September 2011 Dear Friends: CTAC congratulates two of its partners whose successes in reform and student achievement gains made them headliners this week: The Charlotte-Mecklenburg School District in North Carolina, a CTAC partner since 2007, won the prestigious Broad Prize 2011 for being the best urban school district in America. Announced this year on September 20, the prize is awarded annually by the Broad Foundation to the urban district that demonstrates the greatest overall performance and improvement in student achievement while reducing achievement gaps among poor and minority students. This year it carried an award of $550,000 that will be distributed as college scholarships to the district's high school students. Exemplary practices cited by the foundation included the district's efforts to strengthen and energize personnel and leaders, partly through its Leadership for Educators' Advanced Performance (LEAP) program, initiated in 2008 in partnership with CTAC. Supported by a Teacher Incentive Fund grant from the U.S. Department of Education, LEAP is a performance-based compensation program. CTAC is LEAP's project evaluator and technical assistance provider. Teachers receive bonuses partly based on their students' achieving "student learning objectives" (SLOs)-developed by teachers using CTAC's SLO process. The Murkland School in Lowell, Massachusetts showed the biggest gains of all 35 Massachusetts schools designated "Level 4" last year for persistently low performance. While 22 of the schools made combined gains of 5 percent or higher in English and math scores on the state test, the Murkland School had a 13 point gain in English and a 20 point gain in math. That not only exceeded all other schools but also meant that the Murkland met its three-year target in the first year. Charged with the task of turning around the district's lowest performing schools, Lowell Public Schools partnered with CTAC in 2010 to implement its Standard Bearer Schools process-a research based process designed to build and sustain highly effective schools. Involving staff and the community at large, this process helped the Murkland School identify and address root causes for its persistently low performance. The result, most notably, was an intensified emphasis on building the internal capacity and expertise of staff to analyze student performance data and use findings to improve teaching and learning-a shift that led to the unprecedented level of student growth. Chris Scott, Ph.D., who served as Superintendent of Lowell Public Schools from 2008 - 2011, joined CTAC's staff this summer as Senior Associate, National School Reform and Superintendent-in-Residence. Best Regards, William J. Slotnik, Executive Director Community Training and Assistance Center (CTAC) CTAC builds district, state and community capacity by providing technical assistance, conducting research and evaluation, and informing public policy. CTAC's major education initiatives focus on performance-based compensation, teacher and administrator evaluation, teacher preparation and development, school turnaround and district improvement, state-to-district assistance, and union-management collaboration. CTAC also provides assistance to community development organizations, heath and human service agencies, grassroots initiatives, and other institutions working, individually or collectively, to address root causes of poverty. For more information, please visit www.ctacusa.com.