Houston Independent School District

Transcription

1 Housto Housto Idepedet School District Program Name: Implemeted: Program Type: Legal Authorizatio: Weighted Studet Formula School Year District-Wide School Board Policy School Empowermet Bechmarks 1. School budgets based o studets ot staffig yes 2. Charge schools actual versus average salaries o 3. School choice ad ope-erollmet policies yes 4. Pricipal autoomy over budgets yes 5. Pricipal autoomy over hirig yes 6. School-level maagemet support yes 7. Published trasparet school-level budgets yes 8. Published trasparet school-level outcomes yes 9. Explicit accoutability goals yes 10. Collective bargaiig relief flat cotracts, etc. yes Housto met 9 out of 10 school empowermet bechmarks. Reaso Foudatio reaso.org 77

2 Weighted Studet Formula Yearbook 2009 I. Program Overview Housto Idepedet School District (HISD) educates approximately 202,000 studets withi the greater Housto metropolita area. The district serves a diverse studet populatio, which is 58 percet Hispaic, 30 percet Africa- America, 9 percet white ad 3 percet Asia/Pacific Islader. Approximately 78 percet of HISD studets participate i free or reduced-price meal programs. HISD also serves more tha 55,000 limited-eglish-proficiet studets who, combied, speak more tha 90 differet ative laguages. To improve istructio ad studet achievemet ad to make the district more streamlied ad efficiet, schools are orgaized withi five regios (North, East, South, West ad Cetral) by feeder patters composed of specific elemetary, middle ad high schools. Each regioal office is maaged by a regioal superitedet who coordiates a team of executive pricipals to esure the quality of istructio throughout the regio s feeder patters. I 1990, the Housto Board of Educatio issued a Declaratio of Beliefs ad Visios for HISD that called for a ew educatioal structure that is decetralized ad features shared decisiomakig. 1 The 1990 Beliefs ad Visios statemet also said that schools should have the maximum freedom to develop ad implemet the methods that best achieve the goal of high studet achievemet. I 1991, the school district implemeted Shared Decisio-Makig Committees (SDMC) at the school level to help advise pricipals ad allow the local school commuity to begi makig decisios with reduced cetral office cotrol. I 1994, whe Superitedet Rod Paige was hired, the district bega to more aggressively decetralize decisio-makig to the school level ad give pricipals cotrol over school budgets. By the school year, pricipals had decisio-makig authority over their school-level budgets. I 2009 HISD remais committed to the decetralizatio of resources ad decisiomakig authority to the school level, where studet academic success is the highest priority. I Housto, schools have bee give direct authority for approximately 60 percet of all district fuds, makig HISD oe of the few school districts i the atio with such a high level of decetralizatio. HISD has also reorgaized other departmets to provide services to schools o a fee-for-service basis. Back i 1987, 70 percet of HISD schools were o the state s list of lowestperformig schools. 2 But i 2009, despite three major icreases i accoutability stadards at the state level, oly 5 percet of Housto s schools are i the state s lowest performig category. Those sigificat, steady gais were the result of a commitmet to accoutability, decetralizatio, competitio ad, more recetly, a chage i focus from passig a test to a focus o solid academicachievemet growth for every studet, every year. 3 II. Studet Based Budgetig Formula The district has formulated a school budgetig process that icludes a weighted studet formula. The process begis with a base grade-level formula for every studet Reaso Foudatio reaso.org

