Metabello* School District

*Metabello comes from the Greek word which
 means to change one’s way of thinking

Jeff Spanogle
EDSE 610
April 23, 2005
Dr. Mullins

Governance:

            School Board:
The school district is governed by a school board of ten.  The term for a school board official is five years staggered every two years.  Four of these will be elected by the community, four elected by the school employee community and two appointed by public officials.  Their responsibilities include planning and goal setting, employing and evaluating the superintendent, setting district-wide school policies, adopting the budget, and creating bonds for voters in the district.
The school board will be paid a small amount of five thousand a year for their service to the community and to the school district.  They will be required to attend regular biweekly meetings.  The school board will rotate with the four schools meeting with the principal, department heads, and other teachers as needed for evaluations, projects and special proposals.
           
            Superintendent:
            The superintendent will be responsible to present the four principals, one for each school, to the school board.  The superintendent will be responsible for the final decisions regarding principals, enforcing school policies on academics, and informing the board on the district’s operations, activities and needs.  The duties of the superintendent also include hiring a Human Resource Manager, a secretary to collect and manage data sent from each school, and an accountant for managing the district’s funds and overseeing allotted monies.  The superintendent is also charged with ensuring school policies are enforced by the principals.

            School Principals:
            Four principals will oversee each school – two elementary, one middle, and one high school – with direct authority to hire teachers (with approval from Human Resource Manager and the ratings of three teachers), fire teachers, enforce school policies, help head and coordinate school activities, organize staff development, and develop teacher relations.  The school principal also coordinates the Assistant Principals and manages a support staff.  The support staff gathers statistics on the school, manages class schedules, regulates and balances the accounting aspects of the school.  This support staff includes two secretaries and an accountant clerk for managing the finances.  There is also a secretary to help the assistant principals

            Assistant Principals:
            There are three Assistant Principals under each principal.  Each Assistant Principal has a specific set of duties as outlined in the following sections.  They meet weekly with the principal to give a full report of their duties and how things are being handled in the school.  Appropriate actions and policies will be suggested and dealt with during these meetings.
           
            Academic Assistant Principal:
            This position heads the academic realm for the school.  They push the academic development of both the student and the teachers.  The school guidance counselors meet under the Academic Assistant Principal and manage the academic progress of each student.  The Academic Assistant Principal works closely with the teachers in a program called Teacher Assistance Program which allows teachers to further their personal education with little or no cost to themselves.  The Teacher Assistance Program will allow teachers to pursue education either while they are teaching (night classes) or take a year off for classes.  This program will be discussed in full later.  The Academic Assistant Principal is head of the Beyond Second Student Assistance Program which helps fund students who qualify to put them through college.

            Discipline Assistant Principle:
            This position heads the disciplinary realm for the school.  They will set disciplinary policies, head the In School Suspension and detention, and manage the security staff.  The Discipline Assistant Principle will meet with staff and teachers to determine how the appropriate discipline procedures are working and dealing with student behavior.  They have the ability to call in parents for conferences dealing with the student’s behavior.  Discipline procedures will be discussed later in full.  The security staff includes three security guards for each school.

            Integration Assistant Principle:
            This position takes a few roles most notably with the integration of curriculum throughout the departments.  The curriculum is heavily integrated between subject areas which force the teachers to step outside their classroom and incorporate other subjects.  The Integration Assistant Principle is in charge of curriculum, heading the department and integration meetings, appropriating funds to teachers for projects, and evaluating teachers on integration of curriculum.  They supervise the department heads for each subject area and meet weekly with them to discuss curriculum, teachers, projects, and how they are meeting their objective to provide a rounded education.  The Integration Assistant Principle is also head of the maintenance department, the custodians, the bus drivers, and the bus drivers.  The Integration Assistant Principle will also assist the Academic Assistant Principal when needed.
           
