1. Communicating School Performance and Improvement
The Department encourages all schools to hold parent nights in order to have open and honest conversations with families about school performance and improvements.
In conversations with families over the past year about the development of the new report cards and Louisiana School Finder, many parents told us that they want to hear from their principal about how the school is doing. They accept that their school may not be an A or B as long as school leadership has a clear plan for improvement, and that the school has been improving overall for the past few years.
The release of the school report cards is an opportunity for schools to be proactive in addressing their school’s strengths and areas of opportunity with families, and to build partnerships that will result in increased student achievement.

2. How to Use This Presentation
This presentation is designed to provide school leaders with a template they can use in their conversations with families. Please customize it to best meet your school’s needs.
Slide directions and talking points are in the notes section of the slides.
All RED text, on both the slides and in the talking points, should be updated with your school-specific information.
Slides in the Appendix provide Louisiana’s overall vision for Birth-12 education, successes to-date, and long-term goals.
This presentation uses screenshots from the Louisiana School Finder to highlight the model school’s performance. Please use one of the methods below to insert screenshots for your school.
- For PCs:
- For Macs:

3. Preparing for Your Parent Event
As you plan your parent event, reflect on the following questions about the school year.
How did our students perform? Do they have the knowledge and skills they need to be successful in the next grade level?
In what subject areas are they excelling? Why?
In what subject areas are they struggling? Why?
Which students are struggling the most? Why?
How will we sustain success and address achievement gaps?
What additional supports did we provide students to help them achieve their learning goals?
How engaged were families? What can we do to improve communication with parents this year?

4. Pelican Academy
Parent Night

5. Agenda Looking Back at 2016-2017 2017-2018 Priorities
Supporting Student Learning at Home
Appendix

6. Pelican Pride in
Our Pelican nation had a great year in Here are a few of our successes:
Our students grew from 17 percent mastering grade-level skills at the beginning of the year, to 34 percent mastering grade-level skills at the end of the year. That’s 100 percent improvement.
87 percent of our eighth graders successfully transitioned to high school.
Our fourth grade choir won the state choir competition.
Mr. Theodore was named the Louisiana Elementary School Teacher of the Year.
75 percent of our families attended both of our student-led parent conference nights.
BASED ON YOUR ANSWERS TO THE QUESTIONS ON SLIDE 4, USE THIS SLIDE TO CELEBRATE YOUR SCHOOL AND STUDENTS’ SUCCESSES FROM
Read Slide
Now that we have celebrated student and faculty success, let’s take an in-depth look at how our school performed last year.

7. School Performance
Every public school in Louisiana receives an annual school performance score.
Reported on a 150 point scale, the school performance score communicates how well a school is preparing students for the next level grade level by using student performance on state tests and other metrics such as graduation rates and college credit attainment.
Embed animated video here
TEXT IN RED WILL NEED TO CHANGE BASED ON SCHOOL GRADE SPAN.
Annually, every public school in Louisiana receives a school performance score. The school performance score is reported on a scale from zero to 150, and communicates how well our school is preparing its students for the next level grade-level by looking at student performance on state tests and other metrics such as graduation rates and college credit attainment.
Let’s take a look at how school performance scores are calculated. PLAY VIDEO

8. How to View Our School Report Card
This year, school report cards are available in the new Louisiana School Finder at The school finder allows families to find information about their own school, or help them find a school when they are moving to a new city or area within the state. The School Finder includes information on all early childhood centers and programs, traditional public, charter, magnet and alternative schools, and school participating in the Louisiana Scholarship program.
So let’s take a look and see how our school performed last year. If you would like to follow along, go to ww.louisianaschools.com on your phone and type in Pelican Elementary.

9. 2016-2017 School Performance Score and Letter Grade
USE THESE SLIDES TO WALK FAMILIES THROUGH YOUR SCHOOL REPORT CARD. SCREEN SHOTS CAN BE EXTRACTED DIRECTLY FROM SCHOOL FINDER, OR INFORMATION CAN BE PRESENTED IN A BULLETED LIST.
Example Talking Pt: This past year, our school received a school performance score of 90.6 and a letter grade of a B.

10. School Performance Score Trend and Comparison
IF YOUR SCHOOL HAS DECLINED OVER THE PAST COUPLE OF YEARS, SHARE INFORMATION WITH FAMILIES ON WHAT YOU ARE DOING TO CHANGE THAT TRAJECTORY THIS YEAR.
Example Talking Pt: Our school has increased its school performance score 14.3 points in the past three years, and is one of the higher performing schools in our district!

11. Student Performance
USE THIS SLIDE TO REINFORCE THAT STUDENTS IN LOUISIANA WHO SCORE “MASTERY” (LEVEL 4) ARE THOSE THAT ARE FULLY READY FOR NEXT GRADE LEVEL. IT IS ALSO THE EXPECTATION IN OTHER STATES. OUR KIDS CAN DO THIS.
Example Talking Pt: While the percent of students scoring Mastery has doubled in the past year due to the hard work of our faculty, we still have room to grow to reach the goal of at least 50% of our students scoring at Mastery by 2025.
Additionally, we will focus on ensuring that more of our freshmen are completing at least six Carnegie units in 9th grade, which is the “percent of students on track at the end of 9th grade” that you see here, and that all high school students are mastering the key skills and content in English I and II, Biology, US History, Algebra and Geometry.

