District+Improvement+Plan.Austin+ISD+vs.+My+District

Obtaining a copy of our district improvement plan was quiet the challenge. Our district does not have what I would consider to be a traditional improvement plan. As a campus principal, the development of the campus improvement plan was organized in such a manner that you provided goals, strategies, actions, resources, timelines and measurable outcomes. I was expecting to find a similar document for our district. However, what I found was a summary of the elementary department, secondary department, and instructional support services improvement plans that were based on the district goals.

The district level committee creates the district goals and then they are approved by the board. These goals are on our website and are shared with all stakeholders. Each campus is charged with aligning their campus goals with the district gals. Each campus improvement plan includes goals, strategies, action steps, performance measures, targets, and resources. Sometimes, there are actual dollar amounts included as part of the resources that will be utilized. The campus improvement plans are submitted to the elementary and secondary assistant superintendents. The campus plans are combined to create two separate documents - Department of Secondary Education Improvement Plan and Department of Elementary Education Improvement Plan. The separate departments that are considered support services submit their plans to the assistant superintendent of instruction. Their plans are combined to create the Instructional Support Services Improvement plan. These three documents are referred to as the short forms. Each of them includes the department goals, strategies, action steps, performance measures and targets. Resources and timelines are not included. There is not one unified document that is the district improvement plan. It is a notebook that contains all of the individual campus plans and department plans. It is not on the website or available to the public.

The district goals, strategic plan, and district profile are available on the website. The strategic plan and district profile are brochures that include the vision and mission of the district. Both brochures are available throughout the district at campuses and other district buildings. The district level committee meetings agendas, notes and presentations are online well. I believe it would be beneficial to have a comprehensive, easy to locate, district plan of improvement. I had to do a lot of research just to identify what our district plan consisted of. Austin ISD’s plan was organized in a way that explained how the district, campuses and resources were connected. Figure 2 illustrated the alignment of the district and the rest of the plan included the agenda, meeting notes, presentations and at the end how the State Compensatory and External Grant Funding budgets would be spent and the dollar amount. Their Performance Based Monitoring Analysis System in Appendix B was more like a traditional format for a campus improvement plan. I appreciate that they are at least coming to a consensus about the activities needed to improve the graduation rate for cohorts on title one campuses. At least in the Austin ISD improvement plan there was a connection to some funding and how it would be utilized to meet the district’s goals. I view the Austin ISD plan as one that began as well organized and informative but then lacked in a summation at the end. However, there is a document in place and available to the public.

The similarities between our district’s plan and Austin ISD’s plan would be that they both include goals, strategies, activities and measurable outcomes based on district goals. Our district plan lacks transparency and is comprised of various documents located in numerous places with minimal documented connection to the budget. Although I did not think that Austin ISD’s plan was as complete and transparent as it could be, I did appreciate the fact that there is one location for the information and documents that were vital to the creation of the district plan.