3 Housto Base grade level weights for are: Elemetary school $3,390 Middle school $3,415 High school $3,379 Early childhood special educatio ad pre-k uits are weighted at 0.5. K-12 studets are weighted at 1.0. The base formula is allocated o 100 percet average daily attedace or i essece each school s total erollmet if every studet atteded every day. The formula also provides additioal resources for special populatios based o studet characteristics. Weights for Special Populatios Mobility (> tha 40 percet).10 Special educatio.15 State compesatory educatio (poverty ad at-risk).15 Gifted ad taleted.12 Vocatioal educatio.35 Eglish laguage learer Mobility is determied by coutig the umber of studets determied to be mobile. A studet is cosidered to be mobile if he or she has bee erolled at the school for less tha 83 percet of the school year (has missed six weeks or more at a school). Schools with mobility less tha 40 percet are give a weight of 0. Schools with mobility more tha 40 percet are give a weight of Special educatio studets are studets a school serves with a idividualized educatio pla (IEP). The weightig provides discretioary o-payroll resources to the studets. The cetral office still allocates special educatio teachers. Multiply the umber of eligible studets by the weight of.15 to get the weighted special educatio uits. 3. State compesatory educatio (SCE) studet couts are based o the 50 percet of studets who qualify for free or reduced luch at a school ad 50 percet of studets at risk, as determied by multiple factors icludig test scores ad dropout status. These two couts are combied to get the total studet populatio that will receive the SCE weight. I other words, this weight multiplies the total umber of free luch studets by.50 ad the total umber of at-risk studets by.50 ad the fuds the ew populatio that was created based o oe-half of the free luch ad at-risk populatio at the school. 4. The gifted ad taleted studet populatio is determied by the umber of studets at each school that have bee desigated as GATE studets. 5. Vocatioal educatio weight is determied by the umber of hours each studet is erolled i vocatioal educatio courses. The uit for each course is computed based o cotact hours multiplied by 175 istructioal days. Multiply the weight of.35 by the uits. 6. Eglish laguage learer weight is multiplied by the umber of studets at each school desigated as Eglish laguage learers. I additio to the studet weights, each school receives a capital allocatio of $10 per erolled studet. HISD also maitais a small school subsidy. The per-studet allocatio for the small school subsidy is $1,116. The small school subsidy Reaso Foudatio reaso.org 79

4 Weighted Studet Formula Yearbook 2009 distributio is calculated based o a school s erollmet. The threshold erollmet levels are as follow: Elemetary school Middle School High School - 1,000 API semiar Job-embedded, persoalized coachig ad support. I additio, HISD provides pricipals with support from budget aalysts durig the yearly budgetig process at each regioal office. III. Autoomy HISD provides schools with approximately 60 percet of the district s operatig budget i the form of weighted studet allocatios. At the school level the total weighted allocatio is approximately 80 percet of the school s overall resources. The pricipal has discretio over these fuds ad the oly madated school positio is the pricipal. I Housto pricipals also have discretio over hirig decisios. Collective bargaiig is illegal i the state of Texas ad school boards set persoel practices. I Housto, the school board policy gives pricipals sigificat discretio over persoel decisios ad the desig ad orgaizatio of each school. IV. School-Level Maagemet Support HISD rus a Aspirig Pricipal s Istitute that provides each pricipal five traiig compoets: Six-week summer itesive Harvard Graduate School of Educatio coursework Year-log paid school-based API itership V. School Site Coucils HISD schools operate uder a sitebased-maagemet cocept with each school havig a Shared Decisio-Makig Committee (SDMC). This school-level plaig ad decisio-makig process was established i 1992 by the Board of Educatio to ivolve professioal ad o-professioal staff members, parets, commuity members ad busiess represetatives i public educatio. Participats at each school review the district s educatioal goals, objectives ad istructioal programs. The school pricipal determies the size of the committee ad omiates members from the public sphere. VI. School Choice Compoet Most schools have specifically defied attedace zoes that iclude residetial areas that each school serves. O the basis of a studet s home address, HISD assigs each studet to a feeder patter composed of a specific elemetary, middle ad high school. HISD also offers parets the optio of sedig their child to a school other tha the home or zoed campus, provided that the school of choice has sufficiet space available to accept additioal studets. Whe the school of choice accepts a 80 Reaso Foudatio reaso.org

