Education Committee Senate & House (All Day)

Everyone if we get everyone there seat will try to get started were little shot a day but you know it's a little boring meetings nobody will say here I'm sorry to hear that it's just. Not really we just kidding with you. Not really all right. Call this meeting to order manager you have a remark I have a couple of opening remarks I want to give a couple reports that we have Richard Wilson couldn't be here today but we wanted to remind everybody about the inflationary estimates that we talked about a little while back on the changes or if there were any changes and A law August eleventh he gave a presentation about these any said both subscription services advise that federal reserve open market committee has set a target core inflation rate at two percent over the next few years in two twenty twenty five the CPI U. estimated provided at the time suggested the annual inflation rate of two percent to two point two could be expected over the bi annual period beginning July one two thousand twenty one after reviewing the update inflation estimates these two economic data subscription services continue to provide the MC based target of two percent but they have slightly increase the C. P. you range possibilities up to approximately two point five increase the upper end of the range is expected during the second year of the biennium so we'll give you all that report he his daughter's getting married you're pretty quickly so he's kind of short notice to try to get in here so we're a hell let him slide from that it was short report not to like to do that for him any questions on that I couldn't answer me anyway so this what you for no if you want to pass all right the proposed timeline you have one inside your packet on probably your second page of the post time lapse of August to December we are in the September twenty ninth when and what we're gonna look at today and then we will be back to finalize the presentations from For mark consultants next Monday all the Sixt office forty fifth. And to correct fifty. Yeah I think that's right of looking at different things here fifteen six from them all from on the fifth from the other and on the six from us will have a until about the matrix. Well recommendations wording in funding for and then on the nineteenth. There will be a recommendations messes for matrix and in all the first as the deadline for filing adequacy report to the president pro tem in this the Senate and the Speaker of the house on the twenty third full draft report sent all committee members until the first of December presentation draft report feedback member so that's kind of your time wanting to look at that you'll see kind of what were gotten one I'll. All right. A yes so does anybody have anything for we get started with the consultants. Seeing nothing we're going to get started. Justin can you hear us. We your ten and I think we're gonna be trying to control the share of the U. too today so we will see how this goes okay will you are all we're gonna start what I'm seeing it's all yours. If you're speaking we can't. We're working on it great thank you. Okay just in which we think is some hearing in but we cannot hear the sound. Okay can you hear me now when I talk yes yes I can hear you now. Okay I could hear the sound and I was on mute and so I'm wondering if that's gonna be a problem coming across if you guys can maybe pull them up yourself certain. Ma'am did you want to try I I just. Your needed to amend the. Why don't I transfers Justin mission mine. You give me just. We're working on it. Good morning this is just a PA thank you for having us back and we got it. Visitation gradually we've got a lot to cover today. We can hear yeah. Give me one more second to make it full screen on my and. Shared. I'm just going to put their usual study update we're gonna have to presentations on poverty funds. Meeting these this topic was a pretty hot topic and we're gonna come back and talk to you about the national research about best use the property funds it also take a dive into how Arkansas districts are using the ESA funds in relationship to this topic area and the what the district told us in their districts survey mark Fuhrman ankle handle the first presentation makayla talking the seconds we didn't have Amanda brown coming in to talk about professional development Judy time after that we agendas good telly I'm talking about state mental health in really bringing in the results from that district survey that context as some earlier information we presented and then similarly Amanda brown we'll come back and give us context on educational opportunities from that district Sir. You're gonna hear a lot about to the district survey this in this meeting we just want to give you a little bit more background in reminder I we administered the survey it back in July it was announced all district superintendent in charter system directors we received a hundred eighty one responses we got responses from seventy two percent of districts in the state. Forty eight percent of the charter systems and now did you know generally we have a record good representation from the whole state on different demographic characteristics. We are able to yours the. Thanks for both you know for the respondents to look at responses by district signs need well in low cal and so they were using it urban suburban S. one category persons were rolled does that information come from the national center on education statistics. And we want to give you a little bit more information on you know what those different demographic groups look like so we have a couple tables for you. What you see here is that when we make these cuts. We do it as a percentage of districts and so it's a the metric is districts which doesn't which means that you can't have different percentages of students in the different groups so we're looking at well Quintel what's interesting there we actually have relatively similar number or percentage of students with tile as presented districts. Hi is well Quintel. Slightly higher. Percentage of students. Delete link is in you know just a little larger districts on average when you go down to reduced price meals you'll see that there. Your Lewis need districts actually have your your your highest percentage of local students tend to be bigger your house is the districts tend to be smaller and so the overall percentage of the total state student population. So I believe when we look at sign is on this is going to be you know correlated highly your smallest districts that have an average enrollment about three under twenty eight. they don't have not for percent of all the students districts twenty percent largest districts have almost over sixty percent of your students one last thing again as that in C. S. code what you see here is that the majority of your deserves our rural they have a little less than half of your students in them. A quarter of your districts which urban suburban also have about house. Taking a look at representation that I talked about earlier you'll see on the responses that we had really good representation across the free reduced price lunch quintiles similar was signed as we have locality and very similar to that the general demographics region is where we have a little bit of differential a little lower in southwest and central in their overall representation as percentage of districts a little higher in the northeast the. Also in the southeast. So what's coming next month We have our case the review educator panels interstate holder survey we want to bring all that information act we had two additional presentation we talked about doing today for you all looking at the amount of information that we put together we worked with stock in the cochairs. To middle school science policies the information coming from the surveys and some information on capital needs so the next meeting again just because we think we would have taken up way too much time and an ability to focus on what we want to get through today the leader in October we will be talking about the review of resources the matrix in approaches to read jingling young adequacy. And with that we'll take questions. Are there any questions. Sure okay. Senator Elliott. You Mr chair I am not have gotten a little bit behind on this but I'm looking at the page that says survey responses compared to state and I'm down in the category for region where we have the character what we show all responses I'm starting with southwest our responses eighteen percent does that represent mean that their responses are eighteen percent of all the responses you've got. Is an area that currently all right that's correct and then out of that eighteen. Ninety eighteen percent of that category it's of the total of the. And you are that comp all right and the fourteen percent does that mean that what the forty percent means that. Out of eighteen percent forty percent risk presents responded. What's the fourteen percent a one eyed that's what I want to be surrounded land is the fourteen percent of all districts in the state okay all right. So those numbers those numbers get lower in those last three categories I that's not enough is that enough for the for it to have statistical significance or it or does it not skew anything at all eight it does not impact the statistical significance again those numbers state labor or slightly fewer districts in that category of students that first column is the percentage of districts in the state that are in the region and the percentage of responses that were in the region so you can kind of cross the border all the comparable okay so there would be no need to maybe to over sample in those low and of the ones with the lower numbers to be sure we're in good shape without having done that. Okay alright thank you thank you Mr chair. Any other questions. Seeing none okay continue will. That was. I was all the questions. The command this point of the next presentation yes we're ready for next presentation. Maybe you need on the. Works are in HIGHPOVERTY schools and students from low income families. We're going to take a look at this from three different perspectives one is the effect of already in high poverty communities in high poverty schools and then finally the individual student or classroom backs and looking at some of the interventions on that are research base that can be implemented school wide as well as on some specific research based programs and curricula. At the community level studies show that or kids growing up in high poverty neighborhoods he's greater challenges than kids were low income growing up lower poverty neighborhoods so there is sort of a cumulative or concentrating affected growing up in no or neighborhood in this may include a social and economic isolation lack of employment and health risks due to lack Maxis to healthcare and health insurance. Also children in very poor neighborhoods suffer from higher rates and social emotional problems. The student level the effects of poverty manifest around early a language gaps where students were children may be exposed to we're limited vocabulary their parents are lower and lower levels of education. Comparable students from higher income families I was child directed speech as well among lower income parents there is also greater server lost learning loss because often low income students just don't have the encouragement opportunities that other students may have during the summer. Family that's struggling to put food on the table. We not going to have the money to send their their child to a summer language camp or matter robotics cow also lower attended streets ring well income students to do greater incidence of illness and other interruptions such as you know house in security and such things and then finally a lower and lower engagement and motivation due to a sense of alienation a lower perceptions of a link between education success because they don't really hang out we'll models that show being a success in school leads to opposite of our comes later. At the school level concentrations of poverty in obviously we've all seen the charts where it has concentrations of poverty in schools go up on stage or other test scores go down so there is a strong correlation between concentrations already in academic performance particularly on standardized assessments also higher concentrations already seem to impact all students not just low income students and school so if your middle class server higher income students in our school with high concentrations of permitting you may also see your academic outcomes negatively impacted. some of the factors that may be influenced in August a lower school performance include on lack of house your influences some kids there are. His arm or classmates who are successful in school so it becomes harder for you as a student low income students see yourself being successful in school and what needs you may have lowered teacher motivation and morale and burn out in as we know from some of the studies of title one schools often low incomes schools also have the lease qualified least experienced teachers on the schools may also use