• Category 1

    Selected in 2019

  • Grades: pre k - 5
    School Setting: urban
    Town Population: 750,749
    Student Enrollment: 360
    Student Demographics:

    Black/African American: 90%
    White/Caucasian: 1%
    Hispanic: 9%
    Hawaiian/Pacific Islander: 0%
    Asian: 0%
    Native American: 0%
    Other: 0%

    Teacher/Student Ratio: 1:20
    % Reduced Lunch: 75%
    % ELL Learners: 7%
    Founded: 1930
  • PRINCIPAL:
    Kemi Baltimore-Husbands
  • CONTACT:
    1900 Evarts St. NE
    Washington, DC 20018

Langdon Elementary School
Washington, DC
Strong relationships build community.
Describe specific programs in place to ensure that families are involved in the success of your school and students.
Prioritizing families involvement is a continued area of focus.
At Langdon we hold monthly Principal Chat and Chews. these meetings are aimed at building strong relationships with families. At each meeting we begin with fun icebreakers which help to remove titles and barriers that sometimes exist between schools and families.We purposely have a few planned agenda topics so that more time is for open conversations, questions, or concerns families might have.
Our strong PTO works to support the mission and vision of the school. This alignment is established through monthly pre-meetings to discuss supports and area of focus prior to our monthly parent meetings. Our PTO members ensure family style meetings are a strong part of our culture by partnering with local businesses to sponsor dinner.
We our proud our parent development sessions that are lead by District staff and our very own parents. Topics range from toileting support and resume writing.
Last, we have an open door policy. At any time our parents can come and visit their child's class with the only expectation, they leave us feedback on their visit. It is important our parents know this is OUR school.
Describe the most successful activity your school has initiated to strengthen ties to your community.
At Langdon, we worked with purpose and intentionality to create opportunities for our families and our community to strengthen our relationship. We have worked on multiple levels to offer multiple ways for Langdon to engage with Langdon families. Working with Teach for Change, we have increased communication in primary languages to our families, provided monthly chat-n-chews so families can be heard and voice their concerns and needs directly to our principal, and have teamed with our parents to create events such as ECE-topic seminars, parent-led continuing education for parents/guardians, as well as coordinated data nights for all grade levels.
Traditional events that we have offered over many years have remained and continued to be a hit with our families, specifically our HalloSTEAM event. For the past 7 years, Langdon Elementary, along with PTO, hosts an event called HalloSTEAM. This event merges the Harvest season festivities with a STEAM focus. Each year this event grows as new school-community families participate along with our former parents and promoted-student alumni continue to be a part of this interactive, hands-on learning opportunity. This is one example of the rich participation with our families and community that has helped strengthen our ties and develop our relationship. Keeping the traditional events that families and alumni have known, enjoyed, and count on each year, while intentionally providing a way to hear from families and ensure all families are included, we have, with purpose, created relationships that are mutual and student-centered.
Describe your philosophy of school change or improvement.
My philosophy on school change can be involves the following three beliefs.
My first belief is the intentional messaging and actions aligned to this is “our” school and not “my” school. Establishing clear systems that support every voice is important and every member of our school staff, students, and parents have great value to add. Creating platforms for stakeholders to share their opinions and ideas and provide opportunities for staff to learn from each other in various professional learning opportunities such as teacher lead professional development or peer observations.
My second belief is having a clear mission and vision that aligns our school priorities and embodies everyone’s voice. During my first year as principal we embarked on a journey to review their pre-existing mission and vision statement that was not clearly evident or could be articulated from staff. We then, as a new school community reflected on our core values as educators, we shared our dreams and aspirations for our students at Langdon. We then from the ground up created a new mission and vision statement. I am proud to say, six years later our mission and vision is clearly visible and evident in all that we do.

My third belief is the same differentiation, beliefs, patience and compassion teachers have for their students that are at different levels of mastery on the learning spectrum; principals must embody the same core beliefs with their staff. Changing adult mindset, beliefs, and instructional practice takes time.
I only made some grammar corrections in this section since it is asking for your philosophy  - you said you had 4 beliefs but only listed 2 (just so you don’t forget to add 2 more)
What are your school’s top two goals for the next year?
Langdon’s two goals for the next year are to continue to move student approaching proficiency to proficiency and to continue to develop the social-emotional learning for students and staff.
What is the single most important factor in the success of your school that others could replicate?
The single most important factor in this success of Langdon Elementary School that others could replicate has been that in 2014 we identified what the three primary, foundational priorities were for Langdon to support all students to succeed emotionally, academically, and creatively. Once we determined our three priorities (Data Analysis Builds Student Achievement; Strong Relationships build Community; and High Engagement Builds Life-long Learners), we have never wavered. Every initiative, every professional development, every goal and action plan aligned to one or more of these three priorities. There are so many different and “important” choices a school can make; by being consistent and constant in what we fundamentally believed would move students forward it has helped us to remain focused and purposeful.
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 at Langdon Elementary School that has had the greatest impact on student achievement and dramatic movement towards closing the achievement gap would be our work in building teacher capacity and efficacy to plan lessons for small group instruction that clearly aligns to targeted skills and not just ‘teach an activity.’ This process began with our Instructional AP leading professional development on how to extract skills from state standards such as Common Core and plan and align small group lessons.
Next, we prioritized how is real time data being tracked at the small group table aligned to skills. School-wide, we initiated the expectation of skills trackers at the small group table for all rotations. Teachers had autonomy to create their own unique template for their skills trackers, we as a school normed what criteria must be evident in their trackers.
These trackers allow for daily flexible grouping of students based on need at the skill level.
Explain how ESEA federal funds are used to support your improvement efforts.
Explain how ESEA federal funds are used to support your improvement efforts.