12. Student Performance
USE THE STUDENT PERFORMANCE SLIDES TO NOT ONLY COMMUNICATE STUDENT PERFORMANCE IN EACH OF THESE AREAS, BUT TO HIGHLIGHT IMPROVEMENTS YOU ARE MAKING TO BETTER PREPARE STUDENTS FOR THE NEXT GRADE-LEVEL OR COLLEGE OR A CAREER.
Graduation rates are determined by the number of 9th grade students that graduate within four years. Our graduation rate is at 79% which is above the state average. However, this still means that 2 out of 10 of the 9th grade students are not crossing the finish line.
Additional Information is provided here about how well our school is preparing students for college or a career.
Our counselors are committed to working with families to ensure that all of our students have a clear path to graduation.
We are currently exploring expanding our Jump Start pathway offerings to better meet the interests of our students, and provide them with an industry-based credential that can use in the workforce immediately after graduation.
This summer, we piloted a summer internship program with local business to provide 20 students with an opportunity to job shadow professionals in our engineering sector, while earning a summer wage.
Additionally, we are looking into offering more AP and dual-enrollment options to give students access to college while enrolled at Pelican in order to get our college enrollment rates up.

13. Teacher Workforce
Example Talking Pt: We know that our school is only as good as our teachers, and our report card now provide you with information on the percent of teachers who are certified, and the number of teachers that return to the school year after year.
We love our teachers and apparently they love Pelican Academy too, because we retained nearly 80% of our teachers last year.
The report card will also provide information on how diverse is our teaching staff, which we are proud to say mirrors the diversity our student body.

14. Discipline and Attendance
Another new addition to this year’s report card is information on how well our school is ensuring that students are in classrooms and learning daily.
Example Talking Pt: Here at Pelican Academy, we believe that if students are not in school, they are not learning. Any missed day of school is a day of missed opportunity. Therefore, we work closely with our teaching staff to ensure that they have the training they need to address student discipline issues in the classroom.
As a result, 0% of our students received and out-of-school suspension last year. Additionally, 87% of our students missed fewer than 15 days of school last year.
You are probably asking yourself why is 15 days used as the measure here, which seems like a lot of time out of school? It is, and research research shows that students who miss 15 or more days in any given school year, are much more likely to have lower achievement, be disengaged in school, and at an extreme risk for course failure or dropping out.

15. Agenda Looking Back at 2016-2017 2017-2018 Priorities
Supporting Student Learning at Home
Appendix

16. 2017-2018 Pelican Goals and Priorities
Based on our students’ performance in , Pelican Academy is focused on the following priorities this year and next:
ensuring that 75 percent of students who begin the year behind grade level end the school year on or above grade level;
providing better support to 9th grade students in making the difficult transition into high school;
increasing access to Jump Start pathways, Advanced Placement classes, and dual enrollment courses to all high school students, especially those at risk of dropping out;
providing families with the tools they need to support student learning at home through our new Parent Center.
INSERT SPECIFIC SCHOOL OR SCHOOL SYSTEM GOALS AND PRIORITIES FOR THIS SCHOOL YEAR AND NEXT BASED OFF OF NEEDS ANALYSIS ON SLIDE 4. SHOULD REFLECT THE KEYS PROBLEMS YOUR SCHOOL WILL SOLVE FOR WITHIN THE NEXT YEAR.
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17. Agenda Looking Back at 2016-2017 2017-2018 Priorities
Supporting Student Learning at Home
Appendix

18. School and Family Engagement
Pelican Academy is committed to providing families with meaningful, two-way communication opportunities with teachers, school counselors, and Principal Struthers throughout the year.
Use the Remind app to contact teachers or counselors with questions about your child’s progress and learning needs or to inquire about school events.
Principal Struthers at with additional questions or concerns that cannot be addressed by your child’s teacher or counselor.
Visit our Parent Center between the hours of 7:00 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. or attend one of our upcoming parent workshops to learn more about how you can support student learning at home.
USE THIS SLIDE TO INSERT INFORMATION ABOUT HOW PARENTS SHOULD COMMUNICATE WITH TEACHERS AND THE SCHOOL LEADER THROUGHOUT THE SCHOOL YEAR.

19. How Can You Support Learning at Home?
Families play an important role in setting high expectations for learning by having meaningful conversations with their children and their teachers.
By supporting what their children do at school, families are helping their children become successful both in and outside the classroom.

20. Tools and Resources to Support Parents: General
Below are additional resources that you can access to further support your child’s learning at home.
Family Support Toolbox: information on standards, graduation recquirements, test results, and links to PTA and Eureka Math parent guides
Great Kids Milestones: free, online collection of videos showing what success looks like in reading, writing, and math in grades K–12. For high school students, it also includes helpful life and communication skills to prepare them for college or a career
Eureka Math Support Page: free online site to support students in schools that have adopted the Eureka math curriculum
Zearn: free online site to support students in schools that have adopted the Zearn math curriculum
LearnZillon: free online site to support students in schools that have adopted the ELA Guidebooks curriculum guidebook-units
Example Talking Pt: Here are a few online tools that can help you support your child’s learning at home. Parents are welcome to visit our parent resource room anytime to get online and take a look at these tools. If you would like for us to print you a copy of any of these guides, please ask one of the volunteers in the Parent Center to help you.

21. Agenda Looking Back at 2016-2017 2017-2018 Priorities
Supporting Student Learning at Home
Appendix

22. Louisiana Believes
The Louisiana Department of Education is excited to embark on another year with educators across the state as we continue to raise expectations for students and schools.
Our students are just as capable as any in the country and deserve the opportunity to succeed at the highest level. Because of this belief, Louisiana educators have been working tirelessly over the past several years to raise expectations and educational outcomes for students in five major focus areas:
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23. Louisiana’s Success
As a result of this work, students across Louisiana are performing at levels never seen before.
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24. Vision for Louisiana
Louisiana will continue to raise expectations for students so that by 2025 an A-rated school is one where the average student has:
Reaching this goal will require school systems to create and implement strong plans for improvement, including directing additional resources and support to the schools that struggle the most.