Coodanup College – A safe and orderly learning environment

Georgie Wynne and Stacey Plaut from the Fogarty EDvance team, along with members of the Swan View Senior High School leadership team (Cohort 7), recently visited Coodanup College to gain an insight into how they have successfully established a safe, calm, and orderly learning environment. The team at Coodanup College talked through the processes and practices that they have implemented over the last 5 years to ensure that the school was a safe space for learning.

Coodanup College use Positive Behaviour Support (PBS) as their schoolwide behaviour framework, which has been implemented with high fidelity as reflected by their data. The PBS committee create pre-organised packs for teachers to teach the behaviour expectations relevant to that fortnight. When students demonstrate the ‘focus’ behaviour, they earn points through the VIVO reward system which they can use to purchase items from the VIVO store, such as:

• Stationery, stickers, books, etc.
• Choosing the song of the week, from a curated list, to replace the school bell
• Ball tickets / leavers jumpers.

The team from Swan View Senior High School found the visit inspiring and motivating.  Highlights included seeing PBS in action and learning about the transformation of the College through RUOK Day, the Year 6 transition process and the implementation of the Zones of Regulation program.

It is impressive to see how the leadership team at Coodanup College have been innovative in the way they have established and maintained a calm and orderly learning environment. Specifically, the creative use of VIVO points (eg ball tickets), the playground obstacle course for Autistic students, and the school therapy dogs. Of note was also how well student services processes and practices are integrated within the school community to ensure the behaviour framework is owned by all staff. 

Coodanup College is available to host school visits once per term. For more information or if you would like to schedule a visit, please contact Kelly Bennett – Principal (kelly.bennett@education.wa.edu.au).

Find out more about the implementation of PBS in Secondary Schools here.

Cohort 5 of the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program had their final workshop on 10 November. Throughout the 3-year program, nineteen schools attended sixteen workshops with support provided in the form of best practice research and tools, professional mentors, peer support, the development of a rich school data set, access to experts and additional programs, to support school improvement. 

During their final workshop, the school leaders shared their school’s change stories for their next 3 years, discussed their achievements over the past 3 years, shared effective practises and key learnings from other schools in the cohort, reflected on their learning experiences since the beginning of the program, and celebrated their successes.

Fogarty EDvance uses evidence-based research to support school improvement, bringing together the best tools from education, business, philanthropy, and the community sector. The School Improvement Program focuses on building the capacity of school leadership teams to make informed evidence-based decisions, strategically plan and ultimately, improve student outcomes. 

“We believe that with strong leadership, and a clear and prioritised strategic plan whole-school improvement can be achieved. We are incredibly proud of the progress these schools have made over the past 3 years, and we look forward to the ongoing impact this will have on the ~8,000 students across these schools in the future,” said Georgie Wynne, Fogarty EDvance Program Director.

“Our Cohort 5 schools now have access to a range of EDvance alumni activities through the FED Alumni Network. This will allow them to stay connected to ongoing professional learning and supports from the EDvance program, including a group of like-minded leaders who are passionate about improving education outcomes for children of all backgrounds in Western Australia.” 

The Fogarty Foundation established Fogarty EDvance to significantly improve and sustain academic outcomes of students in disadvantaged communities in Western Australia. To date, EDvance has worked with 96 schools spanning 7 cohorts, impacting over 300 school leaders, and 42,000+ students across Western Australia.

Congratulations to the following Cohort 5 schools who have successfully completed the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program:

Teachers from Cohort 6 of the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program had some inspiring workshops on High Impact Instruction recently.

Expert teachers, Brooke Wardana and Anthony Chiappalone, facilitated an engaging workshop about High Impact Instruction in the primary context. They identified the difference between direct and explicit instruction, before working with participants on developing a firm understanding of lesson design components, including the importance of the daily review, and lesson delivery.

Brooke and Anthony have a wealth of teaching experience between them. They shared their teaching expertise with participants, providing explicit instruction lesson demonstrations in literacy and numeracy.

Dr Lorraine Hammond spoke about explicit instruction as an efficient and instructional approach to teaching and learning. She explained how daily review reduces cognitive load and builds automaticity and workshopped the elements of the Explicit Instructional Model, including TAPPLE and Engagement Norms.

High Impact Instruction (or Explicit Instruction) is instructional practice that incorporates both lesson delivery and lesson design where grade-level content is explicitly taught using engagement norms and frequent checks for understanding. Lesson delivery relates to how you present the content (i.e. read with me) and check for understanding (i.e. randomly selecting student responses using popsticks). Lesson design refers to how new content is organised, presented and modelled to students (i.e. Guided Practice followed by Independent Practice). Teachers will also provide daily reviews of previously learned knowledge and skills so they become automated. High Impact Instruction practices involve explicitly showing students what to do and how to do it.

