1

MEASURE
Mission, Element, Analyze, Stakeholders-Unite, Results, Educate,
A Six-step Accountability Process for School Counselors
Name and Address of School: John Overton High School
4820 Franklin Road
Nashville, TN 37220
Principal: Dr. Pelham
Name of Counselor(s) Leading the Initiative: Susan Vaughn
Enrollment: 1900
School Demographics:
2014-2015 Subgroups Tally

Ethnicity

Gender

ELL

ED

14.26 %

47.89 % Y

21.42 %

71.20 %

21.96 %

52.11 % N

78.58 %

28.80 %

28.74 %

SWD

LEP

0.11 %

0.16 %

7.86 % Y

25.22 %

34.76 %

92.14 % N

74.78 %

STEP ONE: MISSION

Mission
Connect your work to your schools mission in keeping with the ASCA or your
states comprehensive school counseling model.
Your school and departments mission statement is:
To prepare students to be college ready, career ready, and life ready.
STEP TWO: ELEMENT

Stone & Dahir, 2003; 2005 rev.

2
Element
What critical data element are you trying to impact? (Examples include:
grades; test scores; attendance; promotion rates; graduation rates;
postsecondary-going rate; enrollment into honors or AP courses, special
education; discipline referral data; etc.
What is the baseline for the data element? Where do you hope to move it goal?
Element: E.L. 9th Grade Completion of the School Choice Application
Baseline: This was a new process, therefore we had no data from last year. Baseline
for this year is that no student had ever completed this application before.
Goal: 95% of the enrolled E.L Freshmen will complete the school choice application by
the due date.

STEP THREE: ANALYZE

Analyze the data element. You can use percentages, averages, raw scores, quartiles,
or stanines. You can aggregate or disaggregate the data to better understand which
students are meeting success. You can disaggregate by gender, race, ethnicity, socioeconomic status or in a multitude of ways to look at student groupings.
The Baseline Data revealed:
Students had never completed this application process before. The counselors had
never seen the application before. This was a completely new process, therefore we
were all starting from scratch.
STEP FOUR: STAKEHOLDERS - UNITE
STAKEHOLDERS - UNITE to develop strategies to impact the data element
Beginning Date: 11/05/2014
Ending Date: 12/05/2014
Stakeholders
School Counselor(s)

Strategies

Stone & Dahir, 2003; 2005 rev.

Went to classrooms to discuss the

process and went over the different
academies our school has. Invited
students and teachers from the
different academies to give a
presentation. Watched the virtual
tour.
Went to the classrooms to help
students enter the information into
the computer. Helped with academy

Administrator(s)

Teachers

Students

Translators

questions, ID numbers, and how

many choices they needed to make.
Called students who were not in the
classes to my office to complete the
application one on one and make
sure they had all of their information
in correctly.
Celia Jolly
Helped us when we helped students
get their information inputted.
Allowed us to interrupt their classes
to get students out of class to input
their information.
Gave mini tours to our students to
the different academies at Overton.
Inputted their information.
Filled out the paper application so I
could help input their application, if
there was a language barrier.
Helped translate if we did not have a
translator in the building who spoke
the students language.
Helped translate for our students who
do not speak English. Explained our
different academies and helped them
fill out the paper application.

STEP FIVE: RESULTS

Results: Restate your baseline data. State where your data is now. Did you meet your
goal?
Restate baseline data: Before, nobody had completed an application.
Results (data now): All non-truant, enrolled E.L. 9th grade students completed the
application by the deadline.
Met Goal: Yes

No ____

Questions to Consider as you examine results and revise your MEASURE:

Which strategies had a positive impact on the data?

Stone & Dahir, 2003; 2005 rev.

4
-Translators had an enormous positive impact on the data. It would not have been
successful without them.
-Cooperation from the teachers had a positive impact.
Which strategies should be replaced, changed, added?
-I would have been more diligent in the beginning, so I would not have had to work so hard
to make the deadline in the end.
-A better understanding of the school options application process would have helped when
explaining to the students.
Based on what you have learned, how will you revise Step Four Stakeholders-Unite?
-I would contact parents to help volunteer. This would help with translation and to get
parent input on the process.
-I would get in to the classrooms to get the teachers to help more with our students who
are either in ELD 1A and ELD 1B, instead of doing it by myself.
How did your MEASURE contribute to systemic change(s) in your school and/or in your
community?
Helping them choose the correct academy and pathway will help students gain skills in
specific areas, which would help these students contribute to the community. This also
helped students connect more with the school, with their teachers, the translators, and
their counselor. This should give these students a sense of belonging in the school, which
is hard sometimes because of the language barrier.

STEP SIX:

EDUCATE

Educate others as to your efforts to move data. Develop a report card that shows how the
work of the school counselor(s) is connected to the mission of the schools and to student
success.
JOHN OVERTON HIGH SCHOOL MEASURE OF SUCCESS
Principal: Dr. Pelham
School Counselor: Susan
Vaughn
Enrollment: 1900

Stone & Dahir, 2003; 2005 rev.

5
Principals Comment

School Counselor(s)s Comment

I was very happy with the results. I
worked diligently to get the student
applications completed and had some
amazing translators to help me.
Critical Data Element (s)
School Choice Application Completion
Systemic Changes
Helping our EL students choose a
pathway to help them gain skills that they
will use once they leave high school.
Stakeholders Involved
Counselor: Susan Vaughn
Administrator: Celia Jolly
Teachers: All Freshmen Teachers
Parents: Parents of EL Freshmen
Students: EL Freshmen

Results
100% of the students who are non-truant EL
freshmen completed the application by the
date the application was due.

Faces behind the Data

Susan Vaughn
Jose Flores
Victoria Bob
Leela Chamlegui
Nasreen Kuvly
Erica Hayes-Schultz
Jennifer Gavigan
Deanna Conn

Colleges and Universities: N/A

Business Partners: N/A

The Educate step in MEASURE has been adapted with permission from the Student Personnel
Accountability Report Card sponsored by the California Department of Education and Los Angeles
County Office of Education.

Stone & Dahir, 2003; 2005 rev.