A LUSD Community Profile

An Introduction to LUSD Community

LUSD is a school district in California that was first founded in the middle of the 20th century. The district has a collection of schools that cater to the needs of the residents in San Joaquin County. There are people from a variety of backgrounds living close to LUSD. LUSD's goal is to provide kids with the greatest education possible so they can prosper in life. Students in grades two through eleven are evaluated by the district using the STAR program. However, the district faces several difficulties, such as the high rates of truancy connected to LUSD and a lack of instructors.

Table of Contents

Abstract 2

Issues Facing the District 4

Location of LUSD 5

Population Size 6

The Size of the School District 6

Mission Statement and Philosophy 6

Innovative Program 7

Effectiveness of Education Program 8

Testing Scores and other Success Measures 8

References

10

LUSD Community Profile

An Introduction to LUSD Community

LUSD, which was initially established in the mid-20th century, is located in California, and it encompasses a group of schools that serves the population residing within San Joaquin County. Notably, the school district involves a total of 49 educational institutions including those that offer elementary, middle school, and high school services. Elementary schools take the lead, with high schools amounting to seven in number. The appointed superintendent has been tasked with the mandate of overseeing the operations of the unit.

The population around LUSD is comprised of people from various backgrounds. Caucasians and Hispanics account for the majority of the area’s residents, with African Americans being represented on the lower side. These people communicate using various languages including English, Spanish, Cambodian, and Vietnamese. However, English has been singled out as being the primary language of instruction to be used in schools that form part of LUSD.

It is also worth noting that aside from enabling learners from San Joaquin County to pursue their academic goals, LUSD is engaged in several other activities that have enabled it to foster strong ties with members of the surrounding community (Flores & Duran, 2014). For instance, the school district has a program that offers adult classes to interested individuals. Examples of lessons that are offered under this particular program include those which are concerned with entrepreneurship and marketing as well as those related to hospitality, computing, and dentistry. Additionally, LUSD also has a program that endeavors to assist members of the community who physically challenged to get high school diplomas alongside helping those who are eager to learn English as a second language.

These activities have allowed LUSD to receive immense support from the Lodi community. Besides, the unit also employs more than 3,000 people to serve in various capacities. This move has also helped LUSD to win the favor of the society in which the school district operates in as it has allowed many people to engage themselves in gainful employment. Even amidst concerns about reduced federal expenditures on education, the school district has managed to retain its workforce in a manner that has served to cement the relationship that it shares with the community (Schneider, Konukman, &Stier, 2010).

Issues Facing the District

However, there have been concerns about the levels of truancy associated with LUSD. In particular, the California Department of Education observed that up to 34% of the learners attending elementary schools within the unit would engage in truancy from time to time (Flores & Duran, 2014). Such statistics were considerably higher than those recorded in other school districts located in different counties across the state. Another challenge is inadequate substitute teachers at the district as some teachers pull out of the classes to pursue professional development that strains the school system.

Location of LUSD

The Lodi Community is found within the city of Lodi, Northern Carolina. While at Lodi, it is easy for a person to access the Western States of the United States. At the north of the City of Lodi, San Joaquin County, the Lodi Community bridges the areas of Northern as well as Central California. Lodi Community enjoys serene areas where the residents can do business and visitors to tour the growing area (James Areida Education Support Center, 2017). The Lodi Community is presented by the Lodi Unified School District that was created in the year 1967. At that time, voters made an approval of eighteen elementary districts as well as the high school district union. A boundary was created in the year 1922 that boarders the Lodi Community and the old Lodi Union High School District. For the past thirty years, the district occupied by the Lodi Community was not occupied. However, it was later ceded to the neighboring districts with Stockton at the South and Deep Water Channel at the north of Jahant Road, which is now at Highway 99, and south of the Hammer Lane. The top five languages spoken by the people at Lodi Community include Vietnamese, Urdu, Spanish, English, Cambodian and Hmong (James Areida Education Support Center, 2017).

