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Red River High highlights RTI 'rider time' and early assessment gaps as priorities for 2025–26
Summary
Red River High School administrators told the Grand Forks school board that "rider time" (an RTI model) is the school's central strategy for 2025–26, citing early gains in attendance and interventions while flagging discrepancies between early NDA Plus interim results and summative assessments.
Red River High School administrators presented a schoolwide plan centered on RTI, known locally as "rider time," and gave the Grand Forks Public Schools board an early look at assessment and climate data in the Nov. 10 meeting.
Dr. Lisonbee, joined by Associate Principal Tyler Hepperly and instructional coach Andrea Altapeter, said the school is emphasizing RTI because, "When RTI is implemented at a high level with fidelity, you have a 1.29 effect size," and that the school is still improving implementation. He said RTI sessions, delivered during a scheduled rider-time period, create regular opportunities for students to access teachers and for staff to target interventions.
Athletic director Tyron Nelson described two student-facing programs tied to the effort: a Leadership Council of about 50 student leaders that helps welcome freshmen and a Freshman Mentoring Program pairing upperclassmen with incoming students. Nelson said more than 100 upperclassmen applied to be mentors this year.
Administrators flagged a measurement issue: early-year NDA Plus interim results appear to align poorly with summative results because the NDA Plus items are aligned to end-of-year standards and were given three weeks into the school year. Dr. Lisonbee said that created unexpectedly low proficiency rates on some interim reports and that the district and state are discussing how to interpret those figures.
The presentation also covered multiple readiness metrics the state tracks. Dr. Lisonbee said Red River had 69% of its graduating seniors classified as "choice ready," 84% meeting workforce-ready indicators and 62% meeting military-ready indicators, noting the ASVAB requirement and recent rollout affect the military-ready number.
Administrators pointed to other early outcomes they view as positive: reduced student absences under the district's attendance policy and a drop in course failures, which they attributed in part to better access to teacher support during rider time. Mr. Hepperly said the school has built 92 rider-time schedules and recorded more than 7,100 sessions since April 2024, including 1,718 targeted intervention sessions.
Board members asked about parent notification and counselor workload; staff said counselors are heavily involved in scholarship tracking and in communicating interventions for students with IEPs and 504 plans, though they acknowledged some communications are handled case by case rather than through a single districtwide push.
The presentation closed with academic goals: a district literacy target to raise proficiency from 48% to 56% and a math goal to raise proficiency from 41% to 49%, supported by department-level professional development and cross-curricular strategies.
The board did not take action on the presentation; members thanked the Red River team and moved to other agenda items.
