When district superintendent Nikolai Vitti started the current school year in Detroit, he set ambitious goals for himself and the district. At a special session this week, the school board approved measurable targets to push that vision forward.
Among the goals: filling empty classrooms, reducing the numbers of chronically absent students, boosting the number of children with new computers, increasing the speed and number of building repairs, and adding to the number of students who receive free breakfast.
Target goals for academic proficiency were set between about one and four percent for kindergarteners through eighth graders.
“When you consider the historical performance of the district, former EAA schools, and the recent flat trend of state performance, to increase student performance at the rate defined would be a significant statement about the district’s improvement,” Vitti said. The EAA, or Education Achievement Authority, was the state’s district for failing schools. The reform district was combined with the Detroit Public Schools Community District this fall.
The district has already been working on some of its long-term goals, for example, getting more teacher applications at job fairs, adding master teachers to raise classroom standards, and competing with charters for students.
Read about all the proposed targets below, and see what kind of information the district may soon begin recording.