, that way you can train a teacher on a strategy and then other teachers can observe that teacher. We can learn from one another as professionals. But also what that creates is um a predictable system for kiddos because we know if a kid walks into the classroom and they understand what they're going to be doing and they're not having to learn a new strategy or new set of expectations, they're going to be more successful. So that supports students and our staff. Um, another point of pride pr pride is I really appreciate the board's um dedication to AVID over the last several years investing in our professional learning whether it be summer
017institute or AVID pathway trainings or our in-house trainings even um that work has done a lot to coordinate the work of our staff and to make sure that we're all moving in the same direction um with the same mission. Um one more thing I would like to mention is um one of the systems that really works for us at Southwest is thinking about um organization. So executive functioning is something that a lot of adolescence struggle with. And so we think about how can we create a predictable system for kiddos that makes sense to the kids and help them develop those skills. Um it could be how do you fill out your planner? How do you plan for a test? What I love about AVID is we're not going to assume that every kid comes to
018school with those skills um already in place. We're not going to assume that a student knows how to study. Instead, we're going to stop, we're going to teach, we're going to practice, and we're going to learn how to be learners first, content second. Um, and that has been really successful as we continue to move Abbid forward at Southwest Middle School. And so we, um, at Sunflower try to support that work as well. So those same things that she um, shared around executive functioning, organization, the importance of notetaking um, and how to be a successful learner. Uh, we start that in kindergarten at Sunflower and many other elementaryaries across our district. Um so we do try to um identify because AVID is a systems approach and there are so many things that we could take on
019to um really push forward in our building. But what we focused on is a um some real intentionality around um focused note-taking as well as collaboration and student engagement. Um, so when I talked earlier about believing that all of our students can, um, if you have not been into some of our classrooms to see first graders do a philosophical uh, philosophical chairs or our third graders doing a Socratic seminar, um, they can absolutely do those things, but that takes training with our teachers. Um, that takes us modeling those strategies and being able to support that work. Um, we also have those projects that are focused on mentorship and career-based opportunities because we want to start instilling in students right away that they have opportunities as they get older that are vast and wide. Um we
020have really made an effort this this school year to focus in as a team um using the first Wednesday of the month during our collaboration time to have an AVID focused PD and that has been very very helpful as our AVID leaders um across the building lead that work and help model some of those strategies for teachers and then um we partner that with sharing successes around those specific strategies. So, we take that little bite-size and um we model it, we practice it, and then we celebrate when we've seen that success. Um, also something fun about Sunflower and to go along with executive functioning, we have a fun little um thing that we do at the end of this day called Reset the Nest at Sunflower. We are eagles and so we have our nest
021and um it allows students just to take some time to take ownership for their belongings, to take ownership for their learning, get themselves set for success for the next day. um and has been really helpful for our students as well. So those pieces we've um are points of pride for us at Sunflower and that we've been working on the last few years and we're excited to set a new articulation guide this summer during summer institute because we have implemented these things very successfully um thanks to the teachers um that are willing to dive in and do the work. Um, and so we're excited to be able to come back another time with a report sharing our work from from this summer and what we set as goals as we move forward um with AVID at
022Sunflower. But I do want to take the opportunity to um share that there were at least 12 classrooms that um were able to be observed during the AVID showcase and those were not just grade level classrooms. Um we had specials, our music and our art um classrooms were observed during that time. um our intervention classrooms were observed. Um we had um so much uh variety in teachers that were not only willing to have observers in their space, but also were excited to show AVID because it does not just happen in the classroom, it happens across our whole building, which is a huge um benefit to students with that commonality. All right, this is my favorite part. So why AVID and Lawrence public schools? It's really important that we address the equity and access for students.