            School Layout:
            The two elementary schools will be at either end of the community to allow easier access to more of the community for the elementary students.  The middle school and high school will be on separate blocks but walking distance of each other.  The layout of each school is that of a donut with the middle being the gymnasium and classrooms surrounding the gymnasium.  The only entrance to the building will be located by the front office so visitors and traffic in and out can be monitored.  There are three other emergency exits located evenly around the outside of the building with one Assistant Principal having an office by each exit.  The Discipline Assistant will be located directly opposite the main office.
            The middle school and high school will also be located adjacent to the public library in which students can provide assistance to the public librarians as part of projects.  This will help students gain an interaction with the part of the community that is involved with reading and hopefully provide interaction for students with those community members who might be more intellectual or knowledgeable. 
            Daily Schedule and Calendar:
            The daily schedule will be a condensed version of class periods allowing a larger time period per class.  The elementary classes will be similar to the middle and high school schedules but the class periods are broken in half with a five minute break after two classes straight in a row.  The elementary also start half an hour earlier and end over an hour later.  The schedule for the middle school and high school is as follows:

           
The schedule is similar to a block schedule only there is no shift from day to day of classes instead the curriculum is reduced down to four main courses.  The highly integrated and project oriented curriculum makes up for the condensed class schedule and allows students firsthand to use practically what they are learning.  The various block is used in a variety of ways (hence the name) and facilitates meetings between teachers and students, teachers and their department heads and staff meetings.  The elementary is once again similar to this except that they actually start at 8:15 in the morning and end at 2:30 in the afternoon with a half class period shorter.
            The annual calendar is interesting since it provides insight into another change of scheduling.  The year is divided into trimesters with each trimester totaling sixty days to give a total school year of one-hundred and eighty days.  The trimester allows classes that are not as easily integrated yet not as fundamental as math, science and language.  Social studies, foreign language, art and technological classes are offered in trisections.  In certain cases, when a course would normally take the period of a year it will be repeated in two trimesters.  The courses of math, science and language will go on year round and require special case scenarios to be written or signed out of these core classes.  The following is the annual calendar for the 2004-2005 school year.

            Lines of Authority:
            The line of authority starts with the school board and superintendent.  The superintendent is over the four principals of each school.  Each principal is in charge of the three assistant principals.  The various principals are in charge of various parts of the school and teachers.  The Integration Assistant Principle heads the department chairs who set policies for the rest of the teachers.  The Discipline Assistant Principal makes discipline policies over all the student body.  The following diagram shows the lines of authority:

Community Involvement:

            The community will make or break a school and the parents are the keystone to bridging the largest gap between school and commune.  The parents will be required to attend a flexibly scheduled meeting once during a six week period.  The meetings will be kept to a minimum but show what their child is doing, how he is doing, and discussion for improvements both on the part of the teacher and the student.  Parent nights will be held once per trimester for the child’s guardian to receive the report card. 
            The community will also be further reached for not only resources of money but people and their experience.  The integrated curriculum will require that each teacher from the core subject areas include one person from the community in their classroom per trimester.  The local paper will work closely with the language department to publish articles written by students.  Local department and grocery stores will benefit from students helping to run the inventory and work alongside a finance manager to ‘run’ the store in a virtual setting and if allowed to actually participate with the store owner. 
            Community will also be invited at the end of each trimester to the schools to participate in an open house to view the various projects the students have completed.  For the end of the year, the students will actually take their projects out of the school (as much as possible) and put them on display in the community center. 
Teachers:
            Teachers:
            The teachers are the hands and feet of a school and are hired for their specialties in interweaving the curriculum in the core subjects and sparsely in other subjects as well.  Each teacher reports directly to a department head that manages the integrating aspects and supports the teachers in lesson planning.  The department heads have a lighter load of only one class because they assist new teachers with their classes and meet regularly with each teacher and other department heads to plan projects.  The department heads are paid a higher salary as part of their higher responsibility. 

            Student Teacher Ratio:
The number of students to teacher is a maximum of fifteen and spread as evenly as possible.  New teachers have a lighter load of only two classes for the first year.  They have a third class that is partnered with the department head or another experienced teacher.  This is a time for not only the new teacher to learn but to be evaluated and have feedback.  Training for giving constructive feedback is provided by the Integration Assistant Principal to those teachers who are working alongside new teachers.  By the third trimester the new teacher is given complete reigns of the classroom with the experienced teacher only observing. 

