12/16/03 -- Community Consolidated School District 15 in Palatine, Ill., has received a 2003 Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award, the nation's highest honor for quality and performance excellence.
President Bush and Commerce Secretary Donald L. Evans announced this year's seven Baldrige winners Nov. 25. The Baldrige winners "represent America's best and are setting a high standard for corporate and social responsibility," Evans says.
Community Consolidated School District 15 has implemented a wide array of programs and services which has led to higher levels of student achievement.
Among these programs are intensive reading intervention programs in kindergarten, first grade, and second grade; the Soar to Success program to accelerate reading growth in grades 3 through 6; and Read 180, which combines technology with high-interest, age-appropriate print materials for children in junior high and targeted elementary schools. One-on-one and small group sessions are provided for English language learners.
District 15 serves 12,390 students in kindergarten through grade 8 in seven municipalities northwest of Chicago. Its student population is 37.5 percent minority, and nearly a third come from non-English speaking households.
Winning a Baldrige award is a "tremendous honor," says District 15 school board President Louis A. Sands. "It's an indication that we are moving in the right direction. The things we needed to do to apply for the award were things we needed to do anyway. The goal was not to win the award, but to achieve continuous quality improvement."
The Baldrige recipients were evaluated rigorously by an independent board of examiners in these areas: leadership, strategic planning, customer and market focus, information and analysis, human resource focus, process management, and results. The evaluation included about 1,000 hours of review and on-site visits by teams of examiners.
Among the achievements of Community Consolidated District 15 cited by the Baldrige program:
• In the 2002-03 school year, 84 percent of second graders were reading at or above grade level, which is nearly 85 percent above the national average.
• From 2001-02 to 2002-03, eighth-grade students' "enthusiasm for learning," a key performance target, increased from 42 percent to 82 percent for reading, from 50 to 80 percent for math, and from 42 to 82 percent for science.
• The district determines its "market performance" by calculating the dollar cost per percentage point of student performance on state tests. At $111.93, the district outperformed three comparison districts, which ranged from $118.57 to $122.36.
• The rate at which special education students are meeting goals has steadily improved since 1998, reaching approximately 14 percent in 2002-03, which is significantly higher than both national and state comparisons of about 5 percent.
• For English language learners, the rate has increased from 8 percent in 1998-99 to 15 percent in 2002-03.
• The turnover rate for certified staff was 11.7 percent for 2002-03, compared to a national average of 20 percent.
• The district has increased the number of its teachers who have been certified by the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards from two in 1994-95 to 48 in 2002-03.
• Teachers deemed "highly qualified" under Illinois' criteria for meeting the No Child Left Behind Act teach 100 percent of the district's classes.
• Science instruction is enhanced by the use of a former school bus converted to a "space shuttle," a Discovery Learning Center for earth science and geology, and involvement in actual space shuttle missions.
In the past seven years, students with learning disabilities have finished first in at least one of four competition areas against non-disabled and gifted students from other districts at the NASA Space Camp in Huntsville, Ala.
• A District Advisory Committee for Educational Excellence -- which includes representatives from key stakeholder groups and is chaired by a community member -- uses a strategic planning process to translate stakeholder expectations, environmental scanning information, and organizational performance requirements into goals and performance expectations.
• The district's strategic vision is translated into a "one-page plan scorecard" for each department. Objectives from these scorecards are communicated to school leaders, who use this information to align their own plans using a "plan, do, study, act cycle."
District 15 has been a participant in NSBA's National Affiliate program since 1971 and a member of NSBA's Technology Leadership Network since 1994.
In 1998, NSBA's Institute for the Transfer of Technology to Education named District 15 a Salute District for Technology and presented it with the first Reed Hundt Award for Excellence in Technology.
Sands adds that District 15 received the top school transportation award in the nation in November -- the Leland E.G. Larson Quality Student Transportation Award, presented by the National Association for Pupil Transportation.
The Baldrige award program was created by Congress in 1987 to enhance the competitiveness of U.S. businesses and reward quality and performance achievements. Awards may be presented to five types of organizations: manufacturers, service companies, small businesses, education organizations, and health care organizations.
The Baldrige program is managed by the Commerce Department's National Institute of Standards, in conjunction with the private sector.