The GSP Monthly Dispatch – February 2022

Welcome to the archive of The GSP Monthly Dispatch, our monthly roundup of upcoming events as well as fresh and insightful writing from our school coaches. Did you know you can get the Dispatch delivered to your inbox every month for free? All you need to do is sign up.

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February 2022

Welcome to the February issue of the GSP Monthly Dispatch! This month, we bring you:

  • Three tools from our toolkits for educators and school communities: learn about using data to inform instruction, explore scoring criteria, and read the case for community engagement
  • Book recommendations from Hayley Didriksen, our director of research and evaluation—discover new ways to intentionally use data
  • Our Elements of Effective Instruction framework, which describes five elements that foster student engagement with the ultimate goal of improving student outcomes and achievement
  • Your last opportunity to share your thoughts and insights about the Common Data Project’s 2021 Annual Report—a deep dive into high school graduation and dropout rates, as well as college enrollment, persistence, and completion measures from across New England

Using Data to Inform Instruction

This resource has been designed as a step-by-step tool for educators interested in ways to use data to inform their instructional practice.

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Scoring Criteria Overview

This tool is for educators to use as they design, critique, and refine the scoring criteria used to evaluate student performance within a proficiency-based learning system.

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The Case for Community Engagement

Discover the many benefits of equitable community engagement. Also, learn what it really means to “share power.”

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This month, we’re trying out a new addition to our Dispatch: the Book Nook, where we share book recommendations from our staff or educators in the field. Have a book (or three!) to recommend? Send us the titles, authors, and links to the works.

First up are recommendations by Hayley Didriksen, our director of research and evaluation, who says, “I would recommend these books for educators looking to more intentionally use data to inform practice.”

Got Data? Now What? Creating and Leading Cultures of Inquiry

By Laura Lipton & Bruce Wellman

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Street Data: A Next-Generation Model for Equity, Pedagogy, and School Transformation

By Shane Safir & Jamila Dugan

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Learning to Improve: How America’s Schools Can Get Better at Getting Better

By Anthony S. Bryk, Louis M. Gomez, Alicia Grunow, & Paul G. LeMahieu

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The Elements of Effective Instruction

The Elements of Effective Instruction framework outlines five intertwined elements of instructional practice that complement and enhance one another. When integrated into learning experiences, these elements foster student engagement with the ultimate goal of improving student outcomes and achievement. The framework is grounded in the understanding that students are more interested and invested in their learning when they feel safe in their learning environment, understand what they are learning and why it matters, have opportunities to practice, receive clear feedback on their work, and engage in complex, meaningful thinking.

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The Common Data Project Annual Report provides transparent, comparable data about high school and college outcomes from across New England. By disaggregating the data by student characteristics across six indicators, we can examine educational equity in regional secondary school outcomes by economic disadvantage (ED), English learner status (EL), disability status, gender, as well as race and ethnicity.

Are you an educator, administrator, parent or caregiver, researcher, student, policymaker, or any other stakeholder with an interest in educational equity? Have you looked at this report? Do you use the data? Then we want to hear from you! Please share your feedback about the Common Data Project Annual Report. By sharing your insights, we hope to continuously improve how we report the data and convey our insights to better serve you.

This survey is open to all. Please feel free to share it widely.

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Thanks for reading! See you next month.

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