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District outlines student-success objectives, literacy supports and competitive summer grant idea
Summary
School staff presented district objectives focused on career planning, attendance, adult-student connections and early-intervention supports, and discussed using SIA, Measure 98 and other grants to fund SLPA hiring and possible summer-learning applications.
Susan, who led the presentation of district objectives, told the committee the board’s strategic-planning work condensed multiple priorities into a set of objectives the district will pursue as it builds next year’s budget.
Susan said the priorities include expanding career planning at middle and high school, increasing regular attendance, connecting every student with an adult for check-ins, developing early identification and supports for students at risk of not graduating, and initiating long-term facility planning. “Develop a program where teachers at all levels identify students at risk of not graduating and provide supports across all future grades for those students,” Susan said.
On literacy and early intervention, the district explained it has added a speech-language pathology assistant (SLPA) at Clemens Primary School to support young readers who do not meet special-education thresholds but benefit from targeted help. Susan said the SLPA role was recommended by the speech-language pathologist to provide early oral-reading interventions that can help struggling K–1 students.
The presentation also reviewed grant funding sources the district uses: SIA (Student Investment Account), Measure 98 for high-school success programming, the integrated guidance structure that brings several state grants together, and a separate early-literacy grant. Jennifer noted the district used student-success grant and some general-fund dollars to cover an elementary math curriculum adoption of about $100,000.
Susan described a new competitive summer-learning grant with a tight turnaround (applications due March 20) that could award grants up to roughly $1,000,000 over three years. She said eligibility rules include 80 hours of continuous instruction, which would require the district to consider full-day or extended summer programming to qualify. “So it would be 3 year grant,” Susan said; the committee discussed whether to commit staff time to preparing the application given the district’s likely score in the ranking.
What’s next: Staff will evaluate which grants and objectives to prioritize with limited new state funding for additional reporting or accountability work. The budget committee was asked to weigh how much staff time to devote to competitive grant applications and program expansions.
