RELEASE: Fontana Unified School District leverages new technology to improve the effectiveness of online classes

PRESS RELEASE: Southern California district one of several in a nationwide group of districts using an innovative progress monitoring system aligned to the National Standards for Quality Online Teaching.

Case Study

Camdenton R-III School District

Dr. Ryan Neal

Assistant Superintendent, Camdenton R-III School District

Performance evaluation is a touchy subject in K-12 education. Done without care, it can come off, at best, as a laborious but mandatory task—and at worst, as a case of institutionalized “gotcha.” But with a blend of trust-building, intentional processes, and actionable data, one Missouri school district is moving from a culture of simple compliance to continuous growth.

Coaching & Support Logs: 5 Tips for Getting Started

Coach and mentor time is precious—and expensive. Though we know coaching can change teacher practice, quality of time matters. It’s an administrator’s job to understand what’s happening at scale in order to tailor instructional support for maximum impact and demonstrate the program’s outcomes.

Funding PD Infrastructure with CARES Act and Title II

As districts ramp up their PD to sharpen educators’ virtual instruction skills, coordinating and supporting newly-remote teaching teams has never been more critical. But with an uncertain school year ahead and funds stretched tight by COVID-19, many education leaders are scrambling to find the budget for professional learning supports. Recent changes to federal education funding structures like Title II and the CARES Act mean that these dollars are now available to invest in long-term PD solutions for continuous improvement.

Virtual Classroom Walkthroughs: 7 Tips for Effectively Observing Online Instruction

Virtual walkthroughs can provide clear, actionable feedback about how professional learning efforts are translating into practice. Check out our top 7 tips for creating a walkthrough program in your district’s online classrooms — or download the free guide of practical look-fors adapted from the National Standards for Quality Online Teaching.

Progress Monitoring for Online Teaching

We're delighted to announce our latest offering: a suite of practical tools and tips for supporting educators in the virtual classroom.

Designing and Monitoring Effective Summer PD: 7 Key Insights for Closing Educator Learning Gaps

Did you get a chance to catch the live Q&A on designing and monitoring effective summer PD? Here’s a recap of the highlights from our conversation with McREL International and Lubbock Independent School District, exploring how research and practice can inform using data to hone summer PD, focus on meeting individual needs, and drive towards change in practice:

Case Study

Fontana Unified School District

Adele Thomas

Director of Professional Learning and Teacher Support, Fontana Unified School District

As COVID-19 began shuttering school districts across the country, Fontana Unified School District had just started rolling out its 1:1 technology program. The new tools have given the district’s 36 thousand students greater access than ever before to distance learning — but the district had to figure out how to handle the transition. They're doing just that with KickUp's Virtual Learning Essentials toolkit.

Coaching During COVID: 6 Key Takeaways from Jim Knight and Diane Lauer

Are you registered for April 17th's live Coaching During COVID conversation? We'll be talking district strategy, coach-teacher communication, and much more in a live Q&A with Jim Knight of the Instructional Coaching Group and Diane Lauer of St. Vrain Valley Schools. To tee up that conversation, we pulled some highlights from Jim Knight on adapting instructional coaching in a virtual context.

Case Study

Lubbock Independent School District

Anna Jackson

Executive Director of Leadership and Professional Development

It takes dedicated support to make professional learning not just inspirational but effective. West Texas’s Lubbock Independent School District pairs instructional coaching with content focus strands to close the knowing-doing gap.