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| The America's Choice High School Design offers a proven solution to high schools that seek improved results for all students. It specifically targets the needs of low-performing schools, ranging from those that have been identified as needing improvement to those, which, though not formally designated as requiring intervention, nevertheless need help to get all of their students to meet standards. America's Choice acts as a turnaround partner, focusing on raising student performance in the key areas of literacy and mathematics and building a culture of success in schools that are struggling. |
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| The first year of engagement with a high school is focused on establishing a system of safety nets designed to accelerate the learning of students who enter high school two or more years below grade level. Our double-period Ramp-Up to Literacy and Ramp-Up to Algebra courses are designed to prepare students to be successful in their regular coursework and on high-stakes exams. The courses provide teachers with high-quality, sustained professional development and a yearlong curriculum designed to make the 90-minute block work smoothly and successfully. The Ramp-Up programs also include a comprehensive set of assessments developed for America's Choice by the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) that measure student progress in mastering the content and skills taught. ACER is a recognized world leader in educational test design and creator of the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA). These assessments are exceptionally useful tools for accurately monitoring student progress and differentiating instruction. |
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| Changing a pattern of low performance that has existed in a school for many years requires a comprehensive, multi-year solution. America's Choice is a standards-based, research-driven design that builds alignment among state standards, assessments, instruction and professional development. It also embraces high performance leadership, management and organization to ensure that all of the school's resources and operations are focused on effective learning and instruction. Parent and community engagement is harnessed to ensure that the full spectrum of resources are available to the students in support of their academic achievement. Thus, implementation of the design (which rolls out over a five-year period) focuses on the whole school, including school organization and structure, as well as day-to-day classroom instruction. |
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| To bring about change and get results, America's Choice offers outstanding professional development and training, on-site coaching and high-quality materials. For schools facing restructuring for consistent underperformance, we offer an Intensive Version of the America's Choice School Design, which includes substantially more technical assistance and coaching time at the school site to ensure effective implementation of the Ramp-Up courses and improved student performance. |
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| Continue to Standards and Assessments to learn about our high school design in greater detail. |
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