Successful conversations and organisational health were the topics of conversation at Cohort 7s School Improvement Program workshop this week.

In order to improve educational outcomes at schools, particularly over a sustained period time, it is important that the school has a healthy culture. Organisations need a healthy culture in order to have long term, sustained improvements. When school leaders know how to focus on their organisational health, they can positively impact student performance.   With a solid understanding of their school culture they can address issues and continue to improve areas of strength. At times, this includes having constructive conversations with staff, which is why these topics are important elements of the EDvance program.

Dr Renu Burr, Director at Burr Consulting and UWA Lecturer, facilitated a very informative workshop about the role of successful conversations to lead effective teams and organisations. School leaders were encouraged to reflect upon the power of well-formed conversations to create a high performance-high engagement culture in their schools while implementing change.  They then used a practise framework to conduct learning conversations that set high expectations, built trust and influenced others.

Rachel Howard, Chief of Staff at the Minderoo Group and engaged by McKinsey & Company, encouraged participants to develop a deeper understanding of how organisational health can drive better performance outcomes. Rachel worked with the school leaders as they examined Frame 2 (Assessing underlying mindsets) and 3 (Architect responses to improve Organisational Health) of the McKinsey Organisational Health Framework.  By implementing actions from the Influence model leaders can get staff actions aligned in the direction of the overall strategic plan.  They also began drafting a ‘Change Story’ for effectively communicating their school’s change agenda.

The Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program focuses on building the capacity of school leadership teams to make informed evidence-based decisions, strategically plan and ultimately, improve student outcomes.

To find out more, visit the Fogarty EDvance website or contact the team at info@fogartyedvance.au or +61 8 6316 1600.

Many EDvance primary schools are already utilising evidence-based approaches in their strategic plans to improve the literacy outcomes for their students. These approaches are also advocated for in the Primary Reading Pledge – schools may wish to review the proposed plan as part of the Pledge, as there is certainly a clear alignment.

In 2020, approximately 50,000 students around Australia began high school with insufficient literacy skills. This cohort had similar numbers of students demonstrating low literacy in NAPLAN in Years 3 and 5, indicating that for most of these children, difficulties with reading had been identified at two key stages in their primary schooling but had not been remediated. 

Research indicates that these students are half as likely to complete school as their peers and have serious life-long educational and social disadvantages. All school systems and sectors, authorities, and leaders are therefore being implored to take the necessary steps to implement the Primary Reading Pledge  and have all students reading by the end of primary school. 

Five from Five, AUSPELD and Learning Difficulties Australia have corroborated to develop the Primary Reading Pledge; an evidence-based and realistic plan for schools to dramatically reduce the number of children who finish primary school unable to read proficiently. This will be achieved by providing primary schools with the resources and training to provide effective assessment and intervention.

The Primary Reading Pledge:

“To reduce to near zero the number of children who finish primary school unable to read by providing primary schools with the resources and training to provide effective assessment and intervention.”

We encourage Fogarty EDvance schools to look at the primary reading pledge and see how this maps to the work outlined in their strategic plans.

The Fogarty EDvance mentors are regularly described as the ‘gold’ in the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program.  

Su Wilson has been an integral part of the mentor team for six years, working with nine schools since 2013.   We spoke with Su about becoming a Fogarty EDvance mentor and the benefits for schools who are part of the program.

How did you become involved with the Fogarty EDvance program?
To lead a school takes commitment and passion, which makes it difficult to simply walk away. When I retired late in 2013, I was fortunate to join Pauline Coghlan and Peter Holcz in designing and delivering a program to train school leaders on school improvement. Through this role and the role of an Independent Public School (IPS) Reviewer, I learned about the work of the team at Fogarty EDvance, so was delighted when I was invited to join an extremely capable and experienced group of mentors. 

Tell us about the schools you have worked with.
I have had the pleasure of mentoring leadership teams from Balga and Roseworth Primary Schools in Cohort 3; and Koorana and Orelia Primary Schools in Cohort 4. I currently work with leaders at Tom Price and North Tom Price Primary Schools in Cohort 6; and Lakelands Primary School and Endeavour Schools, encompassing Endeavour PS and Endeavour Ed Support Centre, in Cohort 7.

All schools have focussed, hard-working leadership teams who have shown total commitment to whole-school implementation of the Fogarty EDvance program in striving for improvements in practice.

Upon entering the program, each school analysed data, and  accessed program tools to gather information about their school . This meant that their planning for improvement related specifically to their own needs, with initiatives and strategies for intervention driven by evidence and current research.

High performing schools worldwide recognise that improving the effectiveness of teaching will lift student outcomes and school performance. Each school with which I have worked has focussed on ensuring there is consistent, high quality teaching in every classroom. 

