Classrooms in USD 257 schools, kindergarten through grade 12, will have occasional visitors this year.
Board members were told Monday night that administrators and teachers will drop in on classes as part of an instructional practices inventory. The outcome anticipated is improvement of the learning process.
Jack Stanley and David Grover, middle and high schools principals, outlined the process.
The visits won’t be to learn “what teachers are doing, rather what students are doing,” Stanley said, and to determine what teaching strategies aren’t being used.
Observers will stay only a few minutes in each classroom. Visits will occur on typical school days when no special events are planned.
Observers will look for six levels of instruction: complete disengagement by the student; students working without teacher engagement; students working with teacher engagement; teacher-led instruction; students learning through conversations; students actively engaged in the learning process.
“This isn’t meant as a teacher evaluation, rather to improve learning opportunities for students,” Stanley said, by encouraging them to be more involved in the learning process.
The instructional practices inventory will be the topic of an in-service session Monday.
Gail Dunbar, curriculum director, told board members the district had contracted with the Curriculum Learning Institute, Emporia, to help “establish a rather extensive process for developing, aligning and adopting curriculum.
“This year we will focus on math, as well as create a process that will carry on with other subject in future years,” she said.
NO COMMENTS were offered at a public hearing on the 2010-11 budget.
The budget, as reported two weeks ago, predicts net expenditures of $17 million, including $12.5 million for general operations, $2.14 million for special education and $1 million for at-risk education.
The property tax levy to support the budget is 48.317 mills, .068 of a mill less than last school year.
BRETT LINN, technology director, told board members that district computer systems are “a lot more up to date and more secure” than last year with updates made to virus protection and spam interception programs.
Also, rewiring and adding wireless routers was done at Iola High School, allowing Internet use of laptops over a wider area.
FOLLOWING a 10-minute executive sessions, Joey Hand was hired to teach elementary music and non-certified employees were rehired through a blanket motion.
