Batesville Junior High School School Profile

Transcription

1 Batesville Junior High School School Profile Providing Opportunities for Educational Excellence Making a Difference with Purpose, Passion, and Pride Charles Beene, Principal Carey Allen, Assistant Principal Virginia Johnson, Assistant Principal Jason Matthews, Assistant Principal Amanda Martin, Counselor Macy Worthem, Counselor Introduction Batesville Junior High School s mission is to operate as a cohesive team of faculty, staff, parents and community to provide all students with essential knowledge for a lifetime of learning, enabling them to lead productive lives. We strive to be leaders in providing opportunities for academic excellence for all students. Faculty, staff, and administration worked together to create a mission that spoke to all areas of our school. We are not only educators in the sense of academia, but we are educators in the sense of life, working together to ensure that our students will become productive citizens. Batesville Junior High School seeks and pursues opportunities to gain input and insight from its faculty, staff, parents, and community members. BJHS has an open-door policy, holds Open House at least four times per year to foster the parentteacher relationship, invites parents for breakfast with the Students of the Month, holds School-Community Committee meetings throughout the year, and also hosts various athletic, academic, and musical performances. In addition to the school-wide events, BJHS has a Title I School Improvement Committee that meets throughout the year. We have parents, community members, faculty, and administration who serve together on this committee. This committee writes our school-wide school improvement plans, makes suggestions for spending Title I Parental Involvement funds, and even addresses parent suggestions and/or concerns. We also invite parents to be a part of our statewide assessments each year by serving as proctors and hall monitors. BJHS conducts annual needs assessments from parents, community members, faculty, and staff through hard-copy and online surveys. SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 1 of 9

2 Batesville Junior High School is located in Batesville, Mississippi, in Panola County. Panola County has a population of 34,498 citizens with approximately 7,400 people residing in Batesville. The county s racial make-up consists of the following: Black, 49.6%; White, 48.4%; Hispanic, 1.5%, and other, <1.0%. The medial age of the population is 33 years of age, and the medial household income is $37, In Panola County, 73.91% of the population has at least a high school diploma, with 13.24% of those holding a Bachelor s degree or above. The medial income in Batesville is $38, and 23.55% of the population holds at least a Bachelor s degree. Our community is supportive and involved with our schools. We have many civic clubs that support student programs inside and outside of our school: Lions Club, Junior Auxiliary, Batesville Jr. Woman s League, Rotary Club, and Civitan Club. Our public library is also extremely involved in sponsoring student programs throughout the school year and during the summer. There are also free tutoring services available through our public library. The local Boys and Girls Club sponsors afterschool and summer activities for our students. Numerous organizations offer organized athletic events for youth as well. Student incentives such as Superintendent s Award, Principal s Award, Student of the Month, and Good Behavior Awards are also a regular part of BJHS. Batesville Junior High School is a public school with 911 students in grades 6-8. Approximately 77.0% of our students qualify for free or reduced lunch. The building was constructed in 1966 with an additional wing added in BJHS has fortyfive classrooms, a band hall, choir room, gymnasium, library, and cafeteria. One of the greatest strengths of BJHS is the technology that is available to our staff and to our students. In addition to numerous computers in individual classrooms, there are six computer labs and a wireless laptop cart used exclusively for students to access online resources. BJHS offers many computer-based instructional programs including Skills Tutor, Compass Learning, English in a Flash, Study Island, and textbook-specific online programs. Accelerated Reader (AR) is a building-wide initiative. Recent school improvement funds enabled us to increase our AR library and to allow all students access to AR learning tools. This school-wide initiative also helps all teachers to incorporate reading into their curriculums. BJHS offers not only the core academic courses but also art, physical education, choir, and band. Academic enrichment courses such as Algebra I, Spanish I, and Merit are available to eligible students. Compensatory math and English classes and tutoring by the Teacher Support Team provide remediation for students. BJHS has the following active clubs and organizations: Pep Squad, TSA, Student Council, Peer Counselors and BETA Club. SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 2 of 9