that word curriculums they're not using the same curriculum that perhaps a lower poverty schools in the same district eight use. There's less parental involvement because parents either feel alienated from schools you don't have. Petition to get school on a regular basis so one. Exactly where this concentration of ACT starts to take place is hard to say the research has shown some studies have shown that the impact concentrations already in school concert at a level as low as twenty five percent already students others suggest is closer to fifty percent or a little bit higher. So. How do we address these effects at the school level. And the district level. I think maybe the key is that there really is no one so verbal which no one approach is going to be guaranteed to work in all situations. And the effectiveness of any given approach is going to be impacted by the specific context of the community school in student. A city in motivation of district and school staff to implement any type of intervention or program with fidelity having the availability to the necessary resources and supports you on a man program successfully and then finally to the ability to says progress make necessary adjustments for any given program sort of taking on the continuous improvement approach of assessed suggest yes Sir us just to get on. Addressing some of the the our community effects that we discussed earlier one of the strategies that's emerging particularly in urban areas is the provision of wraparound services where essentially the school becomes the link between the academic program as well as other supports for students and their families were such things as physical health care mental health. Economic instability family instability essentially grams and supports to try to help offset some of the effects of poverty and communities and as well as school wide property. Often schools there is in this actually on national and I think regional networks schools that bad This strategy and become the center FOR on linking students their families to wraparound services are often known as community schools and these are essentially designed to three dentre fighting needs of students and their families and then try to link them to resources within the school within the district and within the broader community provide the supports that the families to the so examples are and that we have seen are in Baltimore city schools where there is a fairly comprehensive system of on unity schools in Oklahoma there's the Tulsa area community schools initiation of each county school district in order one of the better known community schools that the bridges amend preschool when there are green with nonprofit to help provide wraparound services. So the potential benefits of community schools on that studies have shown include better student attendance at our graduation rates are higher achievement gaps higher achievement overall as well as the reduction in racial and economic cheap gas. Some studies have shown a return on investment for unity schools of up to fifteen dollars for every dollar invested in round services. And finally Evidence suggests found on community school programs are most effective when they're implemented across multiple schools for other than at a school here they're in there also where districts and school personnel are actively involved in support of the community schools I'm not assessed. Of community schools include obviously the wraparound services we were discussing basically under. Families and children to these services to these various service providers full time coordinator in larger schools sometimes you may see more than one full time coordinator or again in their job is to since the needs and risks of students and their families and then link them to on the network of service providers out there in school community. They often provide expanded learning time such as before or after school programs and summer school and then finally they engage any adults in the community technically the parents in other types of training on the go beyond say homework help our classes to your could include such things as job training on how to look for jobs on the habits of successful ladies and such things. Mine too addressing school wide of acts There has been a long History of research in to watch probably more recently have been called eating out schools these are schools with high levels of poverty batter warming much better than one reductions would suggest they would they would perform match and they're going back to the nineteen seventies there have been studies of these on successful HIGHPOVERTY schools look at what similarities there are across the schools. different studies have come up with different specific lists on nearly all of them have identified five six seven different characteristics in these clues include active leadership so this would be not only instructional leadership but also ensuring that the school has. Is strong academic learning climate at the school is has a safe our climate in that the school is structured in using its resources to maximize on the outcomes for students. Also the schools going to have a strong future workforce so high quality teachers on who collaborate and communicate well discuss tunes basically look at take a on common responsibility for the success for all well students also where on the professional development of a engage and is really focused on teaching and learning were really each in learning is this the focus of the school on these goals also tend to use on high quality curriculum because they believe that all students can perform to high standards they're not using a watered down academic or vocational curricula I'm the using the best curriculum in the best instructional practices on their. The use data to drive instruction so frequent formative and summative assessments again using sort of a continuous improvement framework looking at where they're having success where students are falling between the cracks making adjustments making changes to ensure that all kids very friendly successful. Already mentioned that on the staff of the schools have high expectations for all students they believe that all students can achieve high standards they also believe in developing strong personal relationships across the staff among students and then across staff students parents in the broader community. Finally providing ample opportunities to learn and read more so this might be again before or after school time extended learning time of some sort or reconfiguration time during the day to provide students with all that extra time instruction they need if they don't they don't master the the material this time around in the classroom. So that gives you sort of an overview of what we know that sort of beating the either high high quality on the effective lower incomes the schools and to look like from sort of a larger structural organizational point of view some specific strategies that again appear time after time in the research that benefits all particularly on low incomes and at risk students include a full day pre kindergarten and I think we're all familiar with the studies showing that high quality people they prekindergarten particularly for low income students leads to higher academic achievement over China school career these children tend to have higher attendance rates for college in another post secondary options and eventually higher earnings as an adult full day kindergarten rooms again studies show that schools that offer full day kindergarten I'm particularly low income students will have better academic outcomes to compare to similarly situated students better and have a program full day kindergarten again provides an additional boost for the low income students. Smaller class sizes Some controversy around this but I think the research is very clear you're going back to Tennessee stars research studies that specifically for early elementary grades typically cater three small class sizes and we do mean small class sizes fifteen or fewer students per teacher does have a positive effect on student learning particularly for low income and at risk students however there is little evidence to support that larger class sizes we need one twenty two to one I will have the same effect no word or their studies that show into ACT four on smaller class sizes in grades nine three three. Tutoring is another effective program four. Well being low income students particularly if the tutors are certified teacher tutors rather than instructional aides or community volunteers but certified teachers that they work with students one on wondering very small groups of more than three to five students in that the green is aligned with link to what is being talked classroom so that tutoring reinforces bills are what the students are receiving classroom. When we look in extended learning time and the the research is a little bit more next year but It's clear that not all students are going to learn the same or content in the same amount of time and some students are going to need more opportunities on work time to master that content there are some reasons why a I'm extended learning time our research is mixed that includes your number one often particularly AT stay after school programs have multiple goals they're not just there to support students academically but also to provide in Richmond activities such as in the arts additional socialization activities and recreation so So these extended day programs may not be as effective strictly academics because they're trying to accomplish other goals as well. Secondly programs often either poorly implemented in poorly designed so you may have a situation where a school house the teacher to volunteer you know an extra hour after school three days a week to work with kids in some way or another there really is not well thought out plan for doing this. The last Programmer strategy will mention this is for social emotional learning and we noted earlier that one of the impacts off for low income students particularly those living in high poverty neighborhoods is on war socially emotional learning challenges and needs. And studies have shown that effective social emotional learning programs can not only achieve academic performance but also lead to better classroom behavior and better attitudes of the student toward him or herself word other is in toward their school. In addition to these are broader strategies that that we mentioned in the in the look at our commonalities across the beating the odds schools there also there's also an education market place out there where districts and schools are just everything from curriculum to interventions that are on. Based computer based such things. There are also very many programs that are of bill eighteen effectiveness it is not always easy to determine whether a program is effective or not there are a number of companies that may develop a program into an internal E. waste program that shows success I think we we generally recommend that In order to really trust the results in the valuation and should be a fairly extensive evaluation and it should be done by an external evaluator rather than an internally valuation the waiter and that also the research now that should be on hi that are used in a way should. In addition to just looking at the. I'm effectiveness in terms of increased student achievement on districts and schools car also like constant COSTEFFECTIVENESS return on investment analyses so that you're looking at not only you know how much in the state of literacy program boost waiting outcomes for for our students which one does it for the live lowest level of investment which one gives us the most bang for the park just hold on districts and schools in states on eighteen the greatest results on using scarce resources. One source of your program effectiveness ratings on the day I probably is the most extensive and also requires on the most rigorous math a lot mythological standards including the studies particularly are recommending studies done on or on active is the US department of education's what works clearinghouse for providing the link right here. What what works clearinghouse does. Is. Look at the waiting the effectiveness not only have programs but also of the valuations themselves so they look at it um that ology what was how was the methodology is you're with was there a guard control in experimental group was it done honest sufficient number of students across the sufficient number of different types of schools and districts And they look at literacy they'd look at programs for literacy math science English language learners a special education students and others for example number of a number of different programs are what works listing house. Fifty seven programs that have been proven to be active or potentially affect literacy seventeen programs in mathematics my programs and sciences in sixteen programs and socially motion we're here a year often the way that they will rank these is that either on the research as extensive and occurred the logical quality is that they will say that these program has been proven to