The Muskegon High School Story
Muskegon High School is the story of a school in a transitional community in the Midwest. It is the only high school in the district with two feeder middle schools. The high school has approximately 1600 students with 70 professional teaching staff members. Like many other schools in communities with changing demographics and economic challenges, Muskegon High needed to make changes to address the changing needs of their students.
Demographics
Prior to 1965, Muskegon High was one of only two high schools in the surrounding area. For many years, the high school was the community center. However, during the past 30 years as the city residents moved to communities in the suburbs, several suburban high schools opened. This "white flight" from the city significantly changed the demographics of this high school. In 2005 the ethnic demographics were 60% African-American, 25% Caucasian, and 15% Hispanic. Approximately 70% of these students qualify for free or reduced price lunch. Between 25 - 30% of the student population qualify for special education services.
CLC Story
Muskegon High began their CLC effort when they reviewed their state assessment data during their North Central Accreditation process. As the data below indicates, many students were not meeting the standards:
| Math | Reading | Science | Writing | ELA | |
| Met or exceeded standards | 34.3% | 52.2% | 57% | 41.2% | 45.5% |
| Did not meet standards | 65.7% | 47.8% | 43% | 58.8% | 54.5% |
As the School Improvement Team considered the achievement data, they also discussed data that the principals had gathered during their classroom visits. This data confirmed the perceptions of the staff members who served on the team. Their review of all of the data revealed that reading and writing were major areas of need. The principal encouraged the team to design a pilot effort to address the reading and writing needs. They decided that they would begin a small-scale Strategic Instruction Model initiative, take data, and then decide if they would expand the effort. Beginning with CLC levels 1 and 3, they began Content Enhancement Routine instruction in the science department and they established reading classes for students who needed explicit strategy instruction.
When the data showed improvement on science classroom unit tests and increases in reading scores for students in the reading classes, they expanded Content Enhancement to other departments and offered the strategies classes to more students identified with reading deficits. They added the SIM writing strategies in the English classes to improve students' writing skills. Eventually the school developed some interventions for all of the levels of CLC.
When there were obstacles, they faced them and solved them. They not only had the determination and persistence required to address the challenges, but they had the data to support the decisions even when the change became difficult. Each year they refocused on their goals, wrote new action plans, and involved the entire staff in the decision making. Throughout the effort, the principal and the leadership team had the vision, determination, and fortitude to stay the course.
However, as many schools at this stage find, the problems became more complex as performance increased. Although performance had increased dramatically, the external accountability demands also increased. The state continually raised the bar higher. The teachers still had the motivation, the beliefs and the willingness to continue the trajectory of improvement but they needed some expertise from the outside. The leaders turned to the University of Kansas for some consultation and also gleaned ideas from research on urban schools. The principal knew that he could not require more from his staff without increasing their capacity.
Muskegon High continued to write grants to secure funding and target existing funding for consultation, professional development, and visits to other schools. Before they made new changes, they considered how initiatives would integrate with SIM/CLC. After ten years, the school continued to sustain CLC despite the retirement of the principal and several of the teacher-leaders. Currently, the school continues to sustain its commitment to meeting the needs of all students.
Back to Projects