As part of Minnesota’s assessment system, the Minnesota Department of Education measures whether or not students are meeting the state math and reading academic stan- dards, which are what they should know and be abl e to do in a particular grade.

Staples Motley students performed well this year on the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment tests, with almost every grade tested this spring showing significant improvements on math tests over the last five years. With elementary students in their second year of “Everyday Math” we are pleased that the results continue to improve.

Eighty-five percent of ninth graders passed the written composition test up eight percent from two years ago. Fourth grade reading test results are higher than the Minnesota average which also says a lot about our district teachers. The kids and staff work very hard each and every day and continue to strive for excellence in the classroom.

A committee of staff from each building will meet to analyze the MCA test data. They will then put together goals for next year and meet with the school board in the fall to present their plan.

Up to 20 staff members will be heading to a three day National Conference for Professional Learning Communities (PLC’s), as well. Currently, our teachers have monthly work sessions designed to allow our faculty to focus on working together focusing on improving instruction. This provides an outlet to facilitate new ideas and work to fine tune teaching techniques.

We are proud of our teachers and want to provide them with the opportunity not otherwise given in a busy teaching day to work collaboratively to expand on our existing successes. Through the implementation of PLC’s and additional training opportunities for our faculty, we are investing today in our students’ futures.

Professional Learning Communities have proven to be an excellent continuous learning model with strategies that can be implemented immediately into existing curriculum.