| State: Washington DC | Number of Students: 1,420 |
| School Type: Charter Management Organization | Free and Reduced Lunch: N/A |
| Grade Level: 6-12 | English Language Learners: N/A |
School Context
This traditional public college-prep charter school system made up of 4 schools is looking to fast forward into the 21st century. They are just beginning to implement blended learning and slowly rolling out a 1:1 initiative. This charter believes that students will be the change agents in their community and world. The school population are largely first-generation college students who do not have the supports to navigate the college system and culture and the school is taking the responsibility to make these opportunities for students available.
State of Technology
The school reports that a significant portion of students are scoring 40% below grade level on their MAPS test. Even taking into account other factors, they see that intervention is needed, but additional support in the classroom is also needed.
Their current solution is solely an intervention program that is too pricey. Additionally, the training for the teachers was too involved and expensive that led to poor implementation. They really need a solution that balances time and sustainability.
Tech Needs & Requirements
In their ideal solution. The school would have actionable data from the tool that would empower teachers to transform learning both in everyday and in an intervention tool. The school is looking for two significant solutions, intervention, a solely intervention tool would be scaled to 400 students, and supplementary to reinvent learning in all English Language Arts classrooms. The school would ideally like to hear about how the tools satisfies the following ideal features.
They would like targeted instruction on phonics. They would like the content to be rigorous and to offer scaffolding for reading comprehension and close reading skills. They would prefer to have accessible data and for it to be actionable and informative. The school would like the teacher training and onboarding to be intuitive and cost effective. They would like a good looking teacher dashboard that is intuitive, if possible. There should be some transparency on the student interface so that students can keep track of their own progress. In terms of intervention, they would like to be able to see where all students are in skill level, regardless of grade level.
They should be able to see where they are, but it is not necessary for them to control content and pacing.
Teachers for the smaller intervention classes may act like coaches, helping students along the way. However, the hope is that enough work in the core classes will lead to better scores and so they will not need intervention courses. The teachers in the core class, will work the supplemental tool to complement the lesson to reinforce skills.
The tool must provide engaging content appropriate for high school regardless of skill-level, actionable data to inform instruction immediately that is downloadable to CSV, cost transparency for all components and Common-Core aligned. The school provides 1:1 Chromebooks. All data should be available to teachers and to admins. They will use it to inform instruction. The tool should be Common Core aligned and integrate with Powerschool and Clever.