023Historically, when we talk about college readiness, it talks about just a select few stu groups of students, right? But when we're talking about AVID, we want to make sure that no matter what students choose to do after high school, college, career, trade school, right into the workplace profession, whatever that choice is, they have a choice and they have the skills ready to do it. because it turns out that being on time and being able to keep track of your appointments doesn't just happen in college, but it happens everywhere. So, we really want to make sure that those opportunities are available to all of our students and they have the true skills development in place to be successful. Um, the other thing, and I've spoke about it already quite a few times, but is the importance
024of the consistent instructional best practices. Um, as a teacher, it can be very very overwhelming to know exactly which strategy or which support is going to um be the most effective for student progress and student learning. AVID provides um a framework that already has those high yield strategies aligned that allows us to hone in as a school family and say, "Okay, these are the ones that we know are going to make a difference for our students and we're going to do them all together." Um, and that work is incredibly incredibly important. um and is really the only way that you can see true progress as you move forward as a building. Absolutely. I want to mention vertical and horizontal alignment being so important. Sunflower and Southwest are connected through a kitchen, but that connection should
025not just stop at the kitchen. There are so many opportunities for alignment. We can tell the students who come from Sunflower because they have been working in Avid in that AVID framework learning those AVID skills for years. when they get to Southwest, they're prepared, they're organized, they understand how to set something as simple as set up a planner. It just helps with some of that um continu continuity of services and support and making sure that we are all aligned and we see that at our high schools as well. And so that has been important and we appreciate that opportunity for the alignment. We still have room to grow. We do. Um, but we're excited for those continued opportunities and figuring out ways that we can um not not only strengthen that connection between our students
026and some of their experiences, but also make sure that our um students are are middle school ready when they head that way. Um, and that just continues to um drive that point around the culture of college and career readiness, making sure that students see the different opportunities that they have um and our AVID framework allows us to provide those um examples to our students. Absolutely. I love the leadership development and the student agency that comes along with the AVID programming. When we think about student voice and the ownership of learning, that is one of the most critical skill sets that can transcend any situation. Um, I really appreciate that we have been able to really work on that. I don't know where else you see a group of first graders come up and give a
027board presentation. So, thank you for the opportunity to allow them to invest in those opportunities. Um, we are very conscious of trying to find those and develop those skills. Um, it was absolutely incredible. So, I appreciated how that tied in as well. So, there are lots of different reasons why Lawrence Public Schools benefits from AVID. Um, we appreciate you getting to hear our stories and we're happy to discuss more with you and answer any of your questions that you have regarding AVID at Southwest or Sunflower or just Lawrence in general. Great. Thank you very much. Um, before I turn the board for questions, did you have anything else you wanted to add, Dr. Swift? I We're in good shape. Okay, great. uh questions from board members for our presenters. This is Carol. I don't so
028uh have so much a question, but I just want to commend you on the work that you're doing. It is working. Dr. Swift and I attended the Haskell graduation on Friday and I saw it is Lawrence is a small town and I saw a lot of familiar faces walk across that stage and get their diploma. So I was just so happy to know that, you know, we were a part of that and and AVID. I've watched it. I' I've been here. I've seen it implemented and it's it's growing and I can um Yeah, my nephew is living proof. It works. I mean, he's a he's a a like a 4.0. So, yeah, that's amazing. Absolutely. No question. Um uh I really enjoyed um thank you for this presentation, but I also really um enjoyed getting
029to join you for the showcase that you guys did. It was so impressive to see these different things in action. I know I've like Amanda can attest like I'm always like can you explain it to me again? Can you explain? So, um I think I've got it now. But um it was just so exciting like you know like they said you know when you hear the idea of like a kindergarter taking notes you're like but like you know the way that they scaffold everything it really makes sense and it builds off of one another and um you know the training that she's invested um you know in those monthly trainings and stuff and seeing the the peer tutorials at the middle school was just amazing and um so I just I commend you both because
030it's such a great program and I really appreciate how it is so inter not intertwined but just so built in to everything that you do that it's just you know a part of it like it's not something it's not an add-on it is just the way it's done so thank you for that thank you um I too attended the EVIT um showcase and thought it was wonderful enjoyed the little the kids and watching them learn because I really believed and in doing their presentations that they were actually really invested in learning. Um I also enjoyed the little ones that guided us through uh they took their jobs very serious and kept us in line. Um uh my question uh since I is as we implement districtwide I think in uh Sunflower um at elementary everyone
