Kennewick

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District Overview & Description
Kennewick Team Interviews
Introduction and Context
Information to Know Before Reviewing Our Model
Contact Information
View the TPEP Vision Statement & KSD Model

District Overview & Description

The Kennewick School District, located in the southeastern part of Washington state, serves almost 16,000 students in its 15 elementary schools, four middle schools, and nine high schools. Its student demographics are as follows:

• 0.88 percent American Indian or Alaskan Native
• 2.49 percent Asian or Pacific Islander
• 2.22 percent African American
• 29.71 percent Hispanic
• 60.95 percent white
• 48.14 percent eligible for free or reduced-price lunch.

The district employs more than 800 teachers.

Kennewick Team Interviews

Right-click to download the video or click here to view or subscribe in iTunes.

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Introduction and Context

Our notebook is the result of the first year of work by the Kennewick School District staff on the Teacher Principal Evaluation project.

We are very proud of what we have accomplished. Our process of evaluation is focused on providing a model that will clearly define a path of professional growth.

We do that in part through a self-assessment and goal setting process that identifies specific areas of emphasis. For most of our employees this will be a strengths based model working to build on the successes of our staff. The eight evaluation criteria and the corresponding rubrics give the evaluate and evaluator a global look at the work the of the teacher and principal. Our system of evidence helps us to identify important elements of that work to focus on.

This project has caused us to carefully analyze the characteristics of an effective teacher and effective principal. We believe our rubrics reflect that thinking in a very practical sense.

We have designed a process of evaluation for teachers and principals that involve self-assessment, specific goal setting related to the self-assessment, and a summative evaluation that is related to progress on those goals. This process will be strong influence in the professional growth of our staff.

We pride ourselves on the work of our teams. Throughout the process we stressed the idea of a collaborative process that will lead to the professional growth of or certificated staff. As a result of that collaboration we have a process that is strongly supported by our work teams.

Within this introduction are explanations of the sections and definitions of terms used in the notebook.

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Information to Know Before Reviewing Our Model

The Kennewick School District evaluation model is based on our instructional framework of purpose, engagement, rigor, and results. We have been developing this model for over 10 years. The model is supported, in a common instructional language used across the district, with rubrics for each area, and a large videotape library of sample lessons.

For a more detailed description of the development of model see the cover page in the Instructional Frameworks section of this workbook.

The work with the TPEP grant has helped us to expand the lens we used to examine instruction to elements that are or outside of the traditional classroom observation.

Our rubrics and processes of evaluation are pretty well developed. We do need to further develop our training model. That work will be completed over the summer.

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Contact Information

If you have questions about Kennewick’s model, please contact:

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View the vision page and pilot models.

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