5 Housto studet from outside its attedace zoe, HISD requires that the parets agree to keep the studet at the chose school for the etire school year ad parets must assume resposibility for the studet s trasportatio. If the demad for space-available seats exceeds the space available at a idividual school, a lottery is used to determie which studets are selected to eroll i the school. VII. Accoutability I 2008 the Housto Idepedet School District implemeted a ew accoutability process called the ASPIRE (Acceleratig Studet Progress ad Icreasig Results ad Expectatios) model. This overarchig iitiative coects all of HISD s educatioal improvemet efforts ad ecompasses iovative techology solutios, professioal developmet ad commuicatios. ASPIRE s system of valueadded aalysis helped HISD icrease studet achievemet ad reward those who help studets make strog academic progress. As oe of the largest performace-pay plas i the atio, i 2008 the ASPIRE Award Program recogized more tha 10,000 teachers ad other school persoel with more tha $23 millio i bouses. The district also broadeed performace maagemet, makig everyoe i the cetral office more accoutable for the quality of support provided to esure successful teachig ad learig i every classroom. Through ASPIRE, HISD is providig teachers ad pricipals with traiig ad support to esure they have the kowledge, skills ad tools they eed to help all of the district s studets to succeed. ASPIRE uses the latest techology ad iformatio systems to provide pricipals, teachers ad other staff with the most reliable data to make importat decisios about studet performace. A cetral compoet of ASPIRE is school-level, value-added reports to provide iformatio about performace/progress by the campus overall ad at each grade level. These reports give iformatio about specific subjects, icludig readig, math, laguage arts, sciece ad social studies. I additio, the district s research ad accoutability office also provides parets with school-level profiles that iclude school erollmet ad demographic iformatio, special programs ad school performace data. HISD is also more trasparet about the budgetig process tha may districts that report school-level budgets. While most school-level budgets usig studet-based budgetig provide overall school allocatios, HISD breaks the school-level budget dow by idividual studet couts ad the weights these studet populatios geerate. I additio, HISD s school-level budgets also report studet achievemet data for each school. VIII. Performace Outcomes Sice decetralizatio efforts bega i the 1990s, HISD has bee workig o cotiuous improvemet for studet performace. I 2002, HISD wo the Broad Prize for beig a top-performig urba school district. The prize is awarded aually for outstadig overall improvemet while arrowig the achievemet gap betwee ecoomic ad ethic groups. Some of HISD s specific achievemets Reaso Foudatio reaso.org 81

6 Weighted Studet Formula Yearbook 2009 iclude: Eve with the state raisig accoutability stadards, the umber of HISD schools earig a exemplary ratig from the state icreased from 15 to 38 ad the umber of recogized schools rose from 69 to 119 for a record total of 157, a 87-percet gai sice The umber of academically uacceptable schools remaied at 15. This is the highest rate amog large urba districts i the state. The Texas Assessmet of Kowledge ad Skills is the state s cetral assessmet of studet achievemet ad studets must pass it to be promoted to the ext grade level or to graduate from high school. I 2008, 84 percet of schools improved i passig rates i social studies, 79 percet i sciece. Sevety percet of schools improved i math ad 61 percet of schools improved i Eglish laguage arts. Dual-credit ad advaced placemet (AP) courses give studets the opportuity to ear high-school ad college credits at the same time. Record umbers of HISD studets took these classes, givig them a head start as college freshme ad savig their parets thousads of dollars i college tuitio. The umber of studets erolled i dual-credit courses rose 47 percet from 2007 to 2008, with a passig rate for all studets at 95.1 percet. Nearly 7,900 studets were erolled i AP classes i represetig a icrease of 34.8 percet sice From 2003 to 2007, the umber of studets takig AP exams icreased 77.8 percet. Housto s graduatio rate has declied from 80.9 percet i 2006 to 76.8 percet i IX. Lessos Leared 1. Use performace pay i coectio with the weighted studet formula to ecourage pricipals ad teachers to meet the goals they outlie i their academic plas as part of their discretio over budgets. 2. Use value-added aalysis i additio to static achievemet data to aalyze how schools ad teachers are chagig studet performace over time. Offer parets trasparet school profiles that iclude both value-added data ad overall school performace data. 3. Report detailed school-level budgets that iclude each school s studet populatios ad the weights ad budget allocatios attached to those studets. Also report studet achievemet data o school-level budget reports. Resources Adopted Budget, Housto Idepedet School District. Resource Allocatio Hadbook: Recommeded , Housto Idepedet School District, houstoisd.org/budgetigfiacialplaig/ Home/School%20Resource%20 Hadbook/ _Resource_ Allocatio_Hadbook.pdf State of the Schools 2008 Aual Report, Housto Idepedet School District, 82 Reaso Foudatio reaso.org

7 Housto HISDCoectEglish/Images/PDF/AR_08_ SOS.pdf For school-level weighted pupil budgets go here: org/budgetigfiacialplaig/home/ District%20Budget%20Books/ _ Schools_Sectio.pdf Cotact Iformatio Boo Chew School Based Budgetig Maager Housto Idepedet School District 4400 West 18th St. Housto, Texas Edotes 1. Prelimiary Resource Allocatio Hadbook, , Housto Idepedet School District. 2. State of the Schools 2008 Aual Report, Housto Idepedet School District, HISDCoectEglish/Images/PDF/ AR_08_SOS.pdf 3. Ibid. 4. Resource Allocatio Hadbook: Recommeded , Housto Idepedet School District, org/budgetigfiacialplaig/ Home/School%20Resource%20 Hadbook/ _Resource_ Allocatio_Hadbook.pdf Reaso Foudatio reaso.org 83