§ 22.1-253.13:3.A
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When the Board of Education determines through the school academic review process that the failure of schools within a division to achieve full accreditation status is related to division-level failure to implement the Standards of Quality or other division-level action or inaction, the Board may require a division-level academic review. After the conduct of such review and within the time specified by the Board of Education, each school board shall submit to the Board for approval a corrective action plan, consistent with criteria established by the Board setting forth specific actions and a schedule designed to ensure that schools within its school division achieve full accreditation status.
On November 17, 2016, the Board of Education approved the request. The minute is silent as to the “time specified” for the review. The agenda item for that meeting provides an expectation (that was not submitted to the Board for approval) but no deadline:
A division-level Memorandum of Understanding and Corrective Action Plan are expected to come before the Virginia Board of Education by June 22, 2017.
Today (May 8, 2017), Richmond replied to my Freedom of Information Act request regarding the Plan:
- They do not have a suggested model or list of items or format for the Plan from VDOE;
- They have no schedule for conducting the division level review;
- They have no plan or schedule for obtaining the required public input; and
- The do have a draft “template . . . that has not been vetted with RPS administration nor has it been presented to the State Board of Ed[ucation].”
One need not suffer beyond the first few elements in the template to see that it is not a Plan. It is a list of items to go into a Plan.
For example, the “Essential Action[s]” on the “Academics and Student Success” page include:
- Create, implement, and monitor a comprehensive plan to ensure alignment between the written, taught, and tested curriculum.
- Develop and implement a plan for division leadership to conduct instructional walkthroughs at all schools, analyze data collected on walkthroughs, and use the data to make decisions on how to support schools.
- Develop, implement, and monitor programs for students with limited English proficiency compliant with state requirements.
And on and on ad nauseam.
Thus, we see that, in the 172 days since November 17, Richmond has done nothing but create a laundry list of issues to go into a Plan. If they somehow manage to “vet [this or some other document] with RPS administration” and subject it to public comment and have it approved by the School Board, all by June 22, they still will have nothing more than a plan to create a Plan.
But, what the heck! The Board of “Education” that is vested with “supervision of the public school system” does not know how to fix bad schools. Indeed, they admit it(Sept. 21, 2016 video starting at 1:48).
It is merely an outrage that we are being taxed to support this sterile (and lethargic) bureaucratic exercise. It is something beyond an abomination that, in the meantime, Richmond continues to victimize many of its schoolchildren.
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