be effective if there are too few studies or there are some questions about exactly what happened was used you may say the program has shown potential but is not going to reach the level of being on showing positive results but it does have potential for positive results are usually based on additional studies being done of the few studies that have been done a particular program. Will open it up on this two questions I also want to note that in the appendix we have links to the three examples of community school programs that we mentioned earlier and also on by this is the complete list of the types of programs that the what works clearinghouse has examined and it shows the total number of studies that were reviewed in each one of the areas as well as number of studies that have shown either positive or promising results as you can see this berries agree on what you're looking. So go back to the questions. All right here we go represent Lowery. Thank you Mr chair on the research that you were presenting about smaller class sizes at the lower grades K. through three can this the same positive effects be realized if a teacher has a teacher's aide or professional or someone else in the classroom helping with the destruction. this is mark Fuhrman XO this studies that have looked at this most closely and and generally the kind of the gold standard of the class I studies are the Tennessee star studies but there have been other studies and I think there was a study of smaller class sizes and sconce and. And possibly wanted to other states and typically what they have found is that the most effective particularly low income kids or at risk kids is when you have a one certified teacher with fifteen fewer cats that you don't get the same effect if you have thirty kids with two teachers or twenty kids with the teacher and instructional a so Where we have the clearest results seems to suggest that it's really you know that the classroom teacher in fifteen or fewer kids that's that's the best approach. Okay thank you thank you Mr chair. Senator Elliot. Thank you Mr chair hi I will get back in the queue when you get tired my asking questions but don't make it up for the first one please So I when you when you started out talking about the silver bullet I am trying to square something here that I think we all struggle with when we say there is no such thing as a civil moment that's gonna work although I've noticed in education we constantly reach for several bullets and then where you talked about their research supported strategies out where we you mention of the source that we can consult for program effectiveness so my question has to do with making these choices about programs and their effectiveness to what extent is it necessary if you could elaborate on that for us to understand that just as we said a you know of any one group is not a group of monolithic thinkers poverty characterization is not a monolith either is it and if it isn't how should we think about that is we are trying to create at least an adequate education for our students. And and as an example I will often times I hear people say well this worked in this school there for all to work in other schools. I think you know we we touched on this in in a couple of the slides that. Because the program works in one school that may not necessarily work in another school near there can be a number of reasons for that it can be something as simple or obvious as the level of implementation for example after the Tennessee star study the California California State California Invested big time in reducing class size. for for young students located three students but also through middle school even and leave in the high school. They didn't think it through entirely and so as they were rapidly reducing class sizes they realize that it happened teachers to do that so then they were hiring a lot of teachers who were say temporary lace injure emergency lace injure Gigi these classes was sent to me they were bringing a lot of less effective teachers in two schools to reduce access of course the result was is they really didn't see an impact of the smaller class sizes because of whatever how the live in fact you have gotten from the small class size A you're losing because of the lack of teacher quality a lot of cases so. Mmhm. You'll certainly if there is the way the if if there seems to be a and approach whether it's class size whether it's a particular you know reading intervention like Success for all or or something like that the the point is. Snap program to look at how it's being implemented in particular school in the district because we've seen no there have been studies that have shown well this success for all for instance was implemented in a school but the under ten elements that the program requires in because of lack of resources. Mmhm this is the school. The six or seven of those components and thus the program to provide the results that were expected so you know I think it's it's hard to make a generalization that because the program works in one school it's going to work in every school or every classroom because they're just so many variables I mean this is a. I highly decentralized system that makes it hard to. Basically required. Word successfully implemented a particular program across the re classroom in this state read in a school district but the bottom line I guess is what I'm gather what you're saying and I think you said this in your slides to some extent no matter what we're doing the program should not the just folded over into a school setting without connections to the rest of what's going on in that school because that's where the silver bullet effect comes from I think that people are searching for and whatever it is a must be implemented with fidelity for example in in our state you we started doing a lot of work on reading we discussed and I think every time we've been in here and if those programs for example I'm not implement it with fidelity. Then we can say we have a program but is not work and not the cause necessarily is to go to bat program that because of the way is implemented on not implemented if I'd sum it up correctly you can just give me a not I'll ask my next question Mr chair then I'll get back in the queue. Okay. the the other thing that I had a question about has to do with this beating the odds kind of idea in we lost schools and we lost students for beating the odds when we ought to be changing the odds for them and the you know I I it really bothers me that that seeing as a matter of success that should be may be emulated by all students because we require so much of our students when we have not changed the odds for them I'm one of those things you mention was input that if we're going to implement these really good strategies we have to have a workforce a strong our teacher workforce. How are you defining strong teacher workforce were set up to us to define it is their research here that we need to know about. That is good question there certainly is research out there both on Preparation but certainly on supporting teachers on you know successful in New teacher induction programs mentoring coaching programs that sort of thing so. And then there are also there been some studies and actually you know touched on some of this is more we've done in Maryland where some of the internationally some of the other countries that have done very well in international tests. really have a strong focus on developing their future workforce so there are some lessons to possibly be learned there in terms of incentivizing you know some of the best students like this the students for in the top ten percent of their high school graduation class were students in their college providing incentives for them to go into teaching because in many cases because of the pay and sometimes the. On the image of being a teacher these gifted individuals of we have lots of choices choose not to go into teaching but to go into other higher paying. Or Of satisfying I guess I want to say that but but mayor. Market. They generally protect your tire prestige I don't know if you were looking for. Okay this is there I'll get back in the queue. Up to two more. The letter by now we have a lot to do this day in Monte so we. Try to get your questions down as much as possible as of represent Allen. Thank you Mr chairman you mentioned earlier that that was though one approach that fit all and you also mention that There were different variables. That we use A can you explain to me. What is the most effective for a bill that we can use to help and the low performance whose. You get the last last part of your last on again. What is the most effective approach that we can use a low performance groups. I'm not sure I can make a recommendation on a particular the most effective approach I mean I think it's in some ways it's almost more of a process of insuring that schools out. sufficient resources have high quality leadership have high quality teaching staff and access to the technology and other supports that they need That I think would be my recommendation for or working with. A low income HIGHPOVERTY schools. A follow up you also mention that what works in one school may that the effective in another school. Is that true. I'm having a hard time you must be a little bit away from microphone could you repeat that one more time okay you mention what works in one school may not be affected and another scoop. Because there were different variables. Yes that's correct. Do you mind if I have been on that one I think in part what you know mark is gone through is that And I think Senator Elliot mentioned it in others there there is a schools are are reading a comprehensive approach to to serving students so it's not one piece of one specific program that's going to do that but it is I think what we're trying to lay out is the types of programs that have been found to be effective when the school building comprehensive overall program to serve students and that can include as we mentioned some community impacts when you look at things like community schools ensuring that there are our needs met beyond I'm just those academic needs but some other pieces to and and working to bring back some of what we heard in the case studies pools which which are Someone add Representative of what we're talking about here next week and and aligned you talk about what some of those schools are doing that aligned with what we're finding here in this research also thank you. Thank you Mr Mr this my my last question and it has to do with the community schools out when community schools have been implemented and in these communities does not be calm the and all committees is that considered the answer for these under this resource communities or is that a gateway to working at some of the things that need attention it in the entire community so that everything is not so dependent right on that school site. I would say that in in nearly all cases the lease for the the schools that were familiar with on the the wraparound services are really there to try to you know I I don't like to use the word offices they are there to Some of the challenges that families and students from low income neighborhoods and low income families are facing so now it's simply providing wraparound services and and not also addressing the academic side of the equation will not lead to a successful school what I can do is is providing those wraparound services can help to help these families and students focus on the academics rather than focusing on on track the. All right so I just the same from that this the schools and unless there is a broader framework or broader plan for the entire community by other factors the community school kind of becomes an island where folks where we are trying to take care of all of the students. but that may not necessarily and any way a drift out into the rest of the community by business taken a larger I guess a large role in what's happening and community leaders and so forth. That was this is this is Johnson servers and I think an important aspect in and mark you know. You jump in here if I'm and I'm not describing strictly an important aspect of the community schools is that the school itself is leveraging the resources available in the community not providing all of them themselves and so a part of the community schools this dumb and having a coordinators and such is that they are they're really helping that families and students leverage what is going on the community and building community at some level so it it it'll it kind of moves away from the idea of being an island and that is actually trying to get out into the community one of the things that we have seen and and some more urban settings that that can be a problem with community schools is that there are only so many resources outside the walls to tap and so with every school was trying to tap those resources you actually the problem so you actually have to develop. The community's resources for those community schools to scale up but overall it's it's really not the school itself providing every wraparound service it's really helping families leverage that