Valley Crossing community school

TO:  Mike Williams

FROM:  Bob Ziller

SUBJECT:    Trip Report, 18 April 2006

     Contact: Mr. Bill Bjorum, Principal
              Valley Crossing Community School
               9900 Park Crossing, Woodbury MN 55125
              Phone: 651-702-5773

     Attended by:  Brian Johnston, Debra Heyerdahl, and Mike Williams

Background   The purpose of this trip was to obtain information on year-round scheduling.  Valley Crossing Community School has a single track year-round schedule in one of its three “neighborhood” schools.   Mr. Bjorum gave us a tour of this school and we found more of interest than year-round scheduling.  The school is a relatively new 10-year old facility.  It is unique in that it is in its own school district.  It draws students from four school districts.

It was started by an entrepreneurial Stillwater superintendent who wished to try year-round scheduling and team teaching.  He promoted this school in a new school district funded by three surrounding districts.  This was unheard of and required state legislation and cooperation from the other districts.  Mr. Bjorum labeled the superintendent a risk taker and needless to say required risks by the surrounding school boards.  New Richmond School Board take heed.

After state and district approvals, district #916 was established and a 900 student school was built.  It was designed into three so-called “neighborhoods A, B, and C, teaching K-6 grades.  The B neighborhood had a single-track year-round schedule while the other two were traditional.  Thus, each neighborhood handles 300 students.  The rooms were built with bellows type folding walls allowing expansion for team teaching with three teachers per team.  There are three lead teachers; one in each neighborhood reporting to the principal.  

Mr. Bjorum emphasized that year-round scheduling should not be tried in an existing building with traditional scheduling.  There are too many problems to overcome—it should be left an option.  As to acceptance the over-subscription by parents of year-round speaks for itself.  Year-round scheduling does not impact student achievement; it neither improves nor hinders it according to Bjorum.  

Mr. Bjorum was proud of the team teaching and performance showed it.  Honor roll students were 80 percent as compared to state average of 40 percent with single teacher classrooms.  If these statistics are valid, then New Richmond should investigate this method of teaching.

Discussion

As a non-educator, I see four advantages to team teaching:  1) A new or problem teacher can be mentored by the others to bring him/her up to speed, 2) Problem areas can be observed by more than one teacher in a dynamic situation, discussed and corrected, 3) a substitute teacher can be guided by the other two leading to less disruption, and 4) team teaching will be observed by students who will see the benefits of it for use in employment when required.  

How about team teaching acceptance by teachers?  Bjorum pointed to the open folding walls and noted that they could have been closed by the teachers had they not wanted this method of teaching.  If this method is to be tried in New Richmond, it should be a management decision.

Single-track scheduling would not be necessary with a new 600 student school, but trying it would give experience as to acceptance by parents and teachers and expose any problems for correction.

Recommendations

Build a new 600, K-6 student elementary school on and adjacent to the East Elementary property.  The building should be built with folding walls for team teaching with storage capacity and compatibility for four-track year-round scheduling.

Open the new school with single track year-round schedule

Open the new school with team teaching.

Finance the new school with a referendum for this building only.

Consider a steel building which would be idea with folding walls.  



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