Lansing Sun

The Lansing School District board of education held a special study session meeting recently, and the main topic of conversation during the meeting was the progress and continued efforts in their identified partnership schools.

Regarding the multi-tiered system of support (MTSS) for academics, Deputy Superintendent Jessica Benavides said during her presentation, "This is one the board is probably heard the most about, especially with our 90-day presentations, and this is an area where this goal in particular will carry us through to our 36-month benchmark.”

The MTSS program has a goal of increasing student proficiency by June 2025.

“So, this is where we have to increase proficiency in ELA, proficiency in math as measured by Mstep and SAT, and then also growth – net growth – so, that's that one-year growth we should be seeing in all our students," Benavides said.

The partnership schools are those that were identified last November as a part of the state’s programs to comply with Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). Michigan evaluates schools based on proficiency, growth, graduation rate, English Learner Progress, school quality, assessment participation and EL participation. The majority of a school’s score comes from Student Growth (34%) and Student Proficiency (29%). Officials weigh each of the categories and score all schools based on the percentage of each category target met, with a perfect score being 100 points. All schools that score under 23.88 are identified as partnership schools with a designation of CSI. This level changes each year and the cut-off score is determined so that it covers that bottom 5% of schools.

Identified schools can range from CSI (bottom 5%), ATS (a student subgroup in the bottom 5% and one or more student subgroup in the bottom 25%) or TSI (a student subgroup in the bottom 25%). The district had two schools identified as ATS, Dwight Rich and Sheridan Road. Thirteen were officially designated as CSI schools. These included Attwood, Averill, Gardner, Gier Park, J.W. Sexton, Lyons, Mt. Hope, North, Reo, Wexford, CAK120, Eastern and Everett.

The district signed the partnership agreement with the Michigan Department of Education this week and will have to give an 18-month benchmark update by November of 2024, with a final evaluation in December of 2025.

The Michigan Department of Education partners with the school through some funding avenues, resources, information and accountability timelines to help them improve the designation of their school. Each building has created a unique plan with specific goals, like attendance levels, academic growth numbers and additional support for students, that they will strive to achieve. For the younger schools, they are also really focusing on creating behavioral expectations to promote better habits and a better learning environment for students and teachers alike.