Fargo Public Schools Maintains the Distinction of Accreditation by AdvancED for Another Five Years
By Associate Superintendent Dr. Robert Grosz
Last week the Fargo Public Schools hosted an AdvancED external review team as they conducted a rigorous, on-site review of the Fargo Public Schools. The review team used the set of Standards for Quality as they examined district and building documents (policies, procedures, and plans), interviewed more than 240 stakeholders (parents, community members, teachers, administrators, and board members), and visited more than 70 classrooms.
After the review of the Fargo Public Schools, the review team recommended that Fargo Public Schools maintain the distinction of accreditation by AdvancED for the next five years.
Why is accreditation important?
Accreditation through AdvancED is important to the entire Fargo Public Schools community. By achieving accreditation through AdvancEd, the community can be assured that the Fargo Public Schools values increasing student achievement; provides a safe and enriching learning environment; and runs an efficient operation.
What’s next?
The AdvancED review team left FPS with commendations and areas for us to focus on for continued improvement. The review team selected Powerful Practices, which are activities/items that other school districts should replicate in order to provide a high quality education. The Fargo Public Schools Powerful Practices identified by the review team are as follows:
The Hub is a powerful management system used district-wide to monitor student achievement, house data, align lesson plans and facilitate collaboration among teachers.
The Fargo Public Schools Mentoring Program provides a comprehensive teacher and staff induction program consistent with the system’s values and beliefs regarding teaching and learning.
Fargo Public Schools engages in an inclusive, comprehensive process to implement a strategic plan that effectively aligns all district initiatives and school-level operational plans.
The governing body ensures that school and district leaders have the autonomy to set and meet improvement goals outlined in the strategic plan and to manage day-to-day operations.
Fargo Public Schools intentionally collaborates with and positively engages businesses, community organizations, neighboring school districts, and post-secondary institutions to leverage resources and meet the needs of students.
Fargo Public Schools has committed to strategic resource management by developing and implementing long range plans in support of the system’s purpose and direction.
As part of the review process, an external review team is charged with providing Improvement Priorities. These are activities/items the district must research, develop action plans, and implement over the next two years. All districts are provided Improvement Priorities by external review teams. The Improvement Priorities identified for Fargo Public Schools by the review team are as follows:
Conduct a thorough audit of all district assessments, including locally generated formative assessments, to determine the value of each, and implement a monitored systemic model for using data to inform daily instruction.
Develop and implement processes to evaluate the effectiveness of all programs and services intended to meet the physical, social, emotional, and educational needs of students in order to determine their impact on academic excellence and student success.
These improvement items will be reviewed by administration and processes put into place to fulfill our accreditation requirements from AdvancED.
According to the Fargo Public Schools Strategic Plan, “Fargo Public Schools is committed to making data driven decisions to ensure continuous improvement and accountability. The school district engages in a comprehensive process of building and district level evaluation and accreditation. This is accomplished by using the AdvancED School Improvement and Accreditation Model. Each school and the district as a whole engages in a five-year review cycle, where the five AdvancED standards for quality school programs are evaluated.” The hosting last week of the AdvancED external review team not only helps to fulfill this statement from the Strategic Plan, but also provides the district opportunities to improve so that we all can continue to strive to accomplish our mission of Achieving excellence by educating and empowering all students to succeed.
About AdvancED
AdvancED is one of the largest community of education professionals in the world. AdvancED works with more than 32,000 schools and school systems, employing more than four million educators and enrolling more than 20 million students, across the United States and 70 other nations. They are a non-profit, non-partisan organization that conducts rigorous, on-site external reviews of PreK-12 schools and school systems. The expertise of the AdvancED organization is grounded in more than a hundred years of work in school accreditation. According to their website, “AdvancED is far from a typical accrediting agency. Our goal isn’t to certify that schools are good enough. Rather, our commitment is to help schools improve.”