Student Enrollment Growth
School Districts do not have the authority to halt development growth, but they have the legal responsibility to educate children, so our District has taken a positive proactive approach towards providing facilities for students. Over the past five years, the Middleton School District has experienced a 21% growth in student enrollment (approximately 484 new students, equaling an enrollment of 2,800+). This student enrollment growth, when viewed by grade level, equates to the additional facility needs of approximately:

A) 37% of a grade school (222 new students – vs a 600 capacity facility),
B) 11% of a middle school (113 new students – vs a 1,000 capacity facility), and
C) 10% of a high school (149 new students -- vs 1,500-capacity facility).

This cumulative five-year growth has had an immense impact on the Middleton School District. In 2003-2004, the District opened a third elementary (Purple Sage) and ten-classroom additions at both the Middle and High Schools. Two of the three elementary schools are now filled at or beyond capacity, as is both the Middle and High Schools. They have brought in three two-classroom portable units to provide additional temporary classroom space (one at Mill Creek, one at the Middle School and one at the High School). Thus far, the District has been able to maintain the State recommended classroom sizes, through proactive planning.

The School Board and Administration have used the growth pattern over these past five years as a means of projecting the future facility needs of the District. Using a modest estimate of 3.5% growth annually (175+ students each year), it is projected the District will have well over 4,000 students enrolled within the next ten years. To meet the needs of these students the District will need to add a fourth elementary, an enlarged middle school and a new high school. In the interim time, prior to construction of
these three facilities, the District projects it will need at least seven additional two-classroom portable units (14 classrooms) to provide adequate classroom space.

A new portable two-classroom unit costs approximately $95,000 (not including setup fees). The District has been aggressive in tracking used units that could be relocated to the District. The time and effort to find previously owned portable units has paid off in a savings to the taxpayers of over $150,000. The District continues to seek out previously used two-classroom portable units to purchase to provide additional classroom space for future growth.

The District also initiated a cooperative effort between the local developers, the City of Middleton and themselves to meet the future facility needs. This cooperative effort has resulted in the donation of three future school sites, (saving taxpayers at least $3 million) two financial contributions and there are at least two other agreements that are currently under development. The District is pleased with the tremendous support and teaming efforts that they have received from:

Middleton Mayor, Frank McKeever,
The Middleton City Council members,
Middleton Planning and Zoning members, and
The Developers (within the Middleton School District boundaries).

All who have taken a proactive stance in assisting the District to meet the needs of future student enrollment growth.

The cooperation of all of the above parties will assist Middleton School District in providing adequate facilities conducive to learning and in maintaining state recommended class sizes. School District funding throughout the State continues to be inadequate and without teaming and partnering of all the local entities, meeting the needs of students would be an impossible task.

The Middleton School District has initiated a proposed change in the State statutes that would allow bonding capacity to be based upon the full market value of homes (no fiscal impact upon the taxpayer) rather than the net market value. The District has also proposed a change in the State statutes that will allow School Boards to set a subdivision development impact fee (on new homes) to be part of the permit fees. Locally the District has proposed a Middleton City Ordinance change, which will allow subdivision developers to include any acreage donated for school green space to be included as part of their 5% open space requirement, therefore encouraging additional land donations.

The lack of adequate funding for facilities has caused the School District Board members and administration to have to take on a new and time-consuming role of seeking creative ways and stretching limited dollars further as they continue to provide a quality education for the students of Middleton School District #134.

2007-08 Teacher Collaboration
Middleton School District #134, like all other Districts throughout the United States, is addressing the 2001 Federal ‘No Child Left Behind’ (NCLB) law and the individual State expectations resulting from its implementation. Our District has always endeavored to help individual students meet their highest academic potential; NCLB, which requires all children be proficient at their grade level, gave us a new perspective on our goals.
The School Board members, District Administration, Leadership Team and I began researching successful academic programs implemented in other School Districts back in 2002. We concluded that collaboration time for teachers to meet regularly with their colleagues was the most effective and efficient way to improve our students’ academic achievement levels. This collaboration time would be used to:
 Review data and share information,
 Map curriculum to the instructional calendar,
 Develop lessons aligned to the State standards,
 Monitor growth of individual students on assignments and assessments,
 Evaluate State test data and other assessments for the purpose of implementing actions plans, and
 Consult with current educational research experts.
A major challenge of implementing teacher collaboration was selecting the best time for it to occur, in order to meet the needs of our students, parents, daycare providers, transportation, District staff and the State minimum instructional hours requirements. After much deliberation and discussion with representatives from all of our stakeholder groups, we decided an early release time every Wednesday provided the best possible scenario as it protects the ‘prime’ learning time for younger students, is less difficult for parents arranging daycare, maintains the breakfast program and promotes High School
students’ attendance. At the conclusion of all of this research, the School Board members approved a one-year trial (2003-2004) weekly collaboration time for our teachers.
Our District was one of fifteen in the State selected to receive the J.A. & Kathryn Albertson Foundation ‘Creating High Performance Schools’ (CHPS) grant, which provided funding and support for our weekly collaboration efforts. Utilizing this funding we were able to hire four one-year Instructional Coaches, master teachers selected from our staff, to assist with the implementation of collaboration time. The Instructional Coaches received extensive training including Robert Garmston and Bruce Wellman’s work on The Adaptive School: Developing Collaborative Groups. These coaches supported our building teaching staff by providing training, studying current research, analyzing data, mapping the curriculum and increasing assessment literacy. It became apparent early on that our paraprofessionals should be included in this collaboration effort and soon these sessions were re-designed to assist them with their area of expertise. Our Administrative Team members began monthly collaboration meetings to guide their efforts through the initial stages and full implementation of collaboration.
During this first ‘trial period’ of one-year, some skeptics doubted the value of the collaboration efforts. However, after review of the weekly written reports submitted to the Administrative Team, feedback of our staff members, and seeing the academic needs of our students being met in new ways, the Administrative Team and Board members all concluded that collaboration was a successful endeavor. The School Board unanimously approved the continuation of weekly collaboration for the 2004-2005 school year.
At the end of our second year of weekly collaboration, we have irrefutable data that this is time well spent, as it has made the difference for our students in many ways:
 Focused time concentrated on students to better meeting individual and group needs,
 Monitoring of student growth allowing instruction to be adjusted to increase group and individual student learning,
 Instructional teams analyze data such as the ISAT, IRI, and teacher-made assessments to better identify student needs,
 Current academic research reviewed to create action plans,
 Interventions planned for struggling students, and
 High achieving students are being challenged.
Although funding has not allowed us to continue with all four of the original instructional coach positions, we continue to provide additional support to our teachers and students with: a certified reading coach, a second gifted and talented facilitator, and Title One teachers whose focus is improving the core skills of math, reading and language in our
lower scoring students.
Because of the success we have experienced in student academic growth due to the implementation of weekly collaboration, other Districts (Caldwell, Vallivue, Fruitland, etc.) are also implementing collaboration and we have received several requests from northwest publishing companies for articles on our collaboration success. Our School Board members unanimously approved the continuation of collaboration for the fifth year and each year thereafter at their regular April 2007 meeting.