PROGRESS REPORT

March 31, 2004

þ     Leadership Team has been meeting at least two hours weekly. This includes the Project Co-directors, Integrative Technology Specialist, Research Analyst, Mentoring and Professional Development Specialist, & Co-Teaching Specialists who represent Teacher Development, Child& Family Studies and Special Education.

þ     Steering Committee has been meeting monthly. This involves representatives from the College of Education, the College of Fine Arts, Diversified Media Resources, Media X, St. Cloud Area Schools – elementary and secondary personnel, and the St. Cloud Education Association.

þ     The TQE logo has been designed by Diversified Media Resources, and has been approved for use on letterhead and business cards.

þ     Web site design meetings have been proceeding. The site will be hosted and maintained at SCSU for increased traffic and for eventual sustainability. The site will be an official SCSU site, linked to the College of Education web page and included in the SCSU web directory. TQE will be utilizing the talents of students to help get the web site up and running.

þ     TQE will be working with IMS students for videotaping of co-teaching situations. This partnership provides valuable experiences for IMS students and high quality video tape for the TQE initiative.

þ     The Data Advisory Team has met one time and will be meeting again on April 13^th. The group is still in the process of discussing the evaluation components of this initiative and clarifying the role of the team.

þ     The External Evaluator has reviewed all data collection tools developed to date and made minor modifications/changes to enhance the outcome evaluation.

Co-Teaching – University Level

þ     The Co-Teaching Specialists have been meeting and have developed a detailed application process and rubric for university level co-teaching opportunities.

þ     Three current courses are being co-taught at the university level. Special Education 622, Special Education 419 and Human Relations 497. Each co-teaching pair includes a university faculty and a public school faculty.

þ     Student mid-term feedback from co-taught courses has been collected and compiled. 113 students responded. A summary of the responses has been prepared by the external evaluator.

þ     The three co-taught courses for Fall 2004 have been determined using the application and rubric. They will be: Special Education xxx, Child and Family Studies xxx, and Human Relations 497.

þ     The Co-Teaching Specialists have scheduled two times to visit each of the co-taught classrooms.

Co-Teaching – PK-12

þ     The Leadership Team recommended that the implementation of co-teaching in PK-12 classes be postponed until Fall 2004, to ensure that sufficient professional development and orientation could occur.

þ     An informational power point has been developed and has been presented at 7 local elementary schools and 1 local secondary school. The other presentations have been scheduled.

þ     To date, 75 PK-12 educators have indicated interest in co-teaching with a student teacher.

þ     Dates for informational meetings for potential SCSU student teachers have been scheduled. These will be geared to those students who are planning to student teach in the St. Cloud area.

þ     A meeting for seven area superintendents to outline benefits of participating in TQE initiatives will be held today (March 31, 2004).

þ     Follow-up meetings were held at two elementary sites to provide teachers with more information about co-teaching. Attendance was very poor at these additional meetings, which may not be a good use of time in the future. There are two additional dates set.

þ      The first full day co-teaching workshop is set for April 27, 2004 at the Kelly Inn. A special invitation will be extended to those teachers who indicated an interest in co-teaching. There are additional workshop dates set for June and August.

Co-Teaching – Undergraduate / Content areas

þ     A power point presentation was developed with the help of Kurt Helgeson, ETS, to outline the opportunities available to content area departments through the TQE initiative. The financial incentive to the department will be made in 2 installments of $1,700 each – to help ensure that departments make at least a 2 semester commitment to this project.

þ     The first meeting was attended by representatives of Math and Science. Both departments appear to be very interested in developing a co-teaching mentorship program.

þ     A second informational meeting will be held today (3/31/04).

Professional Development / Mentoring

þ     A meeting was held with representatives from the District 742 staff development committee, Robin Hasslen and Gayla Holmgren to brainstorm ways to partner to enhance current professional development and mentoring activities in the district.

þ     The leadership team has been reviewing research and discussing a variety of professional development approaches and are currently focusing on developing building level inquiry/study groups.

þ     A survey has been prepared to ask area teachers about their needs in the areas of professional development and mentoring. It is hoped that this could be an on-line survey, but there has been no response as yet regarding the possibility of developing that here.

þ     A request has been made to present to the District 742 staff development committee, but there is no room on the agenda for the remainder of this academic year.

þ     There are two summer institutes that address development of professional learning communities – one in Colorado and the other in Georgia. The leadership team will look into the possibility of having a team member attend each of these meetings.

TQE Leader

þ     A meeting was held to discuss the proposed TQE leader criteria. The group included representatives from District 742, the College of Education and the College of Fine Arts.

þ     The criteria developed by the subcommittee have been given to each steering committee member to take back to their constituents to review, discuss and bring feedback to the larger group. It will be discussed again at the meeting on April 7.

þ     To date, 25 teachers in District 742 have indicated an interest in becoming TQE Leaders.