3 There are 70 certified staff members at BJHS. The certification breakdown is as follows: Class A certification 62.4%, Class AA certification 30.4%, Class AAA certification 5.8%, and Class AAAA certification 1.4%. Our staff is another one of our strengths because we provide students with two counselors, two gifted teachers, four TST interventionists, an ELL tutor, a behavioral interventionist, a speech therapist, a school intervention coordinator, and fifty-seven classroom teachers. Our staff also enables us to offer electives and upper level credit courses. Parental involvement is a definite weakness at Batesville Junior High School. With a student population of over 900, we have less than 50% of our parents involved in BJHS in a proactive manner. With the growing number of students and the changing diversity of our student population, it is becoming increasingly difficult for the administration and staff to emphasize the importance of parental involvement. The creation of the School-Community Committee has made a great impact on having parents involved in the decision-making process for our school. In assessing our school, we found that reading is another major problem at BJHS. More than 70% of our students are reading below grade level. With such deficiencies in reading, it is very difficult to attain adequate yearly progress and to meet our annual growth goals. This has become a major focus for BJHS in the coming year. Student Performance Batesville Junior High School s vision for student performance is for every student to show growth on academic assessments. As a school, our goal is to meet or exceed the targeted NCLB Annual Yearly Progress (AYP) Goals for language arts and mathematics as measured by the MCT2. Currently, BJHS is failing to meet AYP in both language arts and in mathematics. Our spring 2011 MCT2 results are in the table below. Student Performance for : Students Scoring Proficient or Above on the MCT2 in Language Arts Mathematics 6 th Grade 45% 44% 7 th Grade 42% 42% 8 th Grade 43% 63% Student Performance Goals for : Percentage of Students Scoring Proficient or Above on the 2012 MCT2 Language Arts Mathematics 6 th Grade 66% 69% 7 th Grade 64% 69% 8 th Grade 65% 66% SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 3 of 9

4 As a school, our sights are on achieving the goals put forth by the state and federal entities. We are constantly evaluating our progress towards those goals through data analysis of our common assessments, skill mastery, and classroom observations. Our teachers are working diligently to make data driven decisions with respect to the instructional strategies they choose for their classrooms. Teachers keep current data notebooks with state academic assessment data, common assessment data, formative assessment data, and mastery tracking data for each student. This data is used regularly to implement/change instructional strategies within the classrooms, as well as for enrichment and remediation for students. Teachers and administrations constantly strive to improve school-wide instructional practices. In addition to whole-group instruction, we focus on differentiated learning to allow for student differences. The goal in each and every classroom is to challenge those students that are meeting the basic requirements, while providing structure and support for the students that are struggling to grasp the basic requirements of their curriculum. Teachers are constantly monitoring students who fall below the classroom average through formative and common assessments. Each day our sixth grade students have double blocks of instruction in math and in language arts to allow additional time for remediation and enrichment during class. Any seventh grader who did not meet the basic requirements for math and language arts is assigned to compensatory classes in those subject areas. These classes are not only double-blocked for additional time, but these classes are also typically smaller than the non-compensatory classes to allow for more teacherstudent contact time. Any eighth grader who excels in mathematics has the opportunity to take Algebra I for high school credit; students that are deficient in mathematics are assigned to a compensatory mathematics class that is doubleblocked. In the classrooms and in the computer labs, students have access to many online learning programs that allow for individualization of remediation and enrichment. Students that fall in the bottom 5-10% of the population with respect to reading and math may be assigned to the Teacher Support Team (TST). These students may attend reading circles two to three times per week (6 th grade) or attend tutoring in their area of deficiency two to three times per week (6 th, 7 th, and 8 th grade). TST monitors individual student progress constantly and as needed adds/removes students from the tutoring program to facilitate as many students as possible. In addition to involving our parents in the planning and evaluation process of our school-wide improvement plans, BJHS works cooperatively with the South Panola Parent Center to provide resources to help parents help their children with homework and with preparing for state assessments. BJHS promotes events held at the Parent Center to help more parents get involved. BJHS actively works to SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 4 of 9

