District VisionIthaca City School District (ICSD) is a high-performing district in New York, but administrators hope to achieve more. Their vision is to create a community of learners by engaging, educating, and empowering 6000+ thinkers. Ithaca’s definition of thinkers includes not only students, but teachers and administrators who can all learn from each other.

The district is led by Superintendent Dr. Luvelle Brown. Dr. Brown believes strongly in “the moral imperative”, the need to raise the bar and close the achievement gap for all students, championed by educational reform expert Michael Fullan. To prepare each and every student for college and career, Dr. Brown and his staff are transforming ICSD from traditional classroom methods to new and different instructional methods.

ICSD seeks to engage students in their own personalized learning process. By getting students actively involved in the planning, execution, and tracking of their progress towards learning goals, the district has made tremendous strides. It has increased student engagement and achievement. Success can be attributed to a cultural shift towards open communications and trust among teachers, administrators, parents, and students who fully support the district’s vision.

Ithaca City School DistrictA District’s Personalized Learning Story

ImpactWhen a visitor observes a day in the life of an ICSD student, they see a world far removed from the traditional classroom. Students are no longer restrained by a 39 minute class period as their learning now takes place 24x7. Students watch lecture videos at their own pace, complete assignments, work with their peers on group projects, and ask teachers questions via the internet outside of the classroom. Physical classrooms are no longer set-up with desks facing the teacher but in flexible, group configurations to allow collaboration.

Working with their teachers, students at ICSD set their own learning targets that are aligned to the Common Core Learning Standards. Students create their own assessments to demonstrate mastery of the standards and the rubrics by which they will be judged. To demonstrate accountability, students also lead their own parent-teacher conferences.

As the student’s role has evolved, so has the teacher’s role. Rather than lecture students on facts they must memorize, teachers are becoming mentors, facilitating deeper discussions and performance-based activities to encourage critical thinking, communication, creativity, and collaboration. They are shifting their instructional methods to deliver new information via the internet outside of the classroom and using the time in class to work side by side with individuals and student groups to clarify areas of confusion, and to coach students as they work towards their learning targets.

Teachers in ICSD participate in regularly scheduled data-informed Professional Learning Communities (PLCs). Similar to students, teachers are invited to participate in PLCs when it’s most convenient for them, 24x7, online. To inform PLC conversations and planning with students, ICSD teachers use data including attendance, tardiness, assessment scores, etc. for each student to ensure that all are on track for success. Issues or patterns across groups of students are identified early and addressed in a timely fashion.

To engage, educate, and empower staff, virtual professional development courses are offered. This allows for staff to personalize their professional development plan, and continually develop their skills as they shift to new ways of thinking about teaching and learning and put that into practice. They communicate and learn from colleagues within the district and around the world, on a frequent basis via formal and informal PD and communication channels.

One of the biggest differences for Ithaca’s teachers has been adapting to the 24x7 education model. In the traditional classroom, teachers communicated with students during the class period or after school. With the growth of technology, students are doing more work outside the classroom and teachers need to be available to respond to questions and provide guidance in the evenings and weekends.

Communication and Technology To implement their vision of a community of learners, ICSD focused first on working with all school constituent groups to develop a plan for how to make vision a reality. Then, based on their feedback, students and teachers were empowered with a vision and plan. Based on the vision and plan, technology tools and partners were chosen to provide the necessary support. This approach differs from many districts in that the vision for engaging and empowering students came first, and was used to inform the technology plan that would be necessary to achieve the vision.

For example, ICSD encourages students to “bring your own device” to school at the secondary level rather than providing hardware for a 1:1 technology initiative. “I know people are coming to our classrooms every day with multiple devices on their person. So we’re customizing their experience in a way where they need to access that device or multiple devices to do the kind of work that we’re asking them to do,” explained Dr. Brown.

To inform PLCs and to ensure that all stakeholders are informed about individual and group performance, ICSD uses an instructional management system (Schoolnet) which “provides a detailed portfolio of information to educators about student performance” to track learning goals, state assessments, etc. According to Dr Brown, “This information allows for a differentiated and personalized approach to meeting the needs of individual students.”

ICSD utilizes technology tools to develop two-way communications with the community to build an understanding of the district’s vision. Traditional communications like visits to homes, churches, and hair salons, are supplemented by website postings, emails, and social media tools like Twitter. In fact, Dr. Brown recently published a book “#ThinkTweets: 100 transformative tweets for educators” to share his best practices with other educators.

In the spirit of transparent and ongoing communication with the whole ICSD community, ICSD publishes a Balanced Scorecard and an Equity Report Card on the district website. The Balanced Scorecard includes specific indicators of success, such as attendance and tardiness to measure student response to personalized learning (see Figure 1). Importantly the Equity Report Card tracks the districts progress in closing the achievement gap and is able to boast great progress.

Dr. Brown’s efforts to improve communications have paid off. In the first year of an annual community survey, 80% of respondents said that the district was successful in establishing two-way communications. This met the district’s benchmark and they aim higher from here.

Figure 1:

Ithaca’s Balance Scorecard

Evidence For Ithaca, the growth seen since implementing its vision has been remarkable. For non-academic improvements like those monitored on Ithaca’s Balanced Scorecard, enrollment in advanced level coursework has increased 12% since 2013, disciplinary incidents have decreased by 73%, and absences have decreased by 18%. “Young people, when truly engaged, are coming to school. When they have a truly personalized experience, they are here,” Dr. Brown explained.

In terms of academic improvements, the results speak for themselves. Since the switch to personalized learning, graduation rates increased from 78% to 90% (see Figure 2) and SAT scores are up 36 points. More students are reading on grade level or above and ICSD is closing achievement gaps district wide. “Now we know what it looks and feels like to be truly engaged instead of just strategically compliant. I never anticipated this level of success,” Dr. Brown concluded. “I’ve seen students become frustrated and emotional in class, not because of a bad lesson, but because they are truly invested in learning.”

While Dr. Brown is proud of the district’s success with his DO goals (raising attendance, graduation rates, assessment scores, etc.), he is now focusing on his BE goals. BE goals are harder to define as they are environmental. They are the feeling that one gets when one walks into a classroom where everyone is 100% engaged in individualized learning. Although ISCD classrooms are at different levels of engagement now, the district’s transformation towards a sustainable, fully-engaged learning community is well underway.

For more information on Personalized Learning, visit pearsonschool.com/three

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Dr. Brown’s Book Recommendations

Love Works: Seven Timeless Principles for Effective Leaders Joel Manby

Creating Innovators: The Making of Young People Who Will Change the World Tony Wagner

Figure 2:

4-Year Graduation Rate at ICSD High School (2009 cohort as of August 2013)78% 85% 86% 90%