Central Office Staff
Poverty Simulation Follow-Up Meeting
October 5, 2017

Several cental office staff participated in the MNPS Poverty Simulation on the morning of October 5, 2017.  Afterwards, staff participated in a follow-up meeting where the collaborative inquiry process was used to analyze multiple sources of data and discuss actions to stop, continue, and start for  supporting student success.

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Activating and Engaging
Visual Synectic

Discussion Points

• feels overwhelming because so much going on at one time
• frustrated trying to figure out things
• like the characters, you feel like everyone is watching you

Discussed for us it was a simulation, for some it’s a reality.

• 42.75% of MNPS students and families are economically disadvantaged.
  
• That’s 37,365 students.

Exploring and Discovering
Data Warehouse Reports

 Several MNPS Data Warehouse reports were reviewed and observations made.

• Assessment Data—MAP & ACT
• Attendance Dashboard—current and past 3 years
  
• Behavior Dashboard—current and past 3 years
  
• Poverty Simulation Experience

Organizing and Integrating
Traffic Light Protocol


Given what we have learned today, what are some practices you might stop doing, continue doing, and start doing?

STOP

• filtering reactions/attitudes through just my experiences
• relying solely on one source of data
• stop using one measure for poverty
• using acronyms during IEP meetings
• teaching to the test
  
• making inferences before seeing what the data says-(5)
• assuming everything is okay if families will not say anything when something’s wrong
• changing assessments
• too many initiatives
• giving students a 50 without doing anything but just showing up-(2)
• test retakes
• focusing only on literacy
• suspending African American and Hispanic students
• assuming there are no gray areas in data collection
• including data from groups that are not prepared
• meeting to meet….teacher centered meetings
• making assumptions based on race or socioeconomic levels
• assuming all students are going to college and taking away skilled worker options, such as vocational training
• focusing on punishment
• relying solely on data—trust teacher truths/stories
• being so judgmental

CONTINUE

• restorative practices—(3)
• recognizing that diversity is a strength
• looking more closely at data by subgroup and super subgroups
  
• assume all parents want what’s best for their child
  
• communicate with parents
• helping the parents/family above and beyond
• collecting data—(3)
• be in relationship—earning trust of kids
• assisting and advocating for those who cannot for themselves
• data warehouse
• assessments
• ACT prep in high schools
• listening
• providing feedback about findings
• evaluating student records
• building relationships with students and families
• looking at data objectively
• exploring the economic climate in Nashville—we are changing rapidly as a city—more homes being built for upper income 2 working parent families, but we are pushing out families who have roots there
• PD for teachers on implicit bias and cultural humility
• RTI
• learning about our students and how to better serve them

START

• partnerships between Metro government and MNPS
• consistently use data for making informed decisions
  
• more culturally relevant training, particularly Latino
• self care/teacher care---work-life balance
• figure out how to keep all HS students in school—(2)
• be more empathetic to families in poverty—(2)
• focused RTI
• vocational education-(2)
• restorative practices system wide-(2)
• teaching children about impact/consequences of choices
• looking below surface presentation, such as life struggles
• conducting data meetings with students and parents within school building and the neighborhood (student led)
• tracking academic data
• analyzing and synthesizing non-academic data and its impact on academic behavior
• increase interventions that target populations
• analyzing data more regularly-(3)
• have action plan for findings
• positive attendance strategies/promotion/initiatives--(3)
• cultural humility trainings with teachers
• share this data with teachers and families—give context and talk about solutions with school community
• being open
• accept that someone can have different experiences
• making careful observations
• more homework in math/science that students are given grades for—If they aren’t given credit or held accountable, they will more than likely not do the work—(2)
• detention and make the kids have tasks (cleaning around the school) for punishment
• hold parents accountable at school level
• remember that “we are Metro” to everyone who comes to us for school information
• proactive and productive
• do more follow up on absences and behavior
• teach basic skills to help students succeed
• identifying areas of need for additional resources/support
• research further trends in the data

Exit Slip Reflection--What actions might you take as a result of our time together?

• research restorative practices-(2)
• analyze pertinent data
• more empathy-(3)
• continue help others who can’t help themselves
• share with co-workers what we experienced today
• be more thoughtful to families
• be more thoughtful to students and how to help them
• continue using all types of data to make decisions-(2)
• advocate for cultural humility trainings, particularly school with high population of AA and Hispanic students
• give to food bank
• be more attentive to the students I come in contact with
• data is relevant along with anecdotal information
  

• be careful about making assumptions, i.e. race, socio-economics
• learn to step outside of myself
  
• collaborate more---colleagues are a great resource
  
• meeting with families in a site that is mutually agreeable (not in home, but a public building closer than school)
• increase awareness of best practice to sue with such a diverse population of students
• don’t assume—seek first to understand then be understood
• talk with teachers with empathy for our students/families
• conversations around school staff
• data analysis with schools with non-academic indicators impacting academic performance
• listen better to other voices and trust their stories

Meeting Feedback--How was the Meeting?

Plus

Suggestions for Improvement

• keep going
• the simulation itself was great-(2)
• pace was good
• great way to put the data in perspective after the poverty simulation
• enjoyed the exercises of the day
• interactive
• participation
• entertaining
• great communication
• excellent, realistic
• great feedback
• very well organized
• so glad we could debrief like this after the simulation and back it up with data-(3)
• great to collaborate with entire group
• role playing
• sharing
• traffic light activity
• information was very practical and will benefit me at work and also out in life
• openness
• activity to curb inferences
• importance of reframing data with multiple sources-(2)
• good mix of MNPS folks—nice to rub elbows with a variety
• excellent facilitation
• listen and learn to understand what people are going through
• powerful
  

• help those of us that are in special ed
• see actions being put in place
• more specific, open-ended questions about the data
• need more time-(4)—could be full day inservice
• handouts for everyone to take home
• less time on calibrating and more tie reflecting on data and stop light
• seemed like your rephrasing some people didn’t necessarily agreed, but complied
• too much data to process
• balance simulation time with afternoon to better engage participants
• fuller data for gathering personal stories
• less summarizing when writing down participant responses
• traffic light questions asked three times today---end of simulation, traffic light, reflection