Pembroke principals present school improvement plans focused on literacy, SEL and technology

Principals from Pembroke's elementary, middle and high schools presented school improvement plans at the Dec. 2 School Committee meeting, outlining priorities intended to raise achievement, expand social-emotional supports and improve technology and facilities.

At the elementary level, a principal said the school's plan centers on five areas: piloting simplified writing and FOSS science, launching a weekly "student of the week" recognition tied to monthly core values, continuing Unified Sports programming, auditing digital subscriptions to ensure fidelity of use (MCAS, I-Ready, DIBELS, Lexia) and improving facilities tracking so maintenance requests are logged and addressed more consistently.

Another elementary principal told the committee teachers have split achievement metrics (K'2–2 and 3'2–5) to monitor growth, will continue DIBELS and I-Ready usage, will survey families about communications preferences, and is addressing safety-related facility work such as door latches.

The North school principal outlined preschool-readiness efforts — including a proposed spring "boot camp" aligned with screening to help families prepare children for school routines and pre-academic skills — and said the school has expanded its student-support team and small-group mental-health work. He also thanked the committee for funding lighting and filtered water-fountain projects.

At the middle school, the principal emphasized student leadership development, monthly career-and-academic-planning lessons, group guidance strategies to improve executive-functioning skills and plans to reinvigorate in-school student-ambassador activities. The principal also said the school will launch a communications survey and recruit volunteers for the library.

High-school principal Talbert tied two NEASC-derived priority goals to district's applied-learning vision and said a two-year pilot with a small group of "early adopter" teachers will model active-learning strategies and diversified assessment approaches. He described social-emotional coaching to be provided to staff via contracted consultant Alexis Reed and district technology priorities developed with Mike Tinker, including device lifecycle management, data security, Wi-Fi migration to the cloud and installing classroom charging stations.

Committee members praised the revival of a faculty council at the high school and asked how progress will be measured; Talbert said observers will use a locally developed rubric to assess classroom shifts and that a NEASC progress report is due in February. The committee acknowledged the school improvement plans (the plans are developed by school councils and are not formal committee approvals).