5 support faith-based tutoring in our community churches and our local Boys and Girls club by providing resources and volunteers to help these organizations work with our students. We have received a great deal of positive feedback from parents and community members who have connections with these organizations. Challenges and Opportunities A major challenge for BJHS is the fact that we have not meet the growth requirements set forth by the state and federal governments and have been under School Improvement since Overcoming public perception of being an unsuccessful school is a major hurdle for BJHS. In fulfilling the obligation of receiving school improvement funds, we have written Title I school improvement plans each year since By writing these plans, we have taken a more comprehensive look at our school, our instruction, and our assessments; we have also taken a very critical look at how we can improve in each of these areas. We have set goals and evaluated our progress toward those goals; we have made changes to make more progress toward being the school that we envision. We have specifically made changes in our professional development and in differentiating our instruction in the classrooms. Through funds from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, we have added technology to every classroom in the form of computers, SMARTBoards, or Lumens document cameras. We have made great strides in utilizing our resources personnel, technology, and materials. Another major challenge has been the lack of parental involvement over the last few years. Although parents generally support BJHS athletic events or student performances, we discovered that many of our parents did not know how to become actively involved in their child s education. To address this problem we held an Educational Fair to show parents all of the great things that are in place to help their children. We had almost 50% or our parents to attend. Parents were able to visit all areas of the school and learn a little about available services such as TST, the library, Merit, Gear Up, and others. Afterwards we formed the School- Community Committee to serve as our Title I School Advisory Committee/School Improvement Committee. We personally contacted a select number of parents, faculty, district personnel, and community members to be a part of this team which meets regularly to discuss issues and gain feedback from our stakeholders. All meetings were open to the public, and we feel that we gained a great deal of parental support through this committee. We continue to promote positive interactions between home and school with our Student of the Month breakfasts and open houses each term. Conclusion We have a lot to be proud of at Batesville Junior High School. Responses from recent teacher and student surveys say it best. SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 5 of 9

6 What are YOU most proud of in your school? (These statements were taken from teacher surveys.) We have a community of teachers that not only care about each other, but are eager to work together sharing ideas to improve our school and surrounding community. This is not just our workplace; it is our home. quality of instruction and the safe and orderly environment that is created by the cooperation of all school personnel. a sense of morality. The counselors have created a supportive atmosphere one in which kids feel comfortable going to them. Our new student of the month program I love that we invite parents to breakfast and visit with them and their students not just sending a certificate home. I am proud of all of the new reward activities that we are doing for our students! It is great to take time to reward the students for good behavior; we spend so much time on the negatives! It is great to send positive messages to encourage them to keep doing better! We have many hardworking teachers. I am extremely excited with the technology that we have available in our school and how hard the technology coordinator works to keep us up, running, and updated on new products and services! I am proud of all of the student assistance programs that we have in place to help our struggling learners. The thing I am most proud of in my school is the camaraderie that is shared among the teachers and the willingness to share to promote learning. I am proud of our Super Star Students of the month and teachers being rewarded. I am proud that we have dedicated staff who even when they can retire choose to come back and continue helping our students. SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 6 of 9

7 What are YOU most proud of in your school? (These statements were taken from student surveys.) I am mostly proud of the awards. Batesville Junior High School gives your something in return for respecting the rules. The thing I m most proud of in my school is sports. I love to play different sports. The thing I m most proud of in my school is my teachers. Without the teachers I think we wouldn t learn. I like all my teachers; they teach me new things every day. They help me prepare for the MCT. I am most proud of the teachers that we have and the cookies that we serve in the lunch room. The reason why I have pride in my school is our football team. We are known for our amazing athletic skills all over the country. The things that I am proud of in my school are my teachers and principals. The reason I m proud of them is because they are persuading and encouraging us to pull our test scores up. They are also teaching us and telling us right from wrong. I know when we come to school we are just supposed to learn, but when I see people I know and love, I just feel respected. When I come to school I know I am loved, respected, and safe. I am proud of many things in this school but I am mostly proud of the library. It has a wide selection of books from horror to adventure. If I could choose where I could stay in school the whole day it would be at the library. I am most proud of my school because I have teachers that are caring and loving. We have great coaches that allow us to perform and teach us how to be good athletes. I am proud that when we need help we can always ask our teacher/sub what to do. SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 7 of 9

8 Student Demographics Total Enrollment: 911 Black White Hispanic Other 6th Grade: 292 Females Males th Grade: 286 Females Males th Grade: 314 Females Males Self-Contained: 19 Females Males SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 8 of 9

9 Staff Demographics Black White Administration Female 1 0 Male 1 2 Total 2 2 Counselors Female 1 1 Male 0 0 Total 1 1 Teachers Female 7 38 Male 5 8 Total Assistant Teachers Female 5 2 Male 1 0 Total 6 2 Custodians Female 1 1 Male 3 0 Total 4 1 SPSD/Batesville Junior High School School Profile Page 9 of 9