North Star Project Update

Name of Project: Shelter Care Educational Program
Name of Initiative: Comprehensive Services to Schools, Children & Families

Team Members: Fifty staff and substitutes serving six youth shelters and one detention center in central Iowa

Give the gist of what your project is about including the long-term goal.
The Shelter Care Educational Program (SCEP) provides the educational program for all students placed in shelter facilities or detention in Central Iowa. Every classroom has a teacher and an associate. All teachers are licensed special education providers. SCEP continues the education students receive in their home districts, provides SCEP curriculum or continues home schooling curriculum. Additionally, SCEP provides GED support, Title I and special education. Approximately 2,000 students from 100 Iowa school districts pass through our program each year.

What are the things that your team has been working on?
SCEP’s curriculum committee completed an ambitious expansion of the literature collection in each classroom. Students have dozens of award-winning books from which to choose. The curriculum committee has also completed the purchase of textbooks for lower incidence courses like environmental science and British literature. They are now in the process of researching content material and literature that will have a high degree of interest for students with low reading ability. Remedial instructional materials for Title I educators have also been purchased and are now routinely employed.

SCEP staff is revising our intake assessments to efficiently identify student skill deficits which can be addressed through differentiated instruction, Title I services and special education.

A new transition program is in development. The program assesses student’s interests and needs before selecting appropriate lessons to complete in a personal portfolio. Each student completes planning in the areas of living, learning and working. Their personal portfolio is Web-based and is available to them indefinitely from any location. SCEP is completing a two-year goal that seeks to infuse writing opportunities and instruction across the curriculum. Research-based writing strategies were the focus of professional development. Teachers developed new lesson plans, three new assessments, revised intake procedures, and expanded Title I services.

Our leadership team has completed Iowa Core Curriculum training and will now begin writing an implementation plan. Iowa Core Curriculum has been incorporated into monthly professional development meetings and will continue as a program goal into the foreseeable future.

What has your team accomplished?
See above.

Why are these important to Agency’s goal of increasing student achievement?
The Shelter Care Educational Program serves students who are at-risk. Forty-three percent of our students are in special education. Most students have both credit and skill deficits. SCEP is acting strategically to address four important goals related to student achievement: 1) to ensure students receive credit from their home schools for their education while in shelter or detention, 2) to provide quality, highly differentiated instruction, 3) to identify and remediate specific skill deficits and 4) to encourage students to rediscover their curiosity and love of learning. Many of SCEP’s students are potential dropouts for their home districts. SCEP educators engage, support and encourage those students toward something better.

What can the staff expect in the future?
SCEP staff has demonstrated a strong willingness and desire to collaborate with one another. We have accomplished more in the past two years than could ever have been expected. We can expect to lift the lives of at risk youth as we and move forward together.