April 20, 2017 Hello AMSD Superintendents! The 11 World Cafes and one student conference conducted across the metropolitan area by the approximately 35 school districts have yielded an enormous amount of rich ideas, suggestions, and ‘thoughts about public education in our school districts. On behalf of the leadership team and the Association of Metropolitan School Districts, your leadership and hospitality at all the café’s have yielded {great ideas for all of us. Please extend our appreciation to everyone who made this part of our work successfull ‘The Ad Hoc Committee of Equity and Integration are now faced with the task of studying and lifting the voices from the café’s data. Superintendents and other regional leaders have had the opportunity to look at the data. You can access the synthesized data at the links below: hun /drive google.com /fle/¢/OBN. WUivORK V2kLeN/EpbZzWUU view? usp-sharng on a ‘As you would expect there are many rch ideas. We have synthesized, so far, three bold ideas that gue) resonated across all of the cafes. They are summarized below: _ ese yz [perce PEPE Cink tS Oona 1. Personalized education that provides access forall, eliminating predictability. + create a clear curiculum and learning process that i inclusive, relevant and resonate) Requires revrewrot turieultm that provide universal rigorous coursework, access, high expectations, ‘meaningful, relevant and personalized 2. Effective, diverse staff who use relationships to meet the needs of all students. + Students are viewed, valued and respected. + Relationships-student-student, teacher-students, families and school staff. + Welcoming environment. ‘Requires changing district practices to recruit and retain diverse staff; welcome activities in school communities, time and resources for schools and teachers to secure relationships with students and families, 3. Equitable resources (time, talent, funds) aligned to student need. * Adequate and equitable funding for class sizes, technology, and personalized learning. Requires review of funding formulas, law changes, district practices, facilities, and collective action. ‘We want to emphasize that this is our first analysis ofa large quantity of data. We cannot overstate that ‘we have more analysis. However, we are learning that the ideas coming from the data will motivate change in schoo! district practice, legislation, funding, governance and leadership. Analysis will continue over the next month. Our goal is to present a set of recommendations and plan to ‘AMSD Superintendents before this report goes live, to the public, including School Boards. To keep you informed of the ideas emerging from the analysis of the data, we will continue to provide updates of our analysis, As always, please direct any questions or need for clarification to John Schultz ‘Thank you for all your support and work inthis endeavor! ‘AMSD's Ad Hoc Committee on Equity and IntegrationA Learning Model that Enables Every Student to Succeed Each student will have access to all courses in their school and the preparation necessary to be successful because of high expectations for their performance in every class and objectives personalized to their interests, skills and knowledge at the 80% level at the end of each school year. Instructional Programs (rigorous courses, access for all students, high expectations for student performance, universal opportunities, meaningful instruction/curriculum, relevant curriculum, and personalized instruction); Personalized education that provides access for all students, eliminating predictability. Create a clear learning process that is relevant and personalized. Effective and diverse staff, who use relationships to enhance learning Requires new laws regarding programs available to every student, the nature of personalization, the nature of high expectations, the nature of course quality and teacher qualities expectations. More funding will be required to assure the broad curriculum necessary under this plan. There will need to be some MDE rules to carry out the legislation and to assure the level of rigor, Personalization, relevance of curriculum and high expectations for performance envisioned by the plan. School Boards throughout the state will need to have policies supporting the vision of the plan in terms of access to all courses, level of rigor, personalization, relevance of curriculum and high expectations for performance, as well as to assure the assignment of high quality teachers for every student. District administrators will need to assure collective action across their respective district in order to secure uniform application of the state laws, MDE rules and School Board policies. District administrators will need to assure that practices by building administrators and teachers secure the actions sought. Union contracts will need to be renegotiated to secure the expected support of teachers for the plan's goals. Curricula at all levels will need to be revised to challenge students and provide relevant experiences to personalize the leaming. Adequate technology will need to be made available to enable the levels of learning through the new curricula developed