are the services available in the community. Thank you. Representative Beck. Thank you Mr chair of I'm I'm looking back on the committee schools the benefits of the committee schools and the statement and just maybe some clarification on it used these basically said that these programs are are strongest when they're implemented across multiple schools. And when the districts are actively involved in supporting so I'm just. Want you to try to clarify a little bit exactly what you're talking about there are you saying that would schools within a district are you saying that multiple districts within the state or house house that. The exactly where you talked about the multiple schools. Well I think what we're looking at is if you have this is probably more applicable to the larger urban areas than to other areas and I think there are kind of unique challenges you particularly for off more role state like Arkansas if your role school district even though you may have very high levels of poverty and there's probably going to be fewer community resources to access because you don't have the nonprofit service providers that you would find in a larger of an area but I think of what what you're getting at it in terms of multiple schools is that you don't sort of having one school as an island out there receiving the services is going to have you if you have several schools serving high income hi I poverty neighborhoods if you really want to see a change in the district want to see on the schools that are serving the highest already students and neighborhoods offer the same types of programs and the leave in yeah and I have a vestment in the in providing those types of services in Baltimore we we look that up this happened to be a. school in the city of Baltimore and is the the school have really become sort of the center of the neighborhood that it was serving and had done a very good job because of the support of the principal the support of the of the reference services coordinator and other staff in recognizing when students and families needed help and then you know which may be you know maybe office I think maybe the classroom teacher that's going to notice that first rather than the the community school or the but then bringing that to the attention of the community schools coordinator to on try to find is that a help with whatever issue the student or his his or her family or dealing with so I think that's what we're trying to get at in terms of both I have enough schools to serve the communities that that need the services and then having biting the staff so that it is basically one person out of school I've tried everything happened really needs to be a school wide effort. Okay. All right that is all the questions before we move on I'm just going to make everybody aware something no most you all know the superintendent Jodi Jenkins of actions passed away last night and the school children might be aware of that remember the family his family and or I guess it's a he had some Jodie's or not from among girls but I think it's eighty Family and school I'm sure they're all morning deeply today he's been suffering what. With the Covin and it finally got him so no please remember the family. All right Justin will move on to item he. If you're ready. Man does but not up right now. Hello and good afternoon my name is makayla talking and I'm going to present on the best use of poverty fine if they find you and survey results. So the president presentation overview we're going to start with a brief background on any in student achievement yes a funds and they'll be referred to as the patient districts and we're gonna talk about districts survey responses regarding activity says yes a fun and then lastly the examination of current district you yes if I'm. Very and of the five shell there are appendix tables the appendix tables look at survey responses broken out by high free and reduced price lunch and low free and reduced price lunch district respondent at urban versus rural district respondent in small versus large district response. Student achievement ASA finding was formally known as the national school lunch. And what yes a categorical funds provide additional funding to districts based upon the concentration of students eligible for free and reduced price lunch. Funding must be a listed allowable use or purpose or be used for activities that have been approved by the Arkansas department education. Funding is based off of the district fair reduced price lunch concentration levels districts below seventy percent after L. concentration levels get the lowest amount of funding student districts seventy to ninety percent energy is pressed Lynch concentration levels get them metal offending student and districts ninety percent concentration level's affinities by students get the highest amount of funding for student. And this can be seen in the following table as you can see districts last from seventy percent for all students receive five hundred and twenty six dollars per student. Districts of greater than ninety eight percent of students received one thousand five hundred and seventy six dollars. As you may have noticed that yes a finding has not changed since twenty seventeen however if the legislature has provided different grant programs to help districts provide programming such as prekindergarten tutoring before and after school programming. Also there is an additional ESA funding to help with changing involvement at some districts me eight. Here is a list of the current allowable uses yes aid fund allowable uses can be programming such as experience based feel trapped prekindergarten programs summer and before and after school programs as well as they can be positions and. Teacher aides to their counselors social workers owner says. Other allowable use is the ability for a distracted transfer dollars to other categorical funds and these can be transferred it to you professional development English language learner funding and alternative learning environment. So let's talk about our state responses so this survey was disseminated to district in charter system administrators the respondents were asked to rate each of the allowable uses that I mentioned in the previous five as their most effective acted somewhat effective or not. I'm in order to make it the survey last we are focused on allowable uses that had reported expenditures in the prior year at least one person. there is also a write in option that allows respondents to write about the types of uses that they also make use there are. The I will start by talking about the funds that have been identified as the most effective and what uses those respondents and then we created what we call an effective reading which takes most effective and affected respondent on each of those. Different types of uses and then we compare that against those ranked not. You can see and this table when we look at the overall most effective use yes they are fifty seven percent of respondents made a classroom teachers as most active fifty four percent of respondents rated curriculum specialist coaches and instructed instructional facilitators as most affected and then other uses that were rated highly effective work council areas social workers are nurses as well as materials supplies and equipment and entered. This site looks at the effective use of yes a fine so this is the percent of respondents believe they used to be affected or most effective as you can see eighty two percent of respondents found bill counselors social workers are nurses to be affected as well as materials supplies and equipment to be most effective some other programming that they found to be as active as fast of the government remediation and in future. This is looking at the percent of respondents believe a use is not access and so as you can see nineteen percent of respondents do not re rated school improvement plan and scholastic audit as not affected. Sixteen percent rated parent education as not impacted in fifteen percent rated for teacher salaries supplements and college and career coach at not that. The study team we then divide it at the very each share divided by we've been divided this survey responses by variation I size around look how you look at a low and FOR I'll responding districts Allen classroom teachers and curriculum specialists and coaches to be the most attractive. Hi Afro districts also found curriculum specialist and coach is to be the most affected in addition to council areas and. Look how if you look at your peril districts they rated it counselor is most affected. And that they both rural and urban districts from classroom teachers and curriculum specialists and coaches to be the fact that. Looking at sine small districts from classroom teachers and early interventions to be most effective well large districts and curriculum specialists and coaches to be most effective. Here are there okay and responses that were received on in the question the question are there any specific resources programs or strategy that you think are the most effective use of this fine. I sixty eight people responded to this question of the sixty eight thirty five percent of the responses discussed individual instruction in being the most effective use of funds and the ability to provide ACT their student forty five percent of responses indicated we need to have school resource officer is in their buildings in order to keep their schools faith. Other respondents talked about the use of funds for mental health services your says salary is in special education services and one of the most common themes that were mentioned across respondents it was the importance of having the funds box of all. Now we'll look at the examination of current district uses yes eight five. So in order to perform this analysis we need to look at the expenditure data including provided by the bureau of legislative research I using nineteen twenty yes a fund expenditure data. Are we combined both ESA capital oracle funding with yes they grant funding. We examine the areas were district use most of their ESA five both state wide and then examine if there's any differences between expenditures by well free images preference and. As you can see on here Curriculum specialist coach is and instructional facilitators that was sixteen percent of total funding across this state is here other activities approved by Arkansas that the problem was fourteen percent of total funding and then it counselors social worker is ordinary says was about fourteen percent of total funding as well as twelve percent expenditures were spent on transfers to other funds which suggests that the expenditures and these areas were higher than what they're categorical funding was coming in and so there's an example nineteen now with eazy-e's eight dollars. You can also see that there is observable variation and then number. If you areas most most lately and classroom teachers counselors social workers under said and then in the curriculum specialist category as well as other activities approved by Arkansas department. If you're looking by size you can see that the largest areas. I. We're spending most of their about twenty two percent of their funds on curriculum specialist cages and instructional facilitator as well by areas or only using about ten percent of the. Yeah however you can see that the smaller areas where using twenty three percent of their funds on other activities approved by eighty II and the larger areas were using on the left. this can also be seen whether urban districts use most of their use twenty three percent or twenty five percent of their funding and curriculum specialists urges and instructional facilitator as well only fifteen percent. Of rural funds were spent and area and then if you look at for I'll twenty four percent of low after all districts and others and figure it is instructional facilitators well in high after all and it was only fifty percent of total funding. In this table you can see that percent of expenditures that were spent on a specific use you can see the percent of respondents that rated that use as most affected as well as the present that rated as most effective or S. that. And you can see some categories where expenditures are lined with the Senate The use this. You can see where expenditures are line that uses that district administrators rated as most affected this is including counselors social workers nurses I thank you on such those coaches instructional facilitate as as well as early intervention I'm it's important to note that two of these uses are already existing matrix resource areas. Additionally if there are any number of areas that are rated as effective at the district are spending less than five percent of their and so this is before and after school remediation classroom teachers as well as part. So here we house and he'd J. quest which I had talked about a lot on the previous slide but that you can see that a good percentage of expenditures are being allocated to transfer to other kind of oracle's or for other activities that are approved by the Arkansas department of education you can you can also see talk about how which areas where