The varying experience of teachers in their respective schools and the degree to which they are willing to change their teaching practice, also has implications for planning for improvement. While having low SES may impact on learning, behaviour and attendance, regional schools also have the added complexity of transient staff.

The team at Fogarty EDvance recognises that the ‘one size fits all’ approach does not work. What does work is exposing school leaders to research, tools for gathering evidence, guidance in developing a three-year plan for improvement and support in leading changes in teaching practice. 

Can you describe a highlight of your experiences with the Fogarty EDvance team.
Highlights are many, but nothing can compete with the moment when school leaders and their staff see the positive outcomes of changes implemented, particularly when they showcase improvements in student performance.

For myself, I love witnessing changes in the practice of teachers, particularly those who may have previously been adverse to changing long standing behaviours.

What do you think are the 3 most valuable things schools gain from being part of the FED program?
I’m really not sure about narrowing the list to three but if I must:

1. Exposure to high quality research, professional development and evidence-based planning using a template with proven success.

2. Access to tools to measure organisational health, gather feedback from stakeholders, intensify the impact of decision-making and foster teamwork and collaboration.

3. Ongoing support from a mentor who is committed to providing guidance and support.

Is there something you know now that you wish you had known when you were working as a school leader?
As a mentor I consciously seek out current research on school leadership and school improvement, with particular emphasis on developing a culture of collaborative practice and professional growth. 

As a school leader I worked with staff to plan for improvement and allocated my budget to resource our plan with a primary focus on the professional growth of my staff.

In retrospect, I now believe in the need to allocate funding (and time) to support my own professional growth and that of other leaders within my school.

Programs like Fogarty EDvance have a single focus, that of supporting school leaders to design and implement a whole school improvement strategy to increase their school’s overall effectiveness.

I now know that working with a team of people, whose focus is on supporting schools on their journey of improvement, would help focus resourcing decisions and ensure staff received targeted professional development and support to effect change.

What would you say to school leaders considering joining the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program?
The core business of every school is to provide the best possible learning opportunities for their students, therefore every school has the potential to improve. 

I believe school leaders who are hesitant about joining the program shouldn’t be weighing up their potential to lead the improvement they are seeking without support, but acknowledge their involvement with Fogarty EDvance as an opportunity to have an even greater impact, not only until the end of the three-year program, but beyond.

As many of you are aware, we have been working on a series of video resources that capture high-impact instruction in action. This suite of videos are known as the EDvance Video Resources and are available to view privately through the streaming platform, Vimeo.

The purpose of the EDvance Video Resources are twofold:

1. For schools that are already working with these instructional practices, another learning opportunity to get together with teachers and consider the discussion points included in the Guidance Notes.
2. For schools that are not currently working with these instructional practices, an opportunity to view some expert teachers in action. We recognise that due to Covid-19, the scheduled school visits for Term 2 have had to be cancelled, which provides limited opportunity for leaders and teachers to view high-impact instruction in action.

All of the teaching strategies used in the videos are evidence-based, and come from the body of research that was introduced to you in Year 1 of the program, including:

1. Archer and Hughes
2. Rosenshine
3. Dataworks: The engagement norms referred to extensively in the video are attributed to Ybarra & Hollingsworth.

The EDvance Video Resources consist of 12 separate videos:

Early Years

1. Brooke Wardana Video 1 – Daily Review on Single Sounds
2. Brooke Wardana Video 2 – Daily Review on Diagraphs
3. Brooke Wardana Video 3 – Daily Review on Syllables
4. Brooke Wardana Video 4 – Daily Review on Comprehension

Middle Years

1. Anthony Chiappalone – Daily Review on Addition and Subtraction
2. Anthony Chiappalone – Daily Review on Multiplication and Division
3. Anthony Chiappalone Video 1 – Learning Objective
4. Anthony Chiappalone Video 2 – Concept and Skill Development
5. Anthony Chiappalone Video 3 – Guided Practice
6. Anthony Chiappalone Video 4 – Independent Practice

Secondary

1. Stacey Plaut Daily Review – Year 7 HASS (The Water Cycle)
2. Stacey Plaut Lesson Design – Year 7 HASS (Demand and Supply)

To access the EDvance Video Resources and Guidance Notes, please email Stacey at stacey.plaut@fogartyedvance.au

A final note: The Fogarty Foundation and Fogarty EDvance have invested significant time and resources into the creation of these videos for the sole benefit of EDvance schools. As such, the EDvance Video Resources are solely for the distribution and use of schools that are part of the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program. Please do not share these resources with any schools or teachers beyond the FED Network without the express permission of our team. Please contact Stacey or Katie for the password to view the Video Resources or for further information at katie.odriscoll@fogartyedvance.au

If you need any support in using these videos effectively, please get in contact with your mentor or the FED team. We hope you find these video resources useful to continue your school improvement journey throughout 2020.

