West Seattle Elementary School
A few years ago it was among the lowest performing of Seattle Public Schools, with student proficiency scores in the single digits. Now, West Seattle Elementary ranks among the district’s highest performers. One of only a handful of Seattle schools recognized for “Closing the Gap,” it is the only Title 1 school to earn that accolade. Over 95% of the students served by West Seattle Elementary school live in poverty. The vast majority are recent immigrants who reside in the government subsidized housing projects near High Point.
Principal Vicki Sacco is the West Seattle Elementary School Principal who, along with Assistant Principal Pam McCowan-Conyers, led the school’s transformation. Rather than pointing to any single magic cure-all, they attribute the turnaround to a team of hardworking educators who mindfully use formative assessment data to continuously monitor student progress on Common Core State Standards.
But many educators are drowning in reams of data reports that aren’t actionable, or aligned to the CCSS. Vicki knew her school needed better data reports for her teachers. She wanted data to clearly and efficiently identify student learning gaps early so teachers could provide timely and targeted interventions for their students.
That is why Vicki and Pam chose to partner with MasterTrack. MasterTrack’s cloudbased progress tracking tools makes it easy for teachers to gather and manage their students’ formative assessment data in one location. “It’s no secret,” says Vicki. “Our formative assessment data tells us what we need to know about student progress when we need to know it.”
“MasterTrack helps us collect, report, and make data actionable in real time,” says Vicki. “That allows us to provide the right interventions at the right time to personalize instruction. MasterTrack is like an early warning system that, if we pay attention to and act upon, really serves our students’ learning needs. MasterTrack has had a significant and positive impact on the overall instructional quality at our school.” Making progress visible is highly motivating to teachers and students, and West Seattle Elementary teachers and students are enjoying their new groove. As Pam said, “Our discipline referrals have dropped over 80% and we have the highest teacher retention rates in the district.” MasterTrack is proud to help the dedicated educators of West Seattle Elementary School maximize student growth.
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