most aligned with the U. says that the respondents rated as most affected as well that you can that districts are spending money in those areas. And then lastly if there are a number of areas that have been rated most affected dot did not receives high percentage of total expenditure allocation. Are expended science that you can look there that I can talk about the difference between survey responses in terms of high and low and FOR I'll districts looking out inside. And we look forward to answering any questions that you may. All right represent a mixture recognized. Thank you Mr chairman the the the question that I have is on you know when you look at the the survey your server I response of your least effective includes things like summer programs and parent education and that look on the the chart it looks at their expenditures and parent education summer program shows zero percent of expenditures which indicates to me that they're not spending any money on these programs and yet. They rate them as not effective so the question that I have is. Is it a preconceived notion among the administrators that they're not effective so we're not spending any money verses the actually not being effective was that. That question make sense and I'm asking is it truly that parent education is not effective or is it. We just don't see it being affected because we're not spending any resources there. We your question we did not run the and there was date they were defending the dollars to the same effect on the label that not effective there could also be the issue that you have district you are spending money in that area and then also the the respondents. We did not run the comparison so we can't really and that at that exact conclusions that you that okay so in other words we don't know whether parent education is effective or not it's the only thing that we know for sure is that schools are spending money on those programs with that be a correct characterization of what we're saying here. And I just wanna McGill command and just be clear that they're not spending yes eight dollars on those programs. Okay so that is. So I may be spending other dollars on the program and that's why they're saying those programs are not effective versus they're just not to and it may be something we need to get to the department that the city. Our school spending because obviously I think we do have summer programs I also think it's important to note that in the event there is respond with makes it and that it would practicable an offense that needed and thank you all so they could not read it house. Or not. Okay so the so the the bottom line I guess the ultimate and what I'm trying to get to this we don't know if parent education is ultimately effective or not all we know is that schools are not spending this money on those programs would that be the only thing we can truly take away from this data. Yeah I think that that's exactly right we we can say what is with this part of money and and that's about as far as we can get alright thank you thank you Mr chairman. Hey. State senator Sturch. Thank you madam chair and this may be the. Question for the departments of our consultants but I wanted to ask. On the key take away one of the main things that you said was that. To expand your categories that a high percentage of the essay funds are used for for other uses either transferred other category because or for other activities approved by the eighties so I'm wanting to know what are these other categorical as did the survey reports say anything about where these other funds are going as far as is that the classroom teachers that they often sided or for early intervention programs or whatever it might be one of those other categorical is that there's transferring this money to. Thank you. The answer that question the other kind of oracle's with the transfers are to our to professional development English learners and alternative learning environment and then as far as the other allowable other activities approved by eighty E. that's something we've been going back and forth with the department on to identify what are some examples of that is just requiring some handling update us we don't have an answer for you at this time. It's something we will include in the final report. Thank you thank you ma'am check. Representative garner. Senator Sturch yes my question thank you very much. Just enter question senator Chesterfield. Adam cheer in your studies across the country. Have you found that these programs have worked. The. Program the parent education programs is their general knowledge of whether or not these programs or effective other than just looking at what somebody is determined to be there idea of what if the activities. Any done studies as you've studied education across the country right. And what works across the country have you found in your in looking at other places. What we're doing now is being very subjective in that we're looking at what somebody say is they think is effective not necessarily whether or not the program is effective in looking at programs across this country have you found that when we engage parents when we have some of these programs. That others don't find effective have we found them to work if parents are better educated as to how to meet the needs of their children does it make for changes in the effectiveness of the learning of their key it's I mean what what are you finding across the country. Reporter I think your point As we do the states across the country absolutely getting families engaged in the learning environment and and understanding schools three people like them liaisons and other interventions that that provide that connection in communities. I think educators talk about that being important all the time. one of the limitations of a to your point of what we're finding here is that folks are having to make a determination on what to use these dollars for in a limited resource environment and so really what they're talking about is probably where they would go first with the resources often but to your point I don't think there would be anything to say you shouldn't engage families and in fact it's important to gauge families but in in this setting at folks we're not we're not highlighting that is where they would put the dollars first as I think one of one the ways I would look at that but you're actually right having parents engage having parents know what's going on with their students and really having parents feel part of the community I think what I folks will talk about frequently as we do this across the country is that if someone is not did not have a great experience in it in school themselves it is harder for them to engage in their child's learning and so schools are trying to find ways to overcome that so that the whole family is engaged in that process and I you know mark said you're one of the issues that was found in when we did this previous yeah the previous presentation is that if a student doesn't see others who had success in school they are less likely to have success in school and so you got overcome that gap and I do think that parity engagement and and and community engagement as a key factor in doing. There are just a few points on it when we highlighted those areas that were least effective I just wanna make sure we keep in mind that those percentages were about ten to fifteen percent of districts that were saying this we're not affected so we're highlighting the ones that were indicated as least effective of the total but that means that it was still considered effective in a number of districts I just quickly pulled up that the date and. Education about of their districts did think it was not active program and another forty some percent thought it was somewhat effective so it was more of a mixed category but in part it could be how they've implemented effective and development. Development and education how effective that stand for that Okay medicated don't want individuals think they known but we programs as a little teaser for next week's discussion of case studies really having engaged parents and community the something that the schools were showing is influential their success. Thank you. Senator Elliott. Thank you Mr when we. I'm following up on the question of about two port where this the money is going to the to other categorical so so if we are spending the ESA money on teacher salaries teacher stipends and transfer and more to A Ali just for example Is there a message and those are transfers that should inform how we are finding the matrix itself where those things traditionally would be funded. I know some locals outside of the matrix but. The we are using this money. In this manner is there a message to us. Senator and I think the alarm is actually made that statement the more than this eight in their examination of these funds that I I think you're you're exactly right there's some indication of And we'll talk a little bit more about this from our educator panels also that the ESA funds are being used to you Wire resources in many different areas and and those other areas might be places that you want to consider it in you know there needs to be different different funding for those areas because it is an indicator that folks you know are are trying to find pots of money to to to fill full band will talk a little bit more about that with the educator panels but there are things like even we heard a lot about safety and security answer as We often heard about ET AL I we often heard about eight ale lease so that they are they they are areas especially Ellen Ellie that are funded but there they are utilizing these resources to increase the amount of funding that they are right they're turning yeah all right thanks Mister I thank you. Okay that is the last of those questions so the. Miss Amanda you are only for items F.. Senate. Professional development next. Yes that's correct. Our next topic is professional development extra duty time so for this presentation I want to start up by reviewing what research is out there on effective professional development then talk about the history of the IP funding in the state including what is that look like today how does that compare to ADD district expenditures in this area and finally when share some information from that survey of district in charter system administrators about how they are providing professional development and what extra TV time requirements and practices look like in the state. So the researchers number key characteristics of high quality professional development the first is that is both content okay and also models effective practiced implement the constant need to be both apple says to teachers using a training and also actionable You should also incorporate active learning still interactive activities discussions demonstrations session so the teachers are not passively receiving information but are really actively engaging in as they burn I just be collaborative learning teachers the acting share ideas and collaborate with others to learn and finally in state should be job abetted so they should be able to take what they learn and apply it directly classroom or have the opportunity is there other teachers implementing classroom. Further it should include coaching to provide personally support it should be a sufficient duration to our teachers time to learn and practice and reflected on them so is the one day or one time events it's just a school goals state and district standards and assessments in teacher evaluations again that is not conflict with any other expectations or items that teachers are responsible for. So in this state Two thousand four five following the two thousand three because the study the state implemented funding for professional development related to their recommendations funding was intended to provide time during the summer for instances summer interest you it should be able to provide on site coaching for teachers collaborative work time aging planning and preparation and then additional funds for training that was really implemented in three. The first thing extending their teacher contract to opportunities a professional development also included in court reading instruction facilitators enter the matrix and inviting additional funding for training through a categorical funds and knowing that teacher contracting the number of instructional facilitators hasn't really fluctuated over the spirit but the amount of funding to the categorical has changed over time your available resources. Current. From the moment is still provided through this PDAs and the teacher contract under to enhance instruction facilitators not on the matrix and then through the categorical funds which is forty dollars and twenty five cents per student of which twenty seven dollars and forty cents is provided directly to destroy your meter is used for the online at the state's online PT's system. Betulinic communities pilot program in addition to the state provided on districts also use other scene local sources in federal funding to fade eight for their professional development. So we look done state funding compared to