Getting from 50/50/50 to 90/90/90-reflections and resurrections

I thought of resurrecting a piece of reading I have stacked away in my mental files on schools that are 90-90-90 (See D. Reeves here).  These schools serve a student population where 90% receive free and reduced lunch, 90% are members of an ethnic minority group, yet 90% perform at or above district or state academic standards.

There are some valuable lessons to be garnered from a quick re-read of this NCLB era research, namely that effective teaching and leadership make a difference, and a great difference when effectiveness is ensured year after year.

These schools do something different than other hard working buildings of staff do, namely:

90-90-90s are persistent, and I would add they are urgent.  They take a no excuses approach to their responsibility to ensure not only student learning, but student attainment and achievement.

90-90-90's use replicable systems and practices.  They ensure that these systems are replicable at each grade level across their site.  They inspire other leaders to learn from them how to create adult capacity.

90-90-90's are consistent in their area of emphasis.  While they modify for local contexts, these schools emphasize the abbreviated following as shared in their entirety here:

•  Devoted Time for Teacher collaboration: teachers collaborate routinely with student learning as the focus an and artifacts of learning as the evidence. Teachers meet together to review student achievement data at a deep level, including the sub-scale scores related to standards.
• Performance assessment: student learning is tested and assessed frequently with opportunities to strengthen learning and attainment
• Informational Text Writing: student learning is demonstrated through information writing/write to think across the curriculum and as assessment of their learning
• Focus is clear: teachers become excellent on highly focused practices that leads to student learning that are systemic across the site and levels served within the building/district.
• Displays of Proficiency: every teacher displays proficient and exemplary student work in a highly visible manner. The result of these displays was that every student, parent, and teacher had a clear and consistent understanding of what the school-wide scoring rubrics meant in practice. 
• Principal: involved in the direct instructional leadership of the school, taking personal responsibility for evaluating student work with teacher teams 

Next steps for any teacher leader-encourage your PLC to make a commitment to discuss student learning using artifacts of their learning, or any other form of data.  Encourage your PLC, or grade level partner or ESL/Special Ed Co-teacher to assess student learning frequently to craft effective feedback so students can respond to and deepen their learning.  Choose to increase the amount, quality and type of writing you ask your students to produce to communicate their learning-we have so many great models and practices that support our practice (Claim, Evidence and Reason is just one, but a living practice in SDW).  Begin or continue to discuss with your learners the criteria for their success in meeting daily objectives for learning.

There are infinite opportunities for team leaders to internalize some of the big ideas here in preparation for the opportunity deepen messaging, tighten up and recommit to the focus, and prepare our teams to analyze the systems that create and sustain highly effective schools for all learners..