LYNN — School Superintendent Dr. Patrick Tutwiler’s goals for this school year focus on increasing the achievement of the district’s two lowest performing subgroups, developing a comprehensive technology plan and improving social-emotional learning for secondary students.
Tutwiler’s goals for student learning are the same as the three he gave himself last school year, and there’s a strong similarity to those for district improvement and professional practice, which he said “reflects the continuation” of the district’s work.
“Do I think we will meet the goals (this year)? I set out to meet them every year in partnership with my team, with the central office, principals. It’s a team effort,” Tutwiler said. “We set out to achieve them because we believe our work with and for the students and their families is that urgent and serious and important. They are not easy goals. It’s a lot of work, (but) this why we’re here, why we chose this profession.”
His intention was for his goals to be driven by the recently completed district strategic plan, which Tutwiler said will shape work in the Lynn Public Schools for the next five years. The plan focuses on developing an inclusive learning environment that allows students to reach their full potential.
Following the school year, Tutwiler will compile an End of Cycle Report, a Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE)-required self-assessment of whether his goals were met that is used by the School Committee as part of the superintendent evaluation process.
He released his report for the 2018-19 school year in October, which showed he met his goals centered around district improvement and professional practice, and made “some progress” toward, but did not meet his three student learning goals.
The superintendent’s three student learning goals are meeting DESE accountability targets for English Language Arts and mathematics for non-high school students with disabilities; increasing the percentage of students making progress toward English language proficiency to 50 percent; and meeting DESE targets for chronic absenteeism at the high school and non-high school levels.
The state accountability system is based on MCAS scores, student growth, high school completion, progress toward English proficiency and chronic absenteeism.
The thinking, he said, was that by increasing the achievement of the district’s two lowest performing subgroups, students with disabilities and English Language Learners (ELLs), that would in turn, increase the performance of all students.
“The overarching student learning goal is to increase achievement for all students,” Tutwiler said. “This is what we’re identifying as indicators of work toward that end. We kept those because we think those are rigorous goals. They reflect groups of students that historically had disparate outcomes. As a reflection of the work that we’re doing with all students, we want to make sure those students are elevating in terms of their outcomes.”
Last year’s goal was to increase students making progress toward English language proficiency from 48 to 52 percent, but the percentage slipped to 46 percent. The goal of increasing the percentage of those students by 4 points remains the same.
For students with disabilities, the focus has shifted from working toward an academic achievement gap closing measure, such as was the case last year to working toward meeting state accountability targets. Last year, performance for non-high school special education students increased, but the gap grew because it was outpaced by the performance of their regular education counterparts, Tutwiler said.
By meeting targets, Tutwiler said that would be progress toward closing the achievement gap.
Tutwiler’s four district improvement goals are developing a three-year technology plan; implementing the district’s five-year plan for a more diverse workforce, which is aimed at increasing staff of color by 1 percent each year; developing a comprehensive social-emotional learning curriculum for the secondary level for implementation in the 2020-21 school year; and developing a plan to maximize learning and growth opportunities to strengthen the overall student learning experience at the high school level.
The SEL goal would be building on a curriculum that has already been developed and implemented at the elementary level. The curriculum and approach will differ at the secondary level, he said, where students have different needs.
The district’s technology plan will focus on developing a strategy to build the foundation for how to better use technology for instruction. A framework for technology in the district will be developed, he said.
Increasing staff diversity, another goal, has been a focus of the district this year, which is based on research that shows that students perform better if they can see themselves reflected in their teachers.
Although the goal appears general, the strategies for increasing the overall experience for high school students is not, Tutwiler said. A high school design initiative, which includes portable classrooms and alternative schedules is aimed at decreasing high school overcrowding.
Other efforts include an early college initiative and expanded career and technical access to provide more opportunities for students after high school.
“We’re thinking about how do we need to evolve the experience of high school to allow for students more diverse learning opportunities and how are we evolving the high school experience in ways that accommodate the needs of our students,” Tutwiler said. “Those are big questions.”
