Essay: Challenges faced by the International School at Mesa del Sol

The International School at Mesa del Sol (TIS) has a strong, dedicated staff, and a small but resolute community that supports the institution. As a public charter school, the organization has the ability to adopt a specific vision – such as its International Baccalaureate (IB) program – in order to help children become better students, but more importantly, to be better people. This demand for a more rigorous learning environment has presented TIS with several challenges, ranging from difficulties in revising policies and procedures to high staff turnover rates. Measures have been taken to address these challenges, but there is still much room for improvement within the organization.
Identification of Challenges
The school’s IB Primary Years Program (PYP) provides its elementary-aged students with a holistic curriculum framework. According to the International Baccalaureate Organization ([IBO], 2013), the six guiding transdisciplinary themes of the program allow students to “deepen their learning by developing their conceptual understandings, strengthening their knowledge and skills across and beyond subject areas.” While the program helps teachers facilitate inquiry-based learning, it does require that specific policies and procedures be in place in order to implement the program to its full potential. The school’s language, assessment, and special education policies were initially created by the Head of School in 2009, but have not been brought to the entire staff for further review and revision since 2013. In addition, TIS administration, staff, and stakeholders have not fully evaluated and revised their existing Program of Inquiry, which is the written curriculum that forms the foundation of student learning from kindergarten through grade five. This has created redundancy among grade levels in the elementary units of study. As a contributing factor to this challenge, the institute’s high staff turnover rates have prevented consistency in establishing policies and procedures for the continuity and ongoing development of its IB program.
Since its opening in 2009, staff turnover has been a major challenge for TIS. By the end of the 2013-2014 school year, 67% of the staff had left. Some of this was due to international teachers whose visas expired, or teachers moving out of the state due to family or personal commitments. Alyssa Katz (2017) asserts that “such astonishingly high rates of teacher turnover year by year are par for the course among charter schools.” As a charter school, TIS has to administer and oversee everything that a public school does, but without the assistance of an overseeing central office. Essentially, the TIS faculty is its own support staff. Having so many individuals serving multiple roles within the organization has been a significant contributing factor to its faculty turnover. Starting each new school year with a number of new staff members has contributed to the low level of implementation in balancing the transdisciplinary program of inquiry and any additional single-subject teaching among specialist teachers, such as art and music.
Measures Taken
To address the challenge of developing and implementing an assessment policy that is consistent with the IBO’s expectations, TIS has designated time in their yearly calendar, based on testing periods, to collect and analyze student assessment data. In addition to hiring a full-time PYP Coordinator to facilitate more teacher collaboration, the school has designated time to calibrate formative and summative assessments, both vertically and horizontally among grade levels. An efficient checklist of targeted learning outcomes per trimester has also been created to avoid repetition in the PYP units of study. However, the school’s language and special education policies have still not been reviewed or revised since 2013. A new Director of Special Education and Student Support has been hired to assist in revising the organization’s special education policy.
The school’s leadership team is in the process of evaluating reflective ways to guide and counsel new staff members through its IB program. The team has discussed holding both team and individual conferences with new hires at the beginning of the school year in order to establish expectations for potential roles they may be required to fulfill over the course of the year. This would be supplemented with an incentives program to maintain adherence to the IBO’s standards. A more comprehensive interview process for hiring new staff members has also been established, in order to more accurately assess candidates’ levels of enthusiasm and commitment to such a progressive and intricate program of study.
Effectiveness of Measures
With the creation of a yearly calendar and scheduled meetings to collect and analyze data based on testing periods, there has been substantial student achievement growth on district and state assessments. As a whole, 94% of the school’s second grade students are now reading at or above grade level. In third grade, individual English Language Arts PARCC scores exceed New Mexico state averages between four and ten points. However, K-5 PARCC scores in math are still below state averages. The school has set a goal to increase this area of student performance by 20% in each grade level. As a means to achieve this goal, fluid and flexible interventions have been put into place during Tier 1 (core) instruction for students not progressing as well as expected. A Student Assistance Team (SAT) has also been established to provide strategic and individualized support to students for whom Tier 1 instruction and interventions have proven insufficient.
Having a full-time PYP Coordinator on staff has ensured ongoing collaboration and professional development among teachers. The coordinator is part of the leadership team, and has devoted time daily to non-evaluative classroom walkthroughs to provide face-to-face feedback to teachers in a timely matter in order to enhance instruction and student learning. The PYP Coordinator has also been instrumental in supporting and mentoring newly hired teachers.
The organization’s revised interview process has helped to secure new faculty members who are invested in the IB program and committed to its ongoing development at TIS. Candidates are required to share both their personal and professional experiences with the reflective action cycle – an essential element of the IB program – before being hired. Once hired, new teachers also spend time observing individual classrooms and interviewing students who have attended the school for more than four years. This has ensured that the organization acquires teachers who are dedicated to both the transdisciplinary and disciplinary areas of the program, as well as to promoting in-depth inquiry within their classrooms.
Insights
While the TIS leadership team has demonstrated an understanding of the benefits and challenges of the IB program’s implementation, the organization would benefit from revising their existing Program of Inquiry (POI), which is the written curriculum forming the foundation of student learning from kindergarten through grade five. A standardized rubric needs to be created for teachers to use to evaluate the POI and establish consistent vertical alignment for units of inquiry across grade levels. This reflective process would ensure a spiralling delivery of the IB program.
Staff members have a strong commitment to the beliefs, values, and ongoing development of this program but should continue to develop an understanding of its transdisciplinary nature among all stakeholders, especially students and their families. Communicating the IB philosophy to families throughout the school year would help to deepen their understanding and commitment to the program. This could be accomplished with monthly parent newsletters, community events and information workshops, the purchase and distribution of promotional materials, and student and parent reflections on personal progress and achievement within the program.
Although staffing is stabilizing, having seen so many teachers coming and going has given various stakeholders – including, but not limited to, families who have been part of the school since its establishment – the impression that the school as a whole is in a constant transitional state. This has led to a lack of commitment from families in embracing the IB program and its impact on their children. While they may have an understanding of specific units of study and the Learner Profile (a foundation of ten attributes and twelve attitudes all students should strive to possess), parents do not discuss, practice, or support this at home. There is a disconnect between what parents know and what they consistently reinforce with their children at home. The school must seek more opportunities to communicate the IB philosophy to families throughout the school year, and to help deepen their understanding and commitment to the program.