Monthly Archives: August 2017

Olmsted Falls High School Construction Update

Posted on by
Reply

J:Mathews K-12Current DesignMatthews Floor Plan Scheme 3 ModeA very long awaited building construction project is taking shape on the campus of Olmsted Falls High School. While we only have some construction fencing and alternate traffic patterns, people will begin to see a staging process take place.

When I became the superintendent 4 years ago one of the first things that I did was visit with the architectural firm that the district has had a long standing relationship with–the Architectural Vision Group. While the high school building project was passed only a year ago, the scope of work has been in the making for about 20 years.

During my first tour of duty as a school psychologist for Olmsted Falls, the district was going through a housing boom. Within 7 years, approximately 1,000 additional students were enrolled which led to significant overcrowding. A small addition to the high school occurred around 1996, but the district kept growing. Despite several attempts, the voters did not approve a bond issue to expand the size of the building and as a result the district was forced to acquire classroom trailers that were supposed to serve as a temporary fix. Fifteen years later, the stars aligned last fall and the voters were overwhelmingly supportive of the Bond Project which will have a significant impact on the building.

Throughout the year I will be providing you with periodic updates and they will also appear on the district’s main blog page as well.  The image at the top of this page outlines the majority of the work that will be conducted and as you can see, there is literally something for everyone to get excited about.

The most significant amount of work will solve our overcrowding problem and it will take place in the academic wings. With Academics, we will add 9 science classrooms and 4 business classrooms including a FAB Lab (16 total). In the Arts, we will add 3 new art classrooms; we will double the size of the band and choir area, and the auditorium will receive lighting and HVAC updates. With Athletics, we will renovate the locker room, create seasonal team rooms, and provide new flooring and ceiling finishes in the athletic corridors. In the heart and most visited sections, we will renovate the kitchen, the cafeteria and the media center. These areas will be completely renovated. They will be a place for students to congregate during the day and meeting space for the community in the evening.

Our goal is to have all of the additional classrooms and building renovations completed for the start of the 2018-19 school. It is an aggressive schedule and it will require those that attend the high school everyday to work around it. When the dust settles, the building will be something that will house all of our students and better prepare them for the next stages in their lives.

Thanks for listening.
~Jim

Redefining Student Success Our Way

Posted on by
3

OFSTripleALogo-For Power Announce TemplateWe Inspire and Empower students! These words and the logo to the left of them mean something. It’s more than an image or a brand. It stands for who we’ve been…who we are…and what we can continue to become.

Soon the Ohio Department of Education, as required by the Ohio General Assembly, will release district report cards that will provide a laundry list of A – F ratings. If you think that there is a solid research base that indicates such a student measurement system leads to high achievement and growth for students you are mistaken.   Simply put, the testing rules and cut scores are created for the purpose of matching the public and policymaker’s expectations for the distribution of the grades. This coupled with the fact that (at least in Ohio) the tests that our district is required to administer to students (we have no choice in this) have changed significantly over the past few years (not only in what they measure, but how they measure it) should give you tremendous pause if you are a student taking them or a parent, a community member or an educator who is left to interpret what they mean.

There was a time in my educational career that I waited like a child on Christmas morning for the testing results to be released so that I could facilitate state test disaggregation sessions with teachers. We would get the test scores that the students produced and we would slice them and dice them trying to glean what we could in order to get better scores. We would look at test maps, which learning indicators were being measured and how our students were performing. We no longer do this…we reject this approach for several reasons. As a district we have consciously elected to disengage in “test prep” and “teaching to the test.” We found that this approach shrinks the curriculum and deprives students and teachers of the defined autonomy that they are granted within the current set of learning standards.

So how are we redefining Student Success? Through a strategic planning process that included feedback from students, parents, community members, educators and others, we have made a conscious choice to reject an accountability system which measures student success largely based on compliance with state testing mandates. It doesn’t tell the whole story and it simply doesn’t work for us. We’re not going Frank Sinatra…we’re going Bulldog–we’re doing it Our Way because we believe that the Ohio Accountability Model deprives our ability to inspire and empower all of our students to achieve their full potential. It goes against our district’s vision and mission and steals our local control. In the words of Kouzes and Posner, we’re Modeling the Way and Enabling Others to Act.

We believe that our charge in Olmsted Falls is to empower and inspire our students and that if you were to ask a student, they would tell you that they don’t feel very inspired or empowered when they take high stakes, state‐ mandated assessments. So…our challenge is to determine how to meet our charge within the “legislative policy box” that we have been forced into, when the way or the path to lead the charge and meet the challenge set before us is, currently and largely, undefined. Our Moonshot Thinking is to work with our colleagues and community to try and figure out how we can be inspiring and empowering to students; foster innovation and creativity within the instructional environment and provide the comprehensive, whole-child, Triple A experience that has been our district’s legacy.

As we approach the first full month of school, we will soon be releasing a Quality Profile that will relay Student Success information to our community as a way to demonstrate that we are fulfilling the district mission and vision that has been formulated and supported by our community.  Please be on the look out for that information.

Thanks for listening.

Jim      

 

Strong Schools Include Open and Honest Communication

Posted on by
Reply

dr_lloyd_read_acerraclass

As your superintendent of schools, I know that Olmsted Falls City Schools provides a great value to the community. We have a top-rated quality of education and our expenditure per pupil is among the lowest in the county. Thanks to the support of our community, our dedicated and caring staff, tremendous parent support and amazing students who work hard every day, we have strong schools.

It is up to all of us to keep our schools strong. Our community stepped up this fall as voters approved a needed zero additional taxes bond and permanent improvement levy to address ongoing facility and maintenance needs across our district. It is now up to our schools to use this money wisely and keep our community informed about the progress that is being made.

The same is true for our academic program and fiscal management practices. We owe it to our community to be open and honest with you about our many successes as well as any challenges that we may face. It is with this spirit of open and honest communication in mind that I am beginning a new blog.

The Superintendent Update blog will provide regular information to the community about what’s happening in our schools, insights on decisions that are made and important updates as to what our district is facing.  I am an advocate for public schools and will provide followers with information related to how some of the state and federal decisions impact us at the local level. The blog is simply one more way for residents to better understand what is happening in our schools and how Olmsted Falls City Schools impacts our community. I hope you will mark this page so that you can follow our regular updates. As always should you have any questions at any time, please do not hesitate to contact the district.