Executive Summary. Wichita North High School

Transcription

1 Wichita Public Schools USD 259 Mr. Sherman Padgett 1437 Rochester Wichita, KS Document Generated On April 9, 2014

2 TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction 1 Description of the School 2 School's Purpose 4 Notable Achievements and Areas of Improvement 6 Additional Information 7

3 Introduction Every school has its own story to tell. The context in which teaching and learning takes place influences the processes and procedures by which the school makes decisions around curriculum, instruction, and assessment. The context also impacts the way a school stays faithful to its vision. Many factors contribute to the overall narrative such as an identification of stakeholders, a description of stakeholder engagement, the trends and issues affecting the school, and the kinds of programs and services that a school implements to support student learning. <br><br> The purpose of the Executive Summary (ES) is to provide a school with an opportunity to describe in narrative form the strengths and challenges it encounters. By doing so, the public and members of the school community will have a more complete picture of how the school perceives itself and the process of self-reflection for continuous improvement. This summary is structured for the school to reflect on how it provides teaching and learning on a day to day basis. Page 1

4 Description of the School Describe the school's size, community/communities, location, and changes it has experienced in the last three years. Include demographic information about the students, staff, and community at large. What unique features and challenges are associated with the community/communities the school serves? Wichita High School North is a large, diverse, urban school set in the heart of Wichita, Kansas. It is one of seven comprehensive high schools in the Wichita Public School system and is accredited by the State of Kansas as well as the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. The staff consists of one principal, one associate principal, three assistant principals, four counselors, a college career advisor and one hundred and fifteen classroom teachers in addition to many support and clerical staff who serve students in grades nine through twelve. The principals and counselors, along with an assigned secretary, work together in an academy system. Each academy has approximately 25% of all the freshman, sophomores, juniors and seniors students at North High School. Students stay in the same academy all four years enabling the assistant principal, counselor and academy secretary to get to know their students well. The enrollment is 2079 students. The demographics of the school are as follows: 62% Hispanic, 23% Caucasian, 8% African American, 4% Multi Racial, 1% Asian, and 1% American Indian. This included 32% ESL and 16% Special Education students. 86% of our students qualified for the free and reduced lunch program. Our graduation rate is 85% and 75% of our students go on to college/postsecondary education including 42% first generation college students. Our location, at 13th street and Rochester, just north of the city center is called the Riverside Neighborhood and the Little Arkansas River runs along the western edge of the school property allowing North High to enjoy canoeing for P.E. and access to all the environmental elements for our science department to explore. Just north of our school starts the largely Hispanic neighborhood of the NOMAR district (North Market Area) and area from which our school draws many students. To our east is the Dunbar Neighborhood, which was a thriving commercial hub of the African-American community in the 1940's and 1950's. As developers have infused money into reviving these areas, many of the families living in these communities served by North High remain economically challenged. Our students come from all different neighborhoods, mostly within walking distance, with property values which range from the millions to families living in weekly rate motels on Broadway. Our challenges, when faced with 86% of our student population living with economic struggles, are being met with energy, enthusiasm, and commitment. No less than 26 of our staff members are North High Alumni. North High School currently offers the most honors, concurrent credit and Advanced Placement (AP) courses in Wichita despite the fact it serves a predominantly lower income minority population. All three of these categories use a rigorous college preparatory curriculum. There are eight honors classes offered in the three core areas of English, Social Studies and Science which include an Honors designation on the transcript. We offer four mathematic classes above Algebra 2. Eight courses are offered for concurrent credit with Newman University or Wichita State University in Wichita, Kansas. They are AP Art History, College Algebra, PreCalculus/Trigonometry, AP Statistics, AP Calculus, AP Language, AP Literature, and Speech. The fifteen Advanced Placement classes that are offered are designated on the transcripts with AP and include the following: AP Language, AP Literature, AP Statistics, AP Calculus, AP Biology, AP Chemistry, AP Physics, AP Environmental Science, AP Government, AP US History 2, AP Psychology, AP Music Theory, AP Studio Art, AP Spanish Language and AP Art History. We also offer several special programs for students. These include AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) College Bound Program, Automotive Technology Program with AES Certification preparation, Bio-Medical Program which prepares college bound students for medical training, Business technology, ELL (English Language Learners), Family and Consumer Science, Gifted Education, Marketing Education including YEK (Youth Entrepreneurs of Kansas), Special Education, and Vocation/Technical Programs with cooperative education offerings at local Wichita Area Technical College sites. Page 2

5 As with all Wichita Public Schools, a North High School Diploma requires a minimum of 23 Carnegie units of credit. All classes receive onehalf credit per semester. Page 3

