How IDEA Public Schools Scales Educator Feedback, Data, and Growth with SchoolStatus

IDEA Public Schools is a charter network that is rapidly growing. As they continue to scale they face many challenges ensuring that their processes are consistent across 91 schools and more than 7,000 educators. IDEA’s leadership recognized that the key to achieving this goal was to strengthen their processes around observations and ensure their administrators had the right tool to succeed. To do so, IDEA partnered with SchoolStatus to implement SchoolStatus Boost, a scalable observation and coaching platform that centralizes notes and data to enable leaders to easily spot trends and support educators.

Creating a network-wide growth mindset for educators

IDEA is a public charter network that serves students in Texas, Louisiana, Florida, and Ohio. Founded in 1998, IDEA has 91 schools, and U.S. News & World Report ranked six IDEA College Preparatory high schools among the top 500 high schools nationwide and in the top 60 in Texas.

IDEA’s mission is to ensure that every student is accepted to and prepared for college. In the 2018-19 school year, more than 1,185 seniors graduated from 15 campuses, and for the 13th consecutive year, 100% of IDEA students were accepted to college.

“Our network is rapidly growing, with new schools opening in 2021-22,” shared Richel Raich-Cantu, Director of On-Demand Training. “The way we onboard, train, and support new leaders and teachers is critical to our mission of 100% college-bound seniors. [SchoolStatus Boost] has become a critical tool for us to be able to streamline the observation and coaching process around our rubric.”

“[SchoolStatus Boost] has become a critical tool for us to be able to streamline the observation and coaching process around our rubric.”

Richel Raich-Cantu, Director of On-Demand Training, IDEA Public Schools

The Goal: Maintain High Expectations for Educators and Leaders as the Network Scales

IDEA’s leaders set high expectations for students and instructors, and they have rigorous standards for the data they use to measure progress. They needed an observation and coaching system that could keep up with their data needs and support their proprietary rubrics, with one for educators and another for school leaders.

Since SchoolStatus Boost partnered with IDEA in 2015, the number of schools in the network has grown eight times as large. This growth has increased the demand for training leaders and educators on the rubric requirements and their overall approach.

Raich-Cantu shared that “because our network is so large and expansive, we’ve relied on digital tools to support our onboarding, training, and coaching work, and [SchoolStatus Boost] is an essential piece of the puzzle. Every IDEA leader and teacher has access to the platform, which enables 1:1 conversations but also network-wide visibility into the ongoing observation and feedback cycle. We use this to pull out emerging trends which drives how we think about professional learning opportunities.”

The Challenge: Disrupt Silos and Leverage Technology to Support Every Educator in the Network

The expansion of the IDEA network means that different schools are at different stages of development and training. Their challenge is to break down communication barriers and ensure that they differentiate professional development to meet the needs of both long-time and new staff members.

“We’re seeing our strongest ratings with our newest staff because they went through onboarding and training most recently,” said Raich-Cantu. “We’re working with our long-time staff members to refresh and recertify their training in our rubrics. [SchoolStatus Boost] helps us manage our growth with continuity and flexibility.”

Streamlining the observation process allows IDEA leaders to focus on what matters most. Raich-Cantu shared, “Our leaders love the Sketch feature. The form is easy to use and includes timestamps and links to our proprietary rubric so that the focus remains on classroom observations.”

“Our leaders love the Sketch feature. The form is easy to use and includes timestamps and links to our proprietary rubric so that the focus remains on classroom observations.”

Richel Raich-Cantu, Director of On-Demand Training, IDEA Public Schools

The Results: A Tool That Supports a Growing Network Focused on Its Critical Mission of College Readiness and Advancement

IDEA leaders have a clear vision for their educators and students, and they look to SchoolStatus Boost to track, measure, and ultimately advance this vision. 

SchoolStatus Boost has enabled IDEA Public Schools to customize the observation, coaching, and professional development process across its growing network of schools. With a centralized place to store evaluation targets, track observation cycles, and view real-time reporting at the individual, group, school, or network level, IDEA leaders can pinpoint holes at each level and monitor progress toward goals. 

For eight years of rapid network growth, SchoolStatus Boost has supported IDEA Public Schools in maintaining its high expectations for educators and students at scale. “We see the [SchoolStatus Boost] customer support team as an extension of our own team,” said Raich-Cantu. “Many are former teachers, and we’ve come to rely on their expertise in designing an observation and evaluation system that works to support our aggressive goals.”

“We see the [SchoolStatus Boost] customer support team as an extension of our own team. Many are former teachers, and we’ve come to rely on their expertise in designing an observation and evaluation system that works to support our aggressive goals.”

Richel Raich-Cantu, Director of On-Demand Training, IDEA Public Schools

Conclusion

Since 2015, IDEA Public Schools has used SchoolStatus Boost to streamline observations across its expanding network of schools. IDEA leaders save time performing over 23,000 observations per year by keeping everything in one location—meetings, evidence, classroom visits, action steps, and notes. From there, SchoolStatus Boost empowers leaders with network-wide data to inform professional development opportunities, helping IDEA Public Schools maintain its standard of excellence across its network of 143 schools.  

To learn more about how SchoolStatus Boost can streamline and enhance your observation process, contact our team.