School Improvement Plans for all 18 schools this year are in the works, said Dr. Melinda Vickers, assistant superintendent of Instructional Services.

School Improvement Plans for all 18 schools this year are in the works, said Dr. Melinda Vickers, assistant superintendent of Instructional Services.

CLINTON — Personnel from schools in Sampson County all attended training this summer to help with resetting their School Improvement Plan (SIP) processes, a process which is utilized by all the schools in the district.

“We are resubmitting School Improvement Plans for all 18 schools this year,” said Dr. Melinda Vickers, assistant superintendent of Instructional Services.

“The curriculum team and I are reviewing all the plans giving feedback,” said Vickers.

This is the first year of the two-year cycle and the board votes this year with items for review next year. The 2021-2022 plans will be the first year; next school year in 2022-2023 the improvement plans will be submitted to the board as an item of information. The board will vote on the 2023-2024 improvement plans.

“The purpose is really to establish a culture of school improvement, as an accurate process instead of just a box to check,” she said.

All the schools have five to six objectives that they will be working on, and the county is utilizing NCStar. Vickers said that by doing so it makes the plan more manageable, a “skinny plan” if you will, that more easily focused on.

“Otherwise it is hard to focus on things accurately or with fidelity,” Vickers said.

NCStar is a web-based tool which guides in charting improvement, plus is part of managing the continuous improvement process, with the goal of building accountability. NCStar’s goal is that the school improvement is best seen through a people directed approach, with people working in teams while being closest to the students.

The NC Department of Public Instruction states that “NCStar contains over 100 research-based effective practices (indicators) and allows schools flexibility to personalize their school improvement plans to meet their distinct needs”.

Additionally, NCSTAR provides for guest access, with the ability to to see school’s “SIPs anytime and in real time in terms of updates.”

Vickers said that board members will be provided with guest logins for all schools using NCStar.

Schools were expected to vote on plans by Sept. 24 and the plans will be ready to review starting Sept. 27 through guest access in NCStar.

The board will vote at October the work session on the SIPs. These are active documents that updated monthly about the current actions and then updated with the upcoming actions.

Over the summer evaluation will occur looking at the current test data and improvements made. From there, the plans could stay the same, be adjusted with additional or completed objectives or have new indicators added.

Reach Emily M. Williams at 910-590-9488. Follow her on Twitter at @NCNewsWriter. Follow us on Twitter at @SampsonInd and like us on Facebook.