Strategically using ESEA federal funds to support our school needs is always our number one priority. We are fortunate that our school system (DCPS) prioritizes the engagement of key stakeholders such as school-based staff and families in the budget decision process at the school level. Each year, we review our school priorities and progress towards each to determine where ESEA monies should be spent.
To strengthen our RtI structures with emphasis on how we are supporting students in need of tier 2 and tier 3 supports, ESEA funds are used to support Literacy Lab Tutors. Literacy Lab deploys two full-time all-day reading tutors that provide one on one reading support for students.

ESEA funds are also used to fund our After-School Enrichment program. It allows us to extend learning by an additional hour for all students in our tested grades. During our Enrichment block we can purchase curriculum resources from ESEA funds to support this initiative.


Identify the critical professional development activities you use to improve teaching and student learning.
Langdon Elementary School consistently prioritizes professional development on a multiple-times per week basis. The main key component to all staff development is that it is student-centered, and a measure of success is identified for not simply teacher actions but based on student data. We strive to be responsive to teacher and staff needs through differentiation and open to teachers and staff requesting specific PD opportunities.
We have spent multiple school years developing teachers’ ability to identify the skill needing to be taught and alignment to the activity/work/product students will use to learn, practice, and demonstrate proficiency/mastery. Langdon provides consistent PD on small group instruction. Teachers lead PLCs to examine teacher practices and student work. These PLCs are data meetings that allow for one teacher on the team to present his/her standard, the objective, the teacher exemplar, the text/problem, and the rubric. The team then examines and uses a student-work protocol to identify key misconceptions and possible re-teach next steps. Teachers also consider if there were any mis-alignments made by the teacher and possible teacher next steps.
Describe how data is used to improve student achievement and inform decision making.
At Langdon Elementary, the use of data is included in our three school priorities. Priority One states, "Data analysis builds student achievement.” The use of data starts with the development of our Comprehensive School Plan. This is a fluid plan that we make adjustments to ensure this plan continually meets the needs of our school. Setting high standards aligned to school-wide goals have greatly impacted our gains over the last few years. At Langdon, we shifted from setting growth targets to setting proficiency for all students.
Our instructional focus at Langdon Elementary is small group instruction with an emphasis on clearly identifying what skills are being measured and how are they tracked towards mastery on a daily basis.
In addition, we have bi-weekly data meetings lead by grade-level teachers that analyze their student work aligned to standards set by Common Core. Lastly, teachers meet bi-weekly with Instructional AP to discuss student level data with actionable next steps to push all students who are below, on, and above grade level.
Describe your school culture and explain changes you’ve taken to improve it.
Our school culture prioritizes the establishing strong relationships between students, adults, families, and community. Since 2014, Langdon Elementary has had three priorities that make up the foundation of every practice, initiative, and decision. Aligned to our Priority Two, “Strong relationships build community,” we have strengthened our school-wide culture more and more each year. To begin, all classroom from ECE through 5th grade start their day with classroom morning meetings. This is a well-invested 15 to 20 minutes at the start of each day. These meetings follow the Responsive Classroom approach which prioritizes students feeling a sense of belonging, empathy, conflict resolution, and empathy. Next, we track positive points students earn throughout the week. At Langdon, we believe in investing more time and attention to students making Scholar-decisions and celebrating their efforts. Each week students can earn time in our game room titled (B.O.O.M. Room for students Behaving and Operating in an Outstanding Manner).
Our latest addition to our school-wide Priority Two is aligned to our progress toward being a trauma-informed school. We have added a “Cool Down Area” in each class. This is a space that student can self-select to visit when they need time alone or a moment to use de-escalation strategies taught by the SEL Team before reflecting on changes they need to make. Many of our students experience trauma that range from unstable access to food, shelter, and/or exposure to violence in the neighborhood/home.
Last, we have the same school-wide expectations set for all classrooms in the building. This consistency allows for our students to clearly know what is expected of them as they transition throughout their day
Stats
  • Category 1

    Selected in 2019

  • Grades: pre k - 5
    School Setting: urban
    Town Population: 750,749
    Student Enrollment: 360
    Student Demographics:

    Black/African American: 90%
    White/Caucasian: 1%
    Hispanic: 9%
    Hawaiian/Pacific Islander: 0%
    Asian: 0%
    Native American: 0%
    Other: 0%

    Teacher/Student Ratio: 1:20
    % Reduced Lunch: 75%
    % ELL Learners: 7%
    Founded: 1930
  • PRINCIPAL:
    Kemi Baltimore-Husbands
  • CONTACT:
    1900 Evarts St. NE
    Washington, DC 20018