district expenditures for the last four years and found that the information hasn't really changed much over that period of time when you consider all sources to against a local. Districts are spending considerably more than their funded through the state professional development in the art of about seventy one dollars for students FOR professional development compared to the twenty seven dollars and forty cents the received. Looking at the final year. So again looking in the final year of twenty twenty and thirty percent of expenditures were funded by the state categorical find on other twenty percent came from other state and local sources and the final remaining forty percent of other large percentage is from federal sources. It is. Looting this funds and sending them to the side districts Rick spending thirty dollars and sixty cents Christina I'm PT compare to the twenty seven dollars and forty cents the receiving the categorical district difference we took a little closer look at what what funds are they using for that. The difference is really funded as a transfer from the estate categorical forty four percent for major expands and FOR other sources. If you take a look at the funds specifically from the state to not total expenditures but how districts are using your categorical dollars. I understand that Maryland is for purchase services that are purchased services which include consultant Speaker course registration fees travelers substitute so that's about two thirds of those categorical funds from the state are used for those are just services one other twenty five percent are spent on salaries and benefits. So we. In Turner's system administrators that took this survey a series of questions about how he is provided currently. We found that in the majority of districts they have ten or more days of professional development so fifty four percent have ten days one of the thirty two percent have more than ten so nearly all of your district right quite a bit professional development time of their meeting fourteen percent districts of less than ten days and the minimum reported in the survey this five days in a few to. We also found that on average that personal development is occurring during the summer. So sixty percent is really during the summer wiki other days either trainings and conferences during the school year joint collaboration time early release early start time. These are also led by a variety of different groups so about a third day's led by school administrators wall around twenty percent of days let either I coughed staff or another transfer Senate districts that. In their meeting ten percent. The teachers and other ten percent by outside consultants to a variety if people are leading the professional development and get a search teams are averages so it really very district to district in in how they're implementing they're asking development. Also on average according to survey responses a third of the topics thirteen duties are used to cover topics either by state and federal requirements. another quarter or then set by the district attorney system school leaders or the teachers themselves so the Brady topics are being addressed based on the. The input of different different groups in the system we also asked about what the topics are particularly helpful or affected and again as responses very quite widely because all districts are using different pieces to meet the needs of their students was most frequently reported where how helpful that professional learning communities or PSP model and and then the right strings those are the most frequent responses that we received. Disturbing the house about teacher planning collaboration and found that nearly all districts have a policy about the minimum time teachers have for collaboration on on average teachers had forty five to fifty nine minutes of planning a day in about sixty eight percent of the districts with one to two periods of that per week allowed for collaboration and in about half of district you can see in the tables below how the the daily planning time the collaboration carried from district to district on average. The survey was extra duty time so in addition to professional development time the matrix also provides funding at and at the order of fifty dollars for student for supervisory needs to reduce the amount of time teachers have on extra duty outside instruction through their time for instruction and FOR that collaboration ending what we found is that seventy seven percent districts that they have a policy regarding this section any time and within the past us about a series of X. unities they might have how often that occurs from delete two three or four times a week when the two times a week of weekly or rarely or never occurring and we found that in nearly all districts teachers have a duty free lunch period. We also found that they are responsible for surprising Lynch street recess pick up or drop off rate so in about a third of districts that occurred dealing With five percent saying it happened three to four times a week and half of districts so most districts thing that occurred when she times a week so in most places not a high level of burden in this area. We also ask you teachers regularly had office hours or periods of time and they were available for after school to meet with students and in forty percent of districts that occurred dealing whereas another twenty five percent said this range from one to four times a week. So again it really actually in in how much action ET teachers are taking on. This church summaries is each of those that we just touched on you can also see that. Their number of activities that are happening either less than weekly or never so that includes your base instance outside of the day we also asked that they were receiving additional compensation for either the extremely within the day outside of the day and in most places that was that was not If there's any questions on professional development or. Senator Chesterfield you're recognized. Thank you Mr chair is there a correlation between student success. And the amount of. P. D. time. That the teachers may have. And the time on task. If we look at that if you have some districts that only have five days of PD. And others that have more or the ones who have the last the least amount of time on it are they more likely to be less successful more successful. Something we looked at within the state yeah and as far as just aggregating those responses by performance level but that's something you can dig in to enter enter the market you have any thoughts about. Inactive professional judgment National development in studies nationally. Are you. Is there any thing that tells us. Nationally what that is. It seems to me that if some districts are giving individual teachers or the teachers in their districts the opportunity to develop professionally. And others are giving them five days. To do this then it would seem to me that those who have the most opportunity to learn how to better connect with their kids would be doing better and if that's wrong. How do we know it's wrong because what we're doing now is giving us information that we're not. To me connecting the dots if you do less time professionally to develop your sales is that going to correlate with kids doing last way all. Is there any study that shows that. We'll probably say to specific studies on the direct correlation between for. Development student outcomes certainly there are been studies over timing including the studies that I've been used to identify effective professional deployment that show that of the characteristics of professional development that Amanda laid out lead to better instruction instructional practices it's been a little bit more difficult to link improvement instructional practices to student outcomes but there have been studies that to show that a professional development particularly when it's accompanied with Reinforcement and support by by coaches or mentors in the classroom has led to to better student achievement you know and and usually studies are limited to looking at whether it impacted literacy or mathematics rather than sort of overall student achievement but certainly if you're if you're professional development practices. Meet the standards that that Amanda laid out there's a better chance that they're going to have an impact on the learning by children. When I was in the classroom. I had early morning duty. Lunch duty an evening duty in addition to teaching duty. And we still have that. Is there any correlation between the ability to just be able to teach. And the emotional and physical strain of having to do all of those different duties. Does it do we have any. Any research that determines whether or not all of this I know it had any impact on me by the last during the day I was just worn out. And so I know that my all students in the last period never got my very best and that is always of concern to anybody who is in a classroom so do we have studies that indicate how we can better use teacher time so that they can have more time on task and there's a time on task directly correlated to the ability to teach better or to be more effective in the classroom. Are you on not touching that okay thank you. No I think that's a great question I think we were all thinking I I cannot think of a study on the top of my head so let us see if there's anything out there A do you know what we see from from the survey results last extra duty time being assigned to teachers in Arkansas and we see in a lot of places so does seem items in the efforts to protect that instructional time I have worked in the state I think the other factor in that is not just extra duty time but the number of courses you take in a day and that amount of cleaning time so I think that I think there's an intersection between acts of a time for planning collaboration and extra. But I do not have an answer for you right at this time on that what research is out there on the impact. I just wanted this is mark Fuhrman and I just want to mention very quickly we had we had discussed some of the studies of. All systems and other countries that that for very well on the international tests like these in any of those there is a longer school day but this this longer school day provides more time for teachers to however eight to nine the rolling the search you know what's working with their kids we're not certain using data to to drive their instructions so there is some evidence that providing teachers not not only with time on task and students but in additional time to serve the reflective and collaborative professionals I can have an impact on teacher quality and see. Senator Elliot you're recognized. Thank you Mr chair I appreciate that last comment because in fact in most of those schools teachers spend only half of their time teaching in the classroom they have time to prepare and this is the thing that I thank god we heard from teachers so much and that hasn't changed over the years in fact teachers now have less time to prepare and it's the thing that we need the most to be great once we get into the classroom and that's be integrated I'm I'm I and I and the other thing about that I think that we don't have research but I'll remind all of us want that things we said when we started this that we would get everything we can from research but there are some things that are a matter of professional judgment and common sense this seems to be one of those things I don't think we need a study necessary to the tell us that if you are only getting fifty nine minutes a day to prepare to be great when you're in the classroom that's something upside down about that and my a question as is about the schools that are is there any kind of pattern for the districts that are implementing only five days a week for professional development. Ninety examined to see if there's a pattern in The impact on performance of this place is again it was only a handful of places that had Fewer numbers of decent ET I do believe it intended to be more charters than other schools that a little more flexibility but that's about all I can say as far as a pattern of those okay thank you thank you Mr chair. Reserve all you're recognized thank you Mr Speaker amendment Mister chair and so represented speaks couldn't be here today and she's ask for me to ask these questions so this is for higher so what are the other water other states doing for professional development and were they getting their topics for professional development and how many hours are that a averaging on professional development. That is something we can look into I don't have that information in front of me. Okay well I would appreciate if you get that information thank you. Representative from ball. Thirty on. I really think. Thank you again but your button again. Okay. Yes it's wrong professional development has your every minute survey take in. about or from teachers. That that they have an opinion on whether the professional developments good or bad or ugly or whatever I hear some. As in teaching a long time and so love this discussion I heard was very pretty so I just wanted for Jim