031basically goes through Abbott and as we implement districtwide will that be the case in all of our buildings? Dr. Dr. Hotsteadler, do you want The answer is yes. Um and and Dr. Hotsteadler will comment. Yeah. Yes, absolutely. And so when we go districtwide, um it will be in all of our traditional buildings starting from day one. And so where we already have it well established, you know, that's just a great way to affirm that important work. And in the spaces where it's new, I can tell you I've been in conversation with those principles and those staff members. They have already invited me into their buildings. In fact, soon soon after these conversations started, they invited me in. They are eager. They are excited and uh the community members and and families that are a part
032of those schools are really really um looking forward to taking this next step uh to the benefit of of the young learners in their homes. And so, yes, absolutely. Um it's already in process. We have some training opportunities uh on on the docket in July. We have a group of teachers going to Chicago, teachers and administrators to um do some deep intensive learning about AVID implementation at a variety of different levels. And so we're positioned really well to start strong in August. Thank you for asking. Um thank you for this presentation. I too am very excited that we are moving this to a district-wide model at elementary school. Um I've seen I have some personal experience with my own students um participating at the middle school level and it's been really transformative for them. So
033um I I'm excited about that. Um this is a question um for Dr. Miles or Miss Grain or or for both of you. Um and I'm not asking for specifics but I am asking just to characterize the impact. Are you seeing um an impact of these practices on the results of like your risk screeners and your formative and summitive assessments that your students are seeing? And is it um um are you seeing improvements year-over-year? I I'm I'm trying to remember. I know it's been at Southwest for a while. I don't remember how many years we've been fully implemented at Sunflower. So, absolutely, we've seen a noticeable increase. So, one of the great things that we have this year is ion. That's the data platform that the district has been providing. And so we've been able
034to make some categories of students to track students who are both in the AVID elective and out of the elective. I can say with confidence that our AVID students their attendance is better. We see fewer disciplinary um entries and um achievement data only continues to increase. So yes, we have felt like that has been supported by data for several years now. Great. Now you want me to go first? Okay. Go ahead. Yeah. Um so at Sunflower this this is my second year at Sunflower as the principal and but the work h um preceded me. They um have been doing great work with AVID um prior to me being there. Um and so we've continued that. However, we did have a little bit of a rebuilding year last year when um there were um some mixed
035staffing that um we and we needed to onboard quite a bit of new staff. Um and so our building goal um that we have set for the year is to um see our spring data increase based on some very specific action steps um that are all aligned to our AVID work. So we're excited to get that information back and really make some of those correlations. That's great. So you really feel like this helps guide your go your building level goal set setting and your needs assessment that you have to do? Absolutely. We are doing each year. Okay. Great. Thank you, Bob. Uh just another question. Um how does if I was a parent at New York school doing looking at them transitioning mo on to Monasuri in the upper grades. How does Monasuri fit with
036AVID? I that's a great question that we have also asked and really look forward to exploring that question. And I won't pretend that we have the answer. Uh but we're really excited to reach out to our monastery partners and it'll be a tremendous conversation to sort I we believe it's a vin diagram. Um and and really excited to see what's on either side and most importantly where the convergence is in the middle. Middle. Yeah. Okay. Stay tuned. Okay. We're on that mission. Yeah. Great. Any other questions for the I'm just a a big fan of AVID. I've watched it grow and into the schools and I love it and I loved um watching I you could see the confidence in our students up here tonight and you and I you it gives them agency. So
037that's the most important thing with the AV and especially with the the clay muse that they're they're selling. They're aware. So I'm just excited to see how much they raise and I hope that they can raise more than their goal of $1,000. Me too. I appreciate you bringing that up because I was just back here kind of kicking myself for not saying that that is um something that I can already attest to with our, you know, skills in AVID. Yes. While we're working on or waiting on some academic progress data to um get completed for the spring, um I feel that it is very apparent and obvious that our students um student agency skills, their speaking and listening, their confidence, their ability to um know how to attack a text and all of those things
038are incredibly strong. and we see those um that pay off right away. Fantastic. Okay. May I share just one final thought and that is um we have a group of 12 seniors from Free State High School who will be doing grad walks in three of our buildings, two elementary and one middle school where they will be in their full regalia walking through the halls to pomp and circumstance. And so that's a great opportunity to just show full circle um how the kindergarteners all the way up um through 8ighth grade will have an opportunity to see what it looks like on the other side right when they get to high school. So thank you again for your time and attention. Thank you very much. All right. kill.