Sept. 22nd Board Meeting

Last night the board heard a presentation from Dr. Charles Venegoni, who is the Division Head of English and Fine Arts @ John Hersey High School in Arlington, IL. Dr. Venegoni's presentation focused on his Aligned by Design, which as systematic approach to education. Thru this approach John Hersey and other schools who have adopted this approach have achieved some, what I would call, significant results on the ACT Test.

The data presented by Dr. Venegoni paints a very good picture of this system. It really showed how all students benefit from this system. Aligned by Design has been implemented at some very diverse districts (both economically and racially) and the results have been very good. One of the things that I found interesting is that the data also shows that the higher the students score on the Explore test (taken in 8th grade) the higher their potential to score on the ACT (taken in 11th grade). That seems logical, but what I liked most was that the growth this system showed vs. others.

For the the schools that scored with in 1 point of Northtown Academy (one of the schools using this system in Chicago) on the Explore test none had the growth that Northtown did. Of the 11 different data groups only 4 had an improvement of 5 or better. Two of these four data groups started with scores more than 5.9 points higher than Northtown Academy. Northtown Academy had a 5.1 growth by their students. That to me is an impressive testament to this system.

There was lots of data and lots of information presented last night. I won't go over it all, but please visit the district website as they will be putting up much of the information their, if not all of it. I just wanted to point out one of the facts that really impressed me amongst all of the things presented.

I do have some concerns with this system. One is that it is a departure from current practice and how will it be received by the building administrators, the staff, the students and the public. Dr. Venegoni and his staff have had quite a bit of interaction with our staff, so this potential change would not be a total surprise. Another fear is that, as Dr. Venegoni stated, the district needs a champion of this system to be the face of it, to push it, to oversee it, to....etc. We may have this person(s), but we need to identify them.

The Curriculum was another concern because this system does not use textbooks exclusively. The curriculum is developed by the staff. Dr. Venegoni stated that a lot of the materials being used by other districts on this system could be adapted to our district. Dr. Venegoni also stated that the curriculum developers in those other districts would be willing to share their curriculum for a price. Which led me to the last of my 4 major concerns...COST. Dr. Venegoni did provide a figure for potentially utilizing some of the materials already developed. I will not state what that figure was because it will change depending on many factors, but let me say it was significantly less than the amount we are setting aside for text books now.

Many of the other board members seemed to share my concerns to varying degrees. I think that all of them can be answered very quickly by Craig and his admin. team. Because this is like the 3rd time Dr. Venegoni and/or his staff have been in the district talking about this I think finding the right person or persons to champion this cause will be easy. I think the district as a whole will also embrace a change to this system as WE ALL learn more about it. I do not think that cost would prohibit implementation.

We as a board either collectively or individually did not pose the questions to Craig about a champion of the cause or how the change would be received @ MGHS. I did think about it while other questions where being asked and answered. However, I did not feel it would be right to put him on the spot to answer those immediately after hearing this presentation. I still feel that way as I am still trying to digest everything we heard last night and to pose that question just would not have been fair.

I hope that WE, as a district, continue to investigate this systematic approach to education. If it makes sense educationally and provides the best opportunities for our students then we owe it to them to investigate this system fully.