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North High outlines SAIL-driven lesson-clarity work and reports early gains
Summary
The Eau Claire Area School Board heard a presentation from district teaching-and-learning staff and North High School leaders on the SAIL (ASSA) professional-learning program, the school’s 100-day improvement cycles and early indicators of reduced credit recovery and higher test participation.
The Eau Claire Area School Board on an unspecified April evening heard staff from the district’s teaching and learning office and North High School present the school’s work with the ASSA SAIL (School Administrators Institute for Transformational Leadership) program and a district instructional framework aimed at improving “lesson clarity.”
Manny Vanbleed, executive director of teaching and learning, told the board the district sends three schools per year to the two‑year SAIL program and that North High is in year two of the work. He described SAIL as one component of a larger district strategy that pairs a guaranteed and viable curriculum with coordinated professional learning, coaching and principal classroom observations.
Kim Koehler, principal at North High School, described the school’s adult‑learning framework anchored on five components — learning targets, success criteria, checks for understanding, engagement strategies, and scaffolding and differentiation — and said the school uses 100‑day Plan‑Do‑Study‑Act cycles to roll proven practices into classrooms. "Our commitment is to implement the 5 components," Koehler said. "We anticipate from our work with SAIL that our work around lesson clarity will take 2 to 3 years to be implemented fully in all classrooms at North High School."
Jordan Fish, a North High health teacher, gave a classroom example: teachers post the daily learning target and success criteria where students can see them and reference them throughout the lesson. "The important piece is that the learning target and success criteria is present and accessible to students throughout the entirety of the lesson so they can continue to refer back to it," Fish said.
School leaders described how the district measures implementation: instructional coaches and administrators commit to classroom observations and walkthroughs (described as at least once a month per classroom) and teams meet regularly to use that observational data to target professional learning. Early school data shared with the board included a marked drop in the number of freshmen needing summer credit recovery (the presenter said that figure is 26 for the cohort discussed) and a 91% participation rate among rostered students in the preACT administration noted as evidence of student engagement.
Board members asked how the district will disaggregate impact data. Koehler and others said the district plans to examine preACT/ACT and student‑climate survey results by subgroups (for example, students with IEPs, students of color, gender) and to use those breakdowns to evaluate whether performance gains are equitably distributed.
The presentation emphasized that SAIL and North’s lesson‑clarity focus are one part of broader district work that includes curriculum review, coaching and expanded pupil services. Board members praised the approach and asked for follow‑up data in future monitoring reports.
The board did not take any formal policy or funding action during the presentation; the item was a board development report and discussion.