6 School's Purpose Provide the school's purpose statement and ancillary content such as mission, vision, values, and/or beliefs. Describe how the school embodies its purpose through its program offerings and expectations for students. North's "old" mission statement reads: "The Mission of the North High School is to prepare all students with the knowledge and skills to grow into productive and responsible members of society." The current school improvement cycle began in 2009 when the current North High School's mission statement, in the form of a graphic design, was developed by asking all staff (teachers, support, classified) to write a personal mission for their classroom, academy, or role. Parents and students were involved at that time through site council and student advisory groups. Those documents were compiled again in 2011 to include new staff and incorporated into the current North mission and vision. Taken together the mission, vision, and belief statements encompass the qualities that are critical to a highly effective school and will guide us in developing the skills our diverse student body needs to be successful. Combined, they challenge staff to empower all students with the 21st Century skills and knowledge necessary to be college and career ready by providing a coherent, rigorous, safe and nurturing, culturally responsive and inclusive learning community. We share the Mission Statement Graphic and Core Belief Statements regularly in parent and student publications, newsletters, and posters and through the weekly Principal's Bulletin sent to the entire faculty and staff. North High School Core Beliefs 1. All students should leave North college and career ready, prepared for the 21st Century; emotionally, academically, and socially. 2. If we build relationships, challenge, guide, and support our students and colleagues, we will create trusting, diligent students that can advocate for themselves, ask questions and contribute to their communities. 3. Students learn in a safe, nurturing environment where they feel welcomed and belong. 4. We believe in adapting our teaching methods to our students' needs. 5. Students can be independent, successful, confident, productive problem solvers. 6. All students have a variety of learning styles to reach their potential and goals in life. North's mission, vision and core beliefs support the goal that North High School will be a learning place for all students and adults. Staff determined that they would prepare our graduates for college or career. North communicates the vision and purpose by posting our vision, mission, and belief statements on our website ( The attitude that is conveyed to students is one of success in academics and personal life through the motto, "Yes You Can/Sí se puede" repeated daily with the Pledge of Allegiance. Our students developed their own set of guidelines for success and used the Acronym S.P.I.R.I.T. to remind students of the six traits. Success is accomplishing our goals. Success is characterized by hard work, dedication, persistence, and a good finish. Success is being better than ordinary, success is reaching extraordinary. Pride means being happy and satisfied in who we are - Redskins! Pride is self-admiration and valuing our efforts, achievements, and accomplishments. We won't take pride to the level of arrogance but we will demonstrate our confidence. Integrity is displayed when we do the right thing. Honesty, truthfulness, and reliability are all characteristics of integrity. Respect is the act of treating someone nicely. We will be kind, courteous, and thoughtful toward others. We believe that we will earn respect by first being respectful. Words like please, thank you, excuse me, and you are welcome are examples of respectful comments. Involvement means being connected to school. We will become involved in many aspects of our school, our class, our clubs, our sports teams, our activities. We know that when we are involved in school we feel more connected and we develop greater pride and ownership. We will also include others, helping everyone feel like they belong. Teamwork is how we will work together to make North the best school it can be. We will cooperate, share, celebrate and collaborate in small and large groups for the better good of the school. Together we are better, together we are one, together we are family we are North High Redskins! Page 4

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8 Notable Achievements and Areas of Improvement Describe the school's notable achievements and areas of improvement in the last three years. Additionally, describe areas for improvement that the school is striving to achieve in the next three years. Over the past three years, North has continued to see enrollment grow, both from increases in students who live in our attendance boundary catchment and the over 340 students who reside outside our attendance area but who wish to attend North on Special Transfer Assignment. Having students "want" to attend North by applying for special assignment is a benefit to the whole. These students have honor-roll grades, very few behavioral issues, and are active participants in both classroom activities and extra-curricular activities as well. Our graduation rate has bounced from 77% to 84% to 79% the last year three years but it has consistently stayed above the once dismal 48% and 60% from 2002 and Currently one of our concerns is our male graduation rate which has been significantly lower (including all ethnicity and economic status groups) than their female counterparts. We are making efforts to develop relationships and connections with these male students by program offerings such as Jobs for American Graduates (JAG), the hiring of a Communities In Schools site worker, and continue to support clubs such as the Brotherhood group for at-risk males. Our average daily attendance has been relatively steady over the same three year period hovering just above 90%. Behaviorally, we still have a large number of behavioral incidents being reported, most of these incidents are being generated by only a small percentage of our student enrollment. Many are a result of our tardy students and their failure to serve consequences such as detention. Reducing tardiness is one of our school-wide goals. Even with our large number of tardies and behavioral referrals, we believe our school climate and culture remains one of a safe and secure learning place. College and Career Readiness is one of our expected student outcomes and to better prepare kids for post-secondary experiences, we have strengthened and encouraged enrollment in Advanced Placement classes. In the past three years we have increased the number of sections by 4 and the number of student enrollments by 206. We now offer 15 different AP courses with multiple sections of AP Language Comp, Lit, Calculus, and US History II increasing a total enrollment from 369 to 575. The exciting thing is this enrollment includes a minority student increase from 47% to 61%. One continued focus is to increase the AP Exam score averages. Last year we had only 20% of our student AP exam takers score a 3 or better. Even though our scores are not as high as we would like, we feel that the experience and exposure to AP level rigor and expectation will benefit many of our college bound students. Page 6

9 Additional Information Provide any additional information you would like to share with the public and community that were not prompted in the previous sections. Wichita High School North prides itself as being a place where students come first. We know that they are our primary mission and that their opportunities and preparedness are our collective responsibility. We have a saying that goes "Once a Redskin Always a Redskin" and even thought the idea of using the word Redskin is controversial, our kids will tell you that it is their identity, not their mascot. We pride ourselves in knowing the difference between a costume and a culture. You won't see kids dressed up as Native Americans, we don't wear War Bonnets to games, we reserve those rights and privileges to the true Native Americans among us. We only wish to honor a tradition and culture which is revered for its honor, strength, bravery, determination, and tenacity. Page 7