Given the COVID-19 pandemic and associated challenges to the WA education system, Fogarty EDvance has determined that the best course of action is to carry out a ‘soft’ launch of Cohort 8, commencing in 2021. The soft launch will involve only 1 – 2 workshop days in Term 1, with additional workshops in Terms 2, 3 and 4 of 2021.

We will shortly be asking for expressions of interest from metro and regional, primary and secondary schools in Western Australia, who are interested in applying to join the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program. We will only proceed to launch Cohort 8 in circumstances where we have achieved a minimum number of interested schools.

One major change for the application process with Cohort 8 is that Fogarty EDvance is now in a position to allow schools with an ICSEA of between 990 and 1050 to apply to join the program. For further details about the eligibility criteria, please direct all queries to Katie Webster at katie.odriscoll@fogartyedvance.au

We will be running a half-day Transformation Framework recruitment workshop on Wednesday, 26 August, 2020 (in person) and Thursday, 27 August, 2020 (via webinar) (Week 6, Term 3) for school leaders to learn more about the Fogarty EDvance program. All current EDvance schools are invited to attend for a refresher, or send any new school leaders along for professional learning – more details and a registration link will be sent out next term.

If you know of any schools or school leaders in your networks that may be interested in knowing more about Fogarty EDvance and potentially being part of Cohort 8, please contact Katie Webster at katie.odriscoll@fogartyedvance.au.

We recently launched the Fogarty EDvance Cohort 4 Report Card.

We were looking forward to welcoming our Cohort 4 schools and guests to the Official Report Card Launch, as we are excited to share the successes of these schools. However, given the current climate and this unprecedented time, the Report Card was launched electronically on 8th April to celebrate the success of the 14 Cohort 4 schools, who have recently completed the three year School Improvement Program, and now join the FED Alumni network. 

Fogarty EDvance’s vision is to improve educational outcomes for students in challenging contexts at a state wide level by 2021

The Fogarty Foundation initiated Fogarty EDvance to significantly improve and sustain academic outcomes of students in disadvantaged communities in Western Australia. To date, EDvance is working with 96 schools in 7 cohorts, impacting over 300 school leaders, and 42,000+ students across Western Australia.

Each school starts the EDvance program at a different stage of student performance – our aspiration is to see all Fogarty EDvance schools reach or exceed the state average for their students.  When students from lower socio-economic backgrounds perform strongly, we demonstrate to our community that it is possible to achieve excellent teaching and learning for every student in the state, regardless of their postcode.

This Report Card shares the impact of the 14 Cohort 4 Fogarty EDvance schools. Included in the document are stories of success that capture how the Fogarty EDvance School Improvement Program continues to build the capacity of school leaders to transform educational outcomes for their students.

• To date, EDvance is working with 96 schools over 7 cohorts, involving over 300 school leaders and impacting 42,000+ students across WA.
• Cohort 7 launched this year, so we now have 24 regional schools in the network – from the Pilbara to Southwest of WA.
• The schools in Cohort 4 have all shown improvements in social or academic outcomes with more than 60% of schools attaining significant improvements in academic results for their students.
• The Report Card also includes updates on the progress from some schools in Cohorts 3 and how they have sustained or furthered their results beyond their 3-year journey in the program. Early impact results for Cohort 5 provide a snapshot of what some of these schools have already achieved.
• Fogarty EDvance and the Foundation are trialling innovative approaches to support high impact teaching practices in schools. Initial results are impressive.

Reaching systemic impact:  We see a pathway to redefining educational equity in WA.  Our bold goal is working with 100+ schools in WA to significantly improve outcomes for 25% of students from low SES backgrounds in the state. The benefit from improving student outcomes is real – the cost of leaving school early is estimated conservatively at $335,000 per student over a lifetime as well as considerably reduced life opportunities.

Watch our launch video

Please take a few minutes to few minutes to hear from members of our team, and also from Dr Dean Goldspink, Principal of Ellen Stirling Primary School, on the impact of the Fogarty EDvance program on his leadership, and on student outcomes at Ellen Stirling Primary School.

Watch our launch video

Download the Cohort 4 Report Card

The Fogarty Foundation and McKinsey & Company have a strong partnership that supports the execution and impact of the Fogarty EDvance program. McKinsey & Co have recently published an in-depth case study analysing the program.

The case study shares the lessons we have learned on school transformation by working with schools throughout Western Australia since 2012. In particular, the case study clearly outlines the relationship between organisational health and school performance – with evidence to suggest a direct link. 

The article can be downloaded here and can also be accessed through the McKinsey & Co website.