• Category 1

    Selected in 2015

  • Grades: pre k - 8
    School Setting: urban
    Town Population: 2,713,548
    Student Enrollment: 1,467
    Student Demographics:

    Black/African American: 0.8%
    White/Caucasian: 8.3%
    Hispanic: 23.7%
    Hawaiian/Pacific Islander: 0%
    Asian: 63.6%
    Native American: 0%
    Other: 3.6%

    Teacher/Student Ratio: 1:27
    % Reduced Lunch: 86.8%
    % ELL Learners: 25.3%
    Founded: 1886
  • PRINCIPAL:
    Alfonso Carmona
  • CONTACT:
    3010 South Parnell Avenue
    Chicago, IL 60616
    773-534-9190
    ahcarmona@cps.edu
Healy Elementary School
Chicago, IL
Our faculty has the autonomy to determine curricular and classroom decisions based on their own analysis of the data. Rather than a top down approach, the administration encourages grade level teams to implement what best serves their students
Describe the most successful activity your school has initiated to strengthen ties to your community.
When the current administrative team arrived in 2010, they kicked off the Annual Healy Back-to-School Barbecue as a welcome to the community to highlight to parents and students that the principal and assistant principal were present and available. Healy’s administration uses the Back--to-School Barbecue to set the tone for each upcoming school year because its casual, relaxed, and familial environment underscores Healy’s commitment to an inclusive partnership between all members of our academic community.

Its success can be measured by the increase in annual attendance, expansion of activities, as well as the food consumed. Community businesses and local politicians have added the Healy Barbeque to their calendars. Healy graduates attend the Barbecue and visit former teachers and staff to share their accomplishments while current students join in the activities to reunite with school friends and spend time with their teachers.
What are your school’s top two goals for the next year?
The top two goals for Healy school in SY 2016-2017 include a school wide focus on closing the achievement gap as evidenced in our SQRP (School Quality Rating Policy) rating; we have placed a particular focus on our English Language Learners and our Diverse Learner populations.

Our second goal for the next school year is to integrate the latest technologies in a way that enhances the learning experience for both the teachers and learners. We recognize that our students are far more comfortable using technology, that testing platforms such as PARCC require all testing students to demonstrate their comfort with the technology inherent in the test, ie. ‘drag and drop’ etc. We want to bring this technological fluency into the classrooms so both the teachers and the students are seamlessly using high grade technology to facilitate learning.
What is the single most important factor in the success of your school that others could replicate?
As a neighborhood school whose students are drawn from within geographic boundaries, Healy has a long tradition of valuing teachers, their content knowledge, and professional commitment. Our current administrative team has taken this fundamental premise to greater heights by placing decision making power in the hands of the faculty. Together, teachers and administrators make impactful decisions about programs, books, class and student schedules, monetary expenditures, and job applicants under the guiding principle of whether a particular decision benefits our students.
Healy is its teachers. Their ideas, their input, their educational beliefs, their collaboration with one another as well as the administration have led to remarkable results within our classrooms and our school community. Valuing teachers leads to faculty stability. Teachers rarely leave Healy; they retire from Healy, they move out of state, but they do not leave Healy unless there are truly unique circumstances.
Describe the program or initiative that has had the greatest positive effect on student achievement, including closing achievement or opportunity gaps, if applicable.
The initiative that has had the greatest positive effect on student achievement, including closing achievement gaps, is the philosophy of the current administrative team that sharing data driven decision making responsibilities with teachers is mandatory to moving an academic community forward.
From the initiation of the Back-to-School Barbeque to the focus on data, each element is essential in creating the tapestry of Healy. Every element is crucial in continuing the success and momentum that has been built over these last years under the guidance of this administrative team. Strong independent teachers with the autonomy to make vital decisions are central to the successful implementation of data driven instruction. It is not a top down “initiative” that leads to sustained school success, but rather teachers’ initiative to do whatever is necessary to meet the needs of their students.
Explain how Title I funds are used to support your improvement efforts.
Healy’s Title I funds are expressly applied to the purchase of teaching positions, with a minor amount applied to consumables for students. Of the Title I monies appropriated, almost 90% is spent on teaching positions that directly impact all grade levels, from K to 8. Administrators and faculty believe that Title I funds should be invested in teaching personnel in order to significantly impact achievement gaps and the academic growth of students. This financial commitment to both the quantity and quality of classroom personnel is a critical component of Healy’s continued academic success, and significantly, the current and future academic and career success of our students.
Describe how data is used to improve student achievement and inform decision making.
The critical element in our success has been the deft use of data to guide curricular decisions and respond to the academic needs and abilities of our students. Because all teachers and administrators focus on data and its implications for students and decision making, we are all highly skilled in the application of that data. While the administration and teachers invested ample time interpreting, analyzing, and synthesizing the meaning, importance, and application of data in instruction, Healy’s faculty has the autonomy to determine curricular and classroom decisions based on their own analysis of the data. Rather than a top down approach, the administration encourages grade level teams to implement what best serves their students. Whether it is the implementation of Walking Reading and Math at the upper grade levels or the departmentalization of grades 5th - 8th, classroom and curricular decisions are made by the faculty involved to best benefit their students.
Stats
  • Category 1

    Selected in 2015

  • Grades: pre k - 8
    School Setting: urban
    Town Population: 2,713,548
    Student Enrollment: 1,467
    Student Demographics:

    Black/African American: 0.8%
    White/Caucasian: 8.3%
    Hispanic: 23.7%
    Hawaiian/Pacific Islander: 0%
    Asian: 63.6%
    Native American: 0%
    Other: 3.6%

    Teacher/Student Ratio: 1:27
    % Reduced Lunch: 86.8%
    % ELL Learners: 25.3%
    Founded: 1886
  • PRINCIPAL:
    Alfonso Carmona
  • CONTACT:
    3010 South Parnell Avenue
    Chicago, IL 60616
    773-534-9190
    ahcarmona@cps.edu