bto success story: COPPER KING ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

When Molly Watson became principal of Copper King Elementary School (Pendergast Elementary District), she faced daunting challenges. The scores in every grade level in reading, math and writing had dropped in the year prior. The school had just been labeled "underperforming" by the state. At the same time, she became a Beat the Odds School Partner. In the next three years, the school dramatically improved its students' academic performance by focusing on the BTO principles of collaborative solutions, built-to-suit interventions and finding what works and sticking with it.

School Overview

Beat the Odds is a rigorous, multi-year school improvement program based upon the Center for the Future of Arizona's nationally acclaimed "Beat the Odds" research study. Copper King is one of 79 Arizona K-12 schools participating in Beat the Odds during the 2011-2012 academic year.

Copper King serves 822 students in grades K-8. Eighty-four percent of the student population is minority, and 71 percent is low-income.

Making the Leap

 

"One of the biggest challenges when I became principal of Copper King was creating a vision with high expectations for students and teachers," Principal Watson said.

The first step was to develop leadership among the teachers. "A lot of times, we forget that piece, because we focus on the instructional strategies," she said. "The teachers loved being groomed as leaders."

She identified her prospective leaders, then moved some of them to other positions to create grade-level leadership. During meetings of the school improvement team, the group often focused on how to provide teachers with opportunities for leadership, and discussed professional development for teachers.

The teacher leaders created collaborative teams called professional learning communities that focused on best practices for reading instruction, and interventions for students who were not showing growth. Principal Watson also did walkthroughs so that teachers were consistently receiving feedback on their classroom instruction.

These efforts gave teachers confidence in their leadership and instructional capabilities, which in turn allowed them to take the risks required for the school to make the leap it needed to make. After the first year of applying the Beat the Odds principles school-wide, the school label went from "underperforming" to "performing plus"–an increase of two levels. "Having that success in the first year really built their confidence," Principal Watson said.

Copper King attained the highest score it has ever received for the "performing plus" label for the most recent school year (2010-2011). In addition, the school was only one point short of an "A" rating (140 points) under the state's new A-F label rating. Copper King's 139 score was the highest among the 14 schools in the Pendergast Elementary District.

Beat the Odds' Impact

Principal Watson credits her participation in Beat the Odds and the support of her BTO mentor as major contributors to the school's success.

"It is extremely valuable to have a mentor," she said. "I can pick up the phone and walk through some of the extremely difficult decisions I need to make, such as budget cuts and staffing changes.

"Also, meeting regularly with my mentor and the other Beat the Odds principals kept me focused on the most important components of leading a school," she added. "It's easy to get sidetracked with all of the things a school principal is faced with daily."