• Category 2

    Selected in 2020

  • Grades: 1 - 3
    School Setting: rural
    Town Population: 17,000
    Student Enrollment: 300
    Student Demographics:

    Black/African American: 11%
    White/Caucasian: 82%
    Hispanic: 0%
    Hawaiian/Pacific Islander: 0%
    Asian: 0%
    Native American: 0%
    Other: 7%

    Teacher/Student Ratio: 1:12
    % Reduced Lunch: 100%
    % ELL Learners: 0%
    Founded: 1926
  • PRINCIPAL:
    Jennifer Taylor
  • CONTACT:
    711 Nickey Street
    Poplar Bluff, MO 63901
    573-785-4047
    jennifertaylor@pb.k12.mo.us
Eugene Field Elementary School
Poplar Bluff, MO
Change Starts with Me!"

Describe specific programs in place to ensure that families are involved in the success of your school and students.
We have implemented several creative ways to immerse families in our school’s culture. Families are invited to participate during school hours in different activities such as a 7 Habits or leadership lesson, assisting their child in creating a personalized vision board, serving as an audience as students share habitat dioramas, and celebrating the kick-off of our annual MAP testing. Parents attend student-led conferences with their child each fall so students can share their leadership binders and progress towards individualized academic goals. We saturate our school’s social media pages with pictures and captions that share everyday events happening in our school. We post our recorded student-led daily announcements on our social media pages to highlight upcoming school activities, student shout outs, and videos of our students and staff engaged in teaching and learning activities.
Describe the most successful activity your school has initiated to strengthen ties to your community.
Eugene Field has implemented the Leader in Me for the last eight years and has been recognized as a Lighthouse School since 2016. Every year, our Student Lighthouse Team assists with planning and implementing a Leadership Day event. Our student leaders prepare for the event by presenting The Leader in Me Paradigms to local service groups, such as the Rotary Club, Kiwanis, and Lion’s Club prior to the leadership event. Student speeches and performances highlight how our students exhibit The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Kids and The Leader in Me Leadership Paradigms. Attendees visit classrooms to learn how our students apply the 7 Habits, serve in different leadership roles around our school, and set and track both personal and academic goals. All students get to participate during classroom visits and many also serve as greeters, tour guides, speakers, performers. The event averages over 100 attendees every year and program surveys are filled with positive feedback!
Describe your philosophy of school change or improvement.
Our school believes in the Leader in Me leadership paradigm that "Change Starts with Me". We understand that our mindset sets the course for our words and actions. We understand the power of our circle of influence and know that we are the model for our students. Our staff shares the same vision and seeks to inspire and empower all stakeholders in our school community. We continuously reflect on our effectiveness and seek out best practices to meet the needs of the whole child.

What are your school’s top two goals for the next year?
Our school will be receiving ten additional chrome book carts later this year making our student to device ratio 1 to 1. All certified staff will be expanding their virtual teaching expertise by applying new learning from professional development for Nearpod, Kami, and various Google applications and extensions.

Last year, our interventionists began assembling a school-wide website with organized and labeled links to all professional development resources, instructional materials, and data collection tools utilized by Eugene Field staff. The goal has now shifted to creating and aligning all curriculum-related documents and tools into digital instructional units accessible for current and future Eugene Field staff.
What is the single most important factor in the success of your school that others could replicate?
We believe all of our school’s success stems from engagement in the Professional Learning Communities process. All certified staff are members of a high-performing collaborative grade level or departmentalized team. These teams meet consistently on a weekly basis. Representatives of each team also serve on a school-wide leadership team as well. All meetings are focused on the effectiveness of instructional planning and delivery along with data analysis. Team members hold each other accountable in building collective efficacy and reaching all school-wide goals.


Describe the program or initiative that has had the greatest positive effect on student achievement, including closing achievement or opportunity gaps, if applicable.
The integration of the developing assessment capable learner instructional strategy with individualized student goal setting is an authentic, intentional approach that has had the greatest positive effect for closing the achievement gap. Students have learned to self assess their initial performance on an essential learning outcomes to determine their current level of proficiency. As a next step, they conference with their teacher to determine the level they aspire to achieve and select strategies to assist them in reaching their goal. Students track their utilization of strategies and post test scores on individualized goal sheets that are kept in their leadership binders. This data then feeds into their grade level and school-wide common formative assessment goals.
Explain how ESEA federal funds are used to support your improvement efforts.
Eugene Field utilizes ESEA federal funds in multiple ways to target student achievement. Our three intervention teachers and one classroom teacher’s salaries are covered through ESEA federal funds. These positions provide crucial reading, math, and behavior interventions to approximately 175 students every year. Funds have also provided Language and Literacy Intervention reading kits for interventionists and Wilson Fundations kits for all first grade classrooms to target early phonetic instruction. ESEA funds have also paid for two chrome book carts that supply 72 devices for our first and second grade classrooms.
Identify the critical professional development activities you use to improve teaching and student learning.
Our classroom teachers, interventionists, and special education teachers received in-depth professional development training on effective teaching and learning practices from our Regional Professional Development Center beginning three years. The two hour sessions were conducted with grade level teams five times per year and focused on math standards. Teachers worked to unpack math standards, define learning targets, and create common formative assessments with aligned success criteria rubrics. This provided teachers with the opportunity to improve their instruction and assessment practices while also expanding their understanding of each unit's mathematical progressions from concrete to pictorial to abstract thinking for all grade level concepts. Collaboration continued during weekly grade level and monthly PLC meetings to ensure our building’s math curriculum and assessment practices were aligned and rigorous. We then replicated the process with our ELA curriculum last year.
Describe how data is used to improve student achievement and inform decision making.
Participating in the Missouri Model District initiative for the last four years has strengthened our ability to make data based decisions that accelerate student growth. Grade level teams have developed rigorous common formative assessments and success criteria rubrics for both high leverage reading and math standards. Teams have developed an efficient digital data tracking system to guide reflective discussions following pre and post assessments. Intervention cycles are designed around benchmarking and cfa results. Students are engaged as assessment capable learners while they score their own pre and post assessments and conference with the teacher about specific lead measures or strategies needed to reach their goal.
Describe your school culture and explain changes you’ve taken to improve it.
Integrating the guiding principles of the PLC and Leader in Me initiatives inspire staff to strive for excellence. These beliefs drive the culture at Eugene Field. Eugene Field previously had the reputation of setting low expectations and making excuses for underperformance. Years of professional development and administrative support have solidified staff efficacy, trust, empathy, and collaboration throughout our school community. Weekly grade level meetings and monthly Collaboration Days offer opportunities for teams to reflect upon student data and plan both instruction and intervention accordingly. Staff emulate leadership principles and paradigms with students as they model the 7 Habits, lead students in creating both personal and class mission statements, and engage in the goal setting process.
Stats
  • Category 2

    Selected in 2020

  • Grades: 1 - 3
    School Setting: rural
    Town Population: 17,000
    Student Enrollment: 300
    Student Demographics:

    Black/African American: 11%
    White/Caucasian: 82%
    Hispanic: 0%
    Hawaiian/Pacific Islander: 0%
    Asian: 0%
    Native American: 0%
    Other: 7%

    Teacher/Student Ratio: 1:12
    % Reduced Lunch: 100%
    % ELL Learners: 0%
    Founded: 1926
  • PRINCIPAL:
    Jennifer Taylor
  • CONTACT:
    711 Nickey Street
    Poplar Bluff, MO 63901
    573-785-4047
    jennifertaylor@pb.k12.mo.us