Contracts:
Contracts for teachers are yearly.  The teachers themselves are evaluated for the first two years they are at the school then every five years afterward.  Teachers are evaluated by their superior starting with new teachers being evaluated by a trained, experienced teacher who is evaluated by the department head and the Integrated Assistant Principal and Academic Assistant Principal.

Hiring and Firing Procedures:
Teachers are hired after applying, observing the school on three scheduled visits, and recommendations from interviews with the Human Resource Manager, the Principal of the school, and the department head of the subject area.  The department head will supervise the visits to the school and have the person applying meet other staff members and participate in a few activities.  The idea is to give the teacher a genuine feel of the school and allow them to not only make up their minds for coming but allow the school environment to attract them. 
A teacher is put into a disciplinary track after a request from both the department head and one assistant principal is sent to the principal.  Meetings between the staff member, the department head and the principal provide grounds for new objectives to be made and met within a selective criterion.  If the teacher fails to meet those objectives he is immediately terminated of his contract. 

Payroll:
            The payroll is reflective of the responsibilities of the staff person.

Title:	#	Salary ($)	Total ($)
Superintendent	1	90,000	90,000
Human Resource Manager	1	45,000	45,000
Principals	4	72,000	288,000
Assistant Principals	12	64,000	768,000
High School:			0
Department Heads	5	55,000	275,000
Teachers	40	47,000	1,880,000
Guidance Counselors	5	42,000	210,000
Middle School:			0
Department Heads	5	51,000	255,000
Teachers	40	44,000	1,760,000
Guidance Counselors	4	41,000	164,000
Elementary School:			0
Department Heads	8	50,000	400,000
Teachers	50	43,000	2,150,000
Guidance Counselors	2	41,000	82,000
Substitute Teachers	8	25,000	200,000
Information Technology Specialist	4	45,000	180,000
Accountant Clerk	5	45,000	225,000
Secretaries	9	38,000	342,000
Librarians	8	35,000	280,000
School Nurse	6	35,000	210,000
Maintenance	8	35,000	280,000
Security Guards	12	29,000	348,000
Janitors	12	26,000	312,000
Total Salaries:			10,744,000
Total Salaries plus Benefits:			13,107,680

School District Budget

 Curriculum:

            Integrated Curriculum:
            The key is to have teachers meet regularly to plan together through their department heads.  The idea is to give students a very real sense of why they are learning the material through hands on projects throughout the year.  The teachers will plan a project together and have at times have other teachers come in to teach the class or direct parts of the project.  As part of the project, other subject will be included such as Art, Social Studies, Technology and at times foreign language.  This will make it easier to maintain a core curriculum which supports the other subjects through projects.  The core curriculum is math, science, and language.  Language is composed of three parts namely literature, composition and speech.  These are divided into the three trimesters although it does not mean that they are taught exclusive of each other but rather an emphasis in the projects chosen during the semester.  The math and science courses are not segued into the traditional courses such as Algebra and Geometry but are divided throughout the trimester into sections of dimension, theory, and logic.  The idea of this being that math is often very repetitious even in the traditional divisions of Algebra, Geometry, Algebra 2 and so forth.
            The curriculum is set up to support grade levels of achievement rather than individualized classes.  Since each class is together in their projects, they must pass all three core classes to get to the next grade level.  Students are encouraged to help each other out by tutoring and peer review of their project work.
           
            Evaluation Practices:
            Each student is reviewed in several key ways.  The first being written tests but not as much emphasis as a traditional setting.  The second factor is projects and the third is written reports and reflections.  These last two play a much larger role in the student’s evaluation than the written test scores. 

            Improving Reading Ability:
            Students need exposed to literature and reading at all levels.  Those that are found to have trouble with reading are put alongside other students who are known for their excellent reading ability.  Teachers will be instructed to pair these students together and have them complete smaller key projects to help the excelling student teach the other how to improve reading.  These projects are done within the confines of the language classes.  Those found to have major reading deficiencies will be given two trimesters (the 1st and 3rd of each year) of reading and writing help.  This class will be specially designed for those who are falling behind to help each other catch up through research projects, article summaries, book reports, oral reports, journalism and news casting. 

