Diplomas Now i3 Site Recruitment

I3 School Recruitment Goal

• 10-11 New i3 Middle School Partners

• 12+ New i3 High School Partners

District-level Observations from Diplomas Now i3 recruitment

Accelerators Barriers• Strong central district

turnaround office with authority over school planning, budgets and principals

• Programmatic buy-in from Superintendent thereby opening up different funding options

• Large numbers of turnaround schools and district acknowledgement of scope of problem

• Desire for collaboration (openness to external partners)

• Decentralized structure (principals create their own SIG plans or choose partners without district support or leadership)

• SIG timing and process (late identification in schools, lack of district strategy or openness to partnerships)

• Districts utilizing partial support models (district or external partners) or SIG funding for components as opposed to comprehensive turnaround

• Incomplete understanding of DN as supplemental service provider as opposed to whole school turnaround

• Random assignment for i3 evaluation and inadequate funding

Organizational Observations from Diplomas Now i3 recruitment

Opportunities Challenges• Leveraging organization/district

relationships to integrate Diplomas Now into larger partnerships

• Existing relationships with superintendents, city and state education leaders

• Strong partnership with sites and DN National team to support district engagement and follow up

• Creative financing using i3 and other district funds (not explicitly tying DN to SIG)

• Leveraging supportive DN principals

• Inconsistent messaging or understanding by districts of the model as more than simply, CY, CIS or combination

• Upselling from tiered intervention to comprehensive turnaround

• Working through the district bureaucracy from the bottom up

• The School Improvement Grant timeline and process

Site Categories

• Mega districts that did not participate in cohort 1 (Phi, NY, Chi, Detroit)

• Smaller districts that did not participate in cohort 1 (Columbia, Seattle, Columbus, San Antonio)

• Cohort 1 Partners (EBR, LA, Boston, Miami, DC)

Questions to Discuss

1. What worked in your district for i3 recruitment?

2. What did not work?

3. Are you aware of any district strategic initiatives that i3 could fit into?

4. How can the national Diplomas Now team best support you?

5. Are there other strategic partners that can be helpful (e.g., United Way)?