cannon survey from teachers. I believe the most recent the LR report A not sure if it was around twenty eighteen when they left a professional development they did include as ample of some teachers in the survey looking at opinions on professional development how effective different pieces were be it trainings they received from distract or the state or other avenues I do not recall the results of that but that would be a resource to look after something that's recently been done in the state I mean do you know. Nationally there teachers are been on professional development I think blood but we spoke with spoke about and research of what makes the affected is that really engaged really supported actionable professional development tends to be the types of professional development that teachers you are highly because they can actually take it is that they're practice our system the one day sessions we tend to hear that this wasn't effective for was an applicability means the more tailored more actionable it can be the better likelihood that it's something that your teachers wrote about you. Okay thank you. All right that is all of the questions on that item. So we're down to the discussion of state student mental health. One. Morning I'm genders good telling with a hearing and I'll be presenting on student mental health. I'm personal provided for context two three for highlights from our April presentation on student mental health supports and then I will talk about the district survey results about how districts and charter systems are currently addressing the mental health needs here in Arkansas. Back in April we presented on the mental health supports we talked about what need exists for mental health report we look that current staffing levels nationally for student support personnel in schools we look at best practices including sharing is view of the national approaches and models that have been developed and looking at staffing recommendations from professional association and then we also look at how other states are organized to prevent to provide student mental health supports in schools. Thank you highlights from that presentation as you know Arkansas currently provides funding for two and a half counselor and nurse position five hundred students in the matrix and the date the creation standards require that each school district has that student guidance counselor ratio of no more than four hundred fifty to one we also shared some data from the national center for education statistics that show that the average counselor staffing ratio in Arkansas was three hundred eighty five our students per counselor with lower than the average of our comparison as a review states in Massachusetts who came in on the average at four hundred seven students counselor. Are we shared several national approaches to address mental health needs I'm the common theme among them was that there really whole child focused approaches and that most of them provide us your level of support for students were there some baseline level of student mental health support that's provided to all students and then as student need increases additional services are provided often by a more highly trained specialists such as the heater special of school social workers or school psychologist. the recommended ratios from the professional associations nationally the two hundred fifty to one school counselor ratio recommended by that school counseling association that's cool for college instances the Asian echoed that two hundred fifty to one school counselor ratio they recommended anywhere from five hundred to seven hundred to one for school by colleges based on need and they recommended a four hundred to one ratio for school social workers. The national association for school social workers recommended eight two hundred fifty to one ratio for school social workers unless that those social workers were working with students with more intensive needs when they would be just the lower ratio. So in the district survey that was sent to every district in charter network in this state we asked how districts and charter systems are currently interesting mental health needs we asked about the strategies that they're using and we asked for them to report the strategy that they're using across these three different student groups first for low need your one students which is typically all students will. Thank you for your moderate need or tier two students and finally for your ex your re which are your highest need and smallest number of students in a school I'm pretty each question we examined if there is variation based upon district five need or location and as I talk to the responses I will I'm calling them all district responses this includes district ends charter system responses. The overall survey results the strategies are most commonly identified for your low need your one kind of all students in the school I'm seventy six percent of districts for the youth counselor land classroom sessions I sixty nine percent say that in the press during instructional courses. Fifty nine percent say that if the dress during advisement or mentoring curious which is most typically if the secondary levels and then forty one percent said they have a small group or a team within the school or district it reviews students needs and develops plans to address them and finally forty one percent said they use small group meetings with counselors FOR collect fashion. For the moderate need your team students are the most commonly identified strategies first fifty nine percent of district that they do one on one meetings with their school counselors fifty four percent said they do small group meetings with counselors. Forty nine percent also again have that small group routine that reviews you need set and develops plans. Forty seven percent say they do some kind of assessment of individuals with mental health needs for their teacher to student. Forty four percent in the utilize an outside agency to provide therapy on site and then thirty eight percent say for their moderate needs your to students they have district or system employed therapist that will provide services to those students. Really for the I just need your three students as you can see there are fewer strategies or identified by number of the district for sixty five percent of district that the use an outside agency to provide therapy on state to their highest need students thirty nine percent do assessment of individuals didn't mental health needs. Thirty nine percent to one on one meetings with school counselors and thirty eight percent have district or is that the main point therapist that provide services onsite. In all of the strategies that we included for districts blacks from we wanted to share those that were the least utilized first instructors employed therapists providing services on fate that was really utilize strategy for tier two and tier three I'm very low procure one eighteen percent and as those national models with state a lot of. Services provided to your one student that is not done through specialist at the Beckley done through school counselors and so that none of the pricing result. On the needed student anywhere from twenty to thirty percent of district reported accessing specialist through their education cooperatives. Eighteen percent at fourteen percent of district said for their loaning and all students that they use some kind of specific curriculum framework that number drops significantly for your moderate and high needs students and that typically the services provided to those students are very individualized. Look at some of these key strategies and see if there's any variation by district needs size or look house first was in district after accessing specialist through education cooperative larger districts reported less use a specialist the call up for their cure one students twenty eight percent of the smallest districts utilize the coops or cure one students compared to only eleven percent of the largest district. You may recall from our previous presentation on the coop that in general the larger districts utilize services from the coop less perhaps because they have more in district House city. Next districts with higher concentrations of poverty were more likely to access specialists to the co ops than more affluent districts for their tier one students from a rate of twenty six percent for the schools with the districts with the highest concentrations of poverty compared to twelve percent of Those are the lowest confiscation of property. For this strategy of counselor lead classroom sessions The higher the need of the district you were districts reported having cancer lead classroom sessions for all students so for district in the two lowest in need tiles sixty percent of those district reported using class so that will serve landed classroom sessions for all students compared to forty nine percent of district in the highest need. however as district need increased the more likely the districts work to report council led sessions for their tour to students district in the lower Snead queen title only six percent reported using counseling sessions for tier two students compared to twenty five percent in the highest need when tile we did not see much variation in this strategy from the findings of the District. Were districts utilizing outside agencies to provide therapy on state on site again these are most often for your high if need two or three students that students are districts with higher any were more economically disadvantaged students reported using outside agencies to serve their tier three through the higher rates than were affluent districts You look at district in the bottom three quintiles of any the wealthier districts our range anywhere from thirty eight to forty eight percent of them use outside agencies while fifty nine and sixty percent of district in the hi it's me when tiles reported using outside agencies to provide therapy on right there two three. Again very little variation based on the size of the district. Or it district or system employed therapist providing services on site again most often utilized for tier two and tier three. larger districts were more likely to report the use of that in house I'm district or system employed therapist and small district so. Serving your three student only seventeen percent of the smallest districts reported using district employed there. Compared to thirty nine percent and thirty one percent of the two largest quintiles district. finally nearly a quarter of summer right around the corner of survey respondents provided additional feedback through our open ended response block on the topic of student mental health. Common themes that just overall districts are seen an increased need for student mental health support in school we had a lot of comments around partnerships with outside agencies district are reported being very thankful for the help of the agencies and for the support that they provide also noted some challenges Or is that billing and payment limitations since outside agencies services typically need to be paid for to either Medicaid or private insurance that can be a barrier. Senate time there can be higher rates of turnover in the the therapists employed by the agencies and so some students may not have consistency in their quest that they're seeing. and finally family willingness to allow precipitation can be a concern Examples included were simply just that the paper work that's required to be filled out can be a barrier and also that some families simply may not want to consent to receiving services from an outside agency. final common theme that we saw in the open ended responses is that districts believe additional funding particularly funding dedicated to provide in district mental health professionals if needed. The highlight of the district on survey responses on in this mental health session section of the survey and I would be happy to answer any questions you may have. Representative make sure recognized. Thank you Mr K. question I had is on that final slide you'd mentioned that US school districts had mentioned that the need for services is increasing did they mention what was causing that increases it just there's more awareness of the issue is that what's going on with the virus break down families what's do we know what's causing that increase in the need. Of the very finest and that question did not provide contact around the need we did add in the introduction to the survey for folks to try to separate these questions from the current pandemic and so We we were hoping that people would be able to separate those from okay I will say that as we've worked across the nationally this is been a common theme that we've seen that districts across the country our our noting in increase the need for mental health services for all students. whether that just simply an increase in that the knowledge of either students or could being driven by some other factors I can't answer that time all right thank you thing stir. Representative garner. Thank you Mr chair I've got a couple of questions of the first is was there a