           
Technology:

            Technology will be heavily incorporated into certain aspects of projects.  Each department will have two computer labs with a computer available for each student and a SmartBoard for the teacher to display a large computer screen for all to see.  The students will be required to regularly use the computers to type up reports, research materials online, create presentations, and construct web pages to display what they are doing in projects.  They will also use blogs to discuss topics in class and set up email accounts for communicating with fellow students, teachers and other students outside the school. 
            A couple technology courses will be offered during different trimesters.  The technology courses will deal with both software and hardware.  Several technology courses will deal strictly with software packages and teaching students how to use the major development studios such as Macromedia Flash, C++ Developer’s Studio, FrontPage, DreamWeaver, and others.  Another course will deal strictly with the hardware side and those that complete the advanced course with recommendations from the teacher will assist the Information Technology Specialist in fixing the computer systems around the school. 

Students:
            Graduation requirements:
            The graduation of a student at Metabello High is much more than just a completion of a set of curriculum; it is the essence of a changed mind.  Thus, graduation requirements are that the student pass the core subjects for four years of high school and also have signed credits on at least, three other subject areas.  A signed credit is simply two or more complete trimesters of a certain subject area.  This means that the student must complete a minimum of two semesters in three other subject areas such as Art, Social Studies, Technology, Economics, Foreign Language and a few others to choose.  Because of the nature of the integrated curriculum, the student should be more exposed to these other subjects than a regular high school student.  Graduation requirements are tracked by the department heads and the guidance counselors.
           
            Pass or Fail Rules:
            A student receives either a pass or fail grade for each project they do.  If they receive a fail rate of more than eighty percent of their projects, they fail for the trimester.  The projects are both individual and group with the individual project given more emphasis and weight in the final assessment of the student.  The group projects provide a background to help the student adjust and get help from other students or the teacher if necessary. 

            Discipline Rules:
            The students are to behave properly at all times.  This behavior is defined differently for the various levels of schools (elementary, middle and high school) but some rules relatively stay the same.  Each student is to treat other students and school staff with respect and dignity.  If a student ever fails to obey a school staff, they are immediately sent to the Disciplinary A.P. to deal with directly.  The students are expected to conduct themselves in a manner worthy of educated adults and speak as such without using profanity.  Students are not to bring weapons to school.  All electronics except those used directly for class are to be kept in the student’s bag until after school hours.  Infractions of these policies result in various levels of disciplinary action – after school detention, in school suspension, Saturday suspension, and expulsion. 

Teacher Shortage:
            To address the issue of teacher shortage, the school system will try to recruit new teachers with the added bonus that they will be given a lighter load, heavy mentoring, and help through the Teacher Assistance Program to further their education.  Also the idea behind the whole project driven curriculum for a different environment will hopefully capture new teachers into trying the new route.  The higher starting pay of $40,000 for high school teachers and higher for those that teach a core subject area should also help entice new teachers. 

 

Programs:

Teacher Assistance Program:
In order to pay for the classes, teachers will compensate by years teaching.  For each year of class, they will be allotted six credit hours at a nearby college or university.  If a teacher fails to fulfill their contract during the course of the year, they will be required to pay back in full the amount loaned to them for the course credits.  Those that work a minimum of two years may apply for summer course credits up to nine hours with the a requirement to teach the next two years at the school.  After working seven years, a teacher may apply for a sabbatical in which they can get up to one year off provided they apply fulltime to a college or university for a degree dealing with either their subject area or teaching.  This will be paid back in the form of three years of teaching to the school.  Any failure on the part of the teacher to complete their obligation to teach will result in a defaulted loan they must pay back in proportion to what they have given back to the school. 

Beyond Second Student Assistance Program:
This program allows students to apply for college scholarships based on need and academic achievement.  Those students that show a willing spirit and a readiness to meet the challenges of college will be given up to a five thousand a semester to pay for college tuition and fees.  A select few will also be chosen who show a potential and interest in teaching will be offered a full scholarship provided they come back to the school and teach for a minimum of two years. 

Teacher to Leader Program:
This program is specifically designed to develop teachers into specialized teachers, department heads, assistant principals, principals and superintendents if they show the capacity and desire.  This program provides training to teachers to become specialized to help new teachers and also work towards directing the departments.  This also provides specialized training to work those in department and assistant principals into higher positions by teaching them techniques and processes on being successful and good leaders.