File: IKE - Ensuring All Students Meet Standards

NOTE: While Colorado school districts are not required by law to adopt a policy on this subject, some content in this sample reflects legal requirements school districts must follow. This sample contains the content/language that CASB believes best meets the intent of the law. However, the district should consult with its own legal counsel to determine appropriate language that meets local circumstances and needs.

(Promotion, Retention and Acceleration of Students)

The Board believes that early identification of students who are not making adequate progress toward achieving standards and effective intervention are crucial. In accordance with the Board's policy on grading and assessment systems, teachers shall assess the teaching and learning process on a continual basis. Teachers shall identify students early in the school year who are not making adequate progress toward achieving the district's academic standards and may choose to implement an individual learning plan for each such student.

The plan shall be developed by the student's teacher and/or other appropriate school staff with input from the student's parents/guardians. The student's parents/guardians shall agree in writing to support the plan. Neglect by the parents/guardians with regard to participating in development of the plan or agreeing to support the plan shall not affect implementation of the plan.

The plan shall address the specific learning needs of the student. Strategies designed to address those needs may include tutoring programs, after-school programs, summer school programs, other intensive programs and other proven strategies. Teachers are encouraged to collaborate on the development of such plans and to use a variety of strategies consistent with the student's learning style and needs.

Each semester, students with individual learning plans shall be reassessed in the content areas covered by the plan.

In order to provide the services necessary to support individual learning plans, the superintendent shall develop tutoring programs, after-school programs, summer school programs and other intensive programs in the content areas covered by the district's academic standards. The Board shall commit resources in the budget to support these programs.

As determined by the principal and in accordance with applicable law, students not meeting applicable district academic standards may not be promoted to the next grade level or allowed to graduate. The procedure to retain a student in kindergarten, first, second or third grade due to the student's significant reading deficiency shall be in accordance with the regulation on early literacy and reading comprehension and applicable law.

When students are retained in the same grade level, the teacher shall evaluate the previous teaching and learning experiences of the student, including whether specific aspects of the individual learning plan were appropriate and effective. Based on this evaluation the teacher shall modify the plan to ensure that the student's needs will be met and that the student's educational experience from the previous year is not merely repeated.

Retention due to social, emotional or physical immaturity shall be used on a very limited basis. After consulting with the student's parents/guardians, teacher(s) and other professional staff and in accordance with applicable law, the principal shall determine whether it is in the best interests of the student to be retained for such reasons.

Acceleration, or advancing a student more than one grade level, shall be used sparingly when special circumstances warrant.

The district administration shall develop regulations to implement this policy, which shall include an appeals process concerning a decision to promote, retain or accelerate a student.

(Adoption date)

LEGAL REFS.: C.R.S. 22-7-1013 (2.5) (recommended considerations for academic acceleration procedure)

C.R.S. 22-32-109 (1)(hh) (board duty to provide opportunity for an academic remediation plan upon request by student's parent/guardian)

CROSS REFS.: AE, Accountability/Commitment to Accomplishment

AEA, Standards Based Education

IK, Academic Achievement

IKA, Grading/Assessment Systems

ILBC and ILBC-R, Early Literacy and Reading Comprehension

NOTE 1: Pursuant to C.R.S. 23-1-119.2, the Colorado Commission on Higher Education (CCHE) must send an annual notice concerning college preparatory courses to the parent or legal guardian of any student who takes the ACT or precollegiate exam. The notice will give a detailed description of what constitutes an inadequate score in math, writing or reading based on the CCHE guidelines for admission to an institution of higher education. The notice will encourage students to take basic precollegiate courses while still in high school to avoid having to pay for remedial courses in college. The notice will also inform them that a student's parent or legal guardian may contact the school in which the student is enrolled and request that the school develop a plan for the student to address the coursework needed to meet CCHE's higher education admission guidelines. The district should be prepared to develop a plan for academic remediation if requested under these circumstances.

NOTE 2: A summer school grant program is available to provide intensive reading, writing or mathematics education to students entering the fifth through eighth grades who received an unsatisfactory proficiency level score in those subjects on the Colorado state assessment program. See C.R.S. 22-7-801 for more information.

NOTE 3: Administrative procedures concerning the promotion, retention and acceleration of students should follow under this coding. Regarding the procedure for academic acceleration of students, state law requires districts to consider procedures "that may include, but need not be limited to," the following: 1) the process for referral for academic acceleration and procedures that ensure the fair, objective, and systematic evaluation of the students referred; 2) a decision-making process for accelerated placement that involves multiple persons, including a student's parents, rather than a sole decision-maker; 3) guidelines for the practice of academic acceleration, including the categories, forms and types of academic acceleration and the award of credit; 4) guidelines for preventing nonacademic barriers to the use of acceleration as an educational intervention; and 5) an appeals process for decisions related to academic acceleration, as well as a process for evaluating the academic acceleration procedures and its effectiveness in successfully accelerating students. C.R.S. 22-7-1013(2.5)(a)(I-V).

[Revised April 2014]