definitions used for mental health in the survey was there definition or or is it mental behavioral or is it just up to whoever's filling out the survey to determine what mental health is. Provided at the civic definition I think we just after that that didn't mental health services that are provided at the district level from the district. Follow up Mr chair. Thank you and the second thing is that we're hearing from a couple of districts that Mental behavioral issues are such that. There's a need for alternative learning environments especially four even kindergarten through five is that something that you're seeing nationally and do you have any research to support or negate that. LA for young kids. Really we've been hearing anecdotally that the there's been movement to those lower grades but I don't think we have any specific research that we present to you today. Thank you. You thanks thank you Mr chair in the we're to go other there in your research did you find out that finding the anything dealing with the availability of mental health professionals at even are there and is there adequate numbers to meet the needs that the schools are are seeing that they have. you know from the survey I'm not sure we have that exact answer we're gonna bring you a little bit more information on this. On Monday through the case studies goals but one of the things that we have that we did find to talk about it get Monday is that there does appear to be. Resources schools and districts leveraging and lease and all that communities we spoke to that are private resources or and so that generally means there's resources available for students who qualify for Medicaid but there can be some disconnect you know because there's not a perfect let the correlation between all thank Medicaid in meeting these mental health There does seem to be a the the private providers that everyone you know every we've spoken to you as access to but there the funding streams can limit students you can actually have access. I can help in in communities where they might not I might not be the availability of staff which I think is part of your question to have them help in house so to just simply is a lot of leveraging the outside resources and just some of the equity issues than when you're in the in betweens implication of not receiving Medicaid but your family can where the service what happens. Representative all you're recognized thank you Mr chair in all of your studies for you've been looking have you looked at I have you seen any states that you state agencies such as DHS and things like that where they do do wrap around services FOR because a lot of times I think kids might have mental health issues that parents don't even know how to deal with and are there cases where wraparound services are used in other states even through other state agencies if that makes sense what I'm asking. Yes there are examples and and some of even what mark talked about earlier with community schools around that part of the community schools format is to that to leverage those other resources in the community often being provided through other Local or county agencies and so it depends I think to be a little bit more of a district by district access I don't have as much I I don't I can't think of an example where there this state is actually implementing that the on something like the district of Columbia which really is again both the district and the a a a you that all their government entities in our are the same so District by district that especially in more urban settings you tend to have more resources available I thank you. Representative Evans. Thank you Mr chair of to the team in all of your research and studies across across the U. S.. Have you read across any in the open ended responses where the concerning mental health spills over more so or or equally well to faculty and staff in what districts are doing to provide services to teachers over the last two three years. I'm. I am more unexplored area of research and practice nationally I can think of a lot of examples where we're states are focusing on providing those services to teachers I know that is at the forefront of a lot of conversations with the current and Jamaican yester pertinent stress on teachers right now but on the flip side there is also some concern about access things mental health services through your employer I think they. Hi seven some privacy related concerns I'm not that I don't think there's quite a bit a body of research out there anyone really working in that space yet Justin were. Okay thank you Mr thank you Representative. But looks like we're down to the last item of discussion on educational opportunities miss Amanda your own. Educational opportunity this presentation is intended to build on to my earlier work that we shared and discussions that we passed about how educational opportunities and experiences can very for students across the state so we want to bring some additional descriptive data analysis two U. law results districts survey and FOR still be looking at a couple examples of educational opportunities in the state CG in eighty course participation and how that Aries and then looking a class size institutions information about the teacher workforce that the experience certification education and salaries of teachers in the state and how those very district to district or the district survey results will be bringing Ford's member mention about offering before and after school and summer school programs including writing transportation to those programs. And then a couple of questions we ask a district in charter system administrators to share with us any changes or that they would be looking to make their CTR rings or any additional education opportunities there like to be offering. With the following question of what challenges do they fees if any meeting those changes or additional opportunities available to students. First looking at available data and all this information is data from collected by the department of education we looked at participation CT and eighteen courses and how that very between districts based upon their silence the percentage of students they have and look house looking at urban and suburban districts versus rural districts in the state. Is the team very by after L. personage by science and look how preceding years the sound that as. You need increase for after elements cheesy complete or slightly increased but you definitely a decrease in the rate of eighteen courses if you look in that second bank of Collins on that first table if you look in the middle table you also see a a quite a pattern related to sized CD completion goes down and size increases where is the P. course offerings increased at a preacher Maddox reach. Only then by locale and this again is where we see a very large difference between settings that a districts thinking impact so there is a higher percentages Gigi leaders and rural settings but a lower percentage of eighty course and so on that end is twenty three percent of roles students are are taking AP courses this is forty percent mission clarified its citizens courses taken so there could be some duplication and. We did not get class sizes Jean teacher ratio and sounds that class is institute your ratios were lowered and smaller districts hire me districts in rural districts emission noted these class inclusive of all settings and funding sources to their exploited in major. It would include your special education courses for example. Again we saw some pretty clear trends in the direction of hair need classes being smaller smaller school settings clearly having smaller class sizes. And then burl settings more likely that smaller classes and lower average students teachers just the start it is the direction you would expect to do both to a condom use of scale and then the idea of targeting additional resources to meet the needs of your friend reduced lunch students so that is the direction you would expect. We your work force you know what we found is that the highest need and smallest districts and quite a bit of variation in the teachers in the classroom so they had a higher percentage of teachers were new to the profession at a lower percentage of teachers that were fully certified dealer percentage of teachers that had an advanced degree. Your average years of teaching experience for teachers in many of those things are related to each other we also found the salaries were lower as need increased or is the size of the district decreased and finally comparing rural districts urban districts there was a similarities in terms of the education level the certification and experience of teachers average salaries for very different. So the stable release summarizes information you can see. The percentages for after all and FOR science increasing bernama's teachers decreasing for certified and someone to see decreasing by need for average years of experience the definitely creasing or science. I think one of the larger standouts is for the role again the experience in education teacher since the same but their salaries were very different in the order of forty four thousand nine hundred ninety two in rural compared over fifty two thousand urban suburban. I was extended learning timeliness information came from that district survey that we discussed. We found that overall districts are more likely to offer academic focus first is it Richmond east activities. And about how the districts reported that it academic before and after school in most of their districts above fifty percent. Districts offer transportation. For those programs is some of their school. We look at it more closely and economic focused again that seem to be what was more likely to be offered and held that very a screaming disinterested edge by size and by the house and we found that higher need districts are mostly more likely doctor both before and after school and summer programs which is exactly what you would want to see essays decrease districts are more likely to occur thank you to make before and after school but less likely Dr summer school as we noted it is not a perfect pattern there is that stand out that that second entitled of size being much different than the other response and. Finally districts regardless of locale offered before and after school is tomorrow level the role of schools were someone or likely Dr summer school in urban and suburban districts. The next area is changes to C. G. offerings so we asked are there any changes your district retirement system would like to making the area of speech he and what you see here it is there's a number of common things that districts and charter systems like to you first thing in the certification operational courses and current industry areas. Increase participation of raw under courses in other industries area and provide CG opportunities in lower grades. Our kind of the top five responses that be seen and you can see all of I'm here we then asked what challenges to the fees making these changes the first. Ending is is needing additional funding to provide those opportunities. Followed by having specific technology equipment or materials having that the building space as we know CG programs for require pretty specialized speaks to conduct an accident you and schedule imitations which often came up related to getting kids to a center or a a secondary campus to take those courses. Finding the staff to teach. There's a number of other challenges listed here as well. When asked about what other opportunities that they like to have for their students the most common responses started at the top so that would be the one to talk more stand for instance or before and after school or computer science courses. Concurrent enrollment courses on summer school and been CD in the restaurant below twenty percent better noted here. What challenges did experience providing this opportunity and the very between offerings let that the largest issues were for before and after school and summer school transportation and additional funding we're we're the highest. Challenges that were noted. Followed by certified staff to teach challenges related to stem in computer science were specific technology additional funding scheduling limitations having staff certified to teach in having the heated campaign capacity in building facilities so again about fifty or sixty percent districts reported each one of those challenges. And then related to concurrent enrollment was additional funding schedule imitations and having certified staff to change so you similar challenges across all areas with with some variation within each. That we'd love to hear your questions on education opportunities. A have no questions. Nobody wants to ask a question on that one by three to home on it. All right no I see no questions. Justin back to you. You have anything else no that's that's only got three we will we'll talk to you all again on this coming Monday all right we will be here on Monday at one thirty. And one one thirty on Monday and look like we are. Finish days anything else from the committee. All right. With that we are adjourned. Here. Thank you also you money.