Population Size

Lodi Community comprises of 29,800 students in the Kindergarten to grade twelve (James Areida Education Support Center, 2017). There are over 3,000 Lodi Community residents employed by the school district.

The Size of the School District

The school district at Lodi consists of 49 sites of schools whereby, 33 of these are elementary schools, 7 being middle schools, 2 are continuation high schools and 4 are comprehensive high schools. There are 2 elementary community day schools within the district, one middle community day school, an adult school, and a Career Center. There is also a Middle College High School, an Independence School, A several Pre-school programs, and a developmental Center for disabled students (James Areida Education Support Center, 2017).

Mission Statement and Philosophy

LUSD is a California-based school district, which served 30,256 learners in the course of the 2013/14 academic year. The district was the thirtieth largest by enrollment in the California state (Flores & Duran, 2014). The mission of LUSD is to guarantee the best education that will make its students succeed in life. The school also has several vision statements that support is mission comprising ensuring every student discovers his or her greatest potential, closing down the gap in achievement between students and its diverse staff that is considerably competent and appreciates its work among others.

The philosophy of the school is to set clear and accurate strategies by using telecommunication and ICT to enhance education programs. The Board of Education of LUSD is responsible for driving the philosophy and does so by establishing education policy for the district, curriculum approval, adoption of a yearly budget, defining the education objectives of the staff, and deciding on matters of the school facility. The BOE philosophy is that comprehensive planning, which aligns with the district's accountability and control plan is essential at every school, in a bid to focus efforts on school improvement on the academic attainment of students and expedite the necessary use of present resourceschallenges (Lodi News-Sentinel, 2017). The Superintendent ensures that school strategies give clear direction and establish cohesive plans attuned with the district and school goals.

Innovative Program

The district’s innovative program is grounded on its integration of a technology plan to address various components of its technology use for the subsequent three years. The technology will provide background information for the district concerning the particular start and end dates of the plan, an overview of the demographics and location of the district a description of the pertinent research behind the plan or approaches in the plan. A second aspect of the ICT innovative program is to set clear curriculum strategies to improve education outcomes (Beisaw& Baxter, 2017). For instance, the plan will describe the students and teachers present access to current use of instructional innovations and digital instruments such as the policies and practices of the district to guarantee equitable access to technology for all students

The plan will also set objectives and an implementation strategy comprising yearly activities for the way technology will be applied to enhance learning and teaching, how and when learners will receive the technology competency and literacy skills and internet security and the pertinent and ethical technology use in classes.

Effectiveness of Education Program

The success and effectiveness of an educational program are contingent on, among other factors, the relationships that exist between an institution and its immediate surroundings. Members of the community are increasingly being considered to be relevant stakeholders in matters related to the education due to the fundamental role that they play as far as the realization of scholastic objectives is concerned. This paper examines the activities associated with the Lodi Unified School District (LUSD) as well as the people involved in institutions located within the geographic unit and the community as a whole.

Testing Scores and other Success Measures

In California, the STAR (Standardized Testing and Reporting) program that comprises the Standard Tests ofCalifornia, the Modified Assessment of California and the CAPA measure the grade achievement of students in grade two to eleven (Losen, Martinez &Okelola, 2014). STAR results comprise grades in English and mathematics (in grades two to eleven), science (grades 5-8) and social science and history in grades 8, 10, and eleven. Tests in science and math mirror the course in which the high-school learner is registered. There are five STAR benchmarks of performance to illustrate the academic proficiency of the student.

In relation to student assessment, the district’s education board believes that the main purpose of student evaluations should be to assists learners, guardians and teachers recognize the academic strengths and weakness areas for individual students in a bid to enhance teaching and learning (Beisaw & Baxter, 2017). The district’s effectiveness shall be assessed in part grounded on these student evaluations.

The BOE anticipates optimizing different assessment measures to attain its education goals. Upon the publication of the school and district-wide student results of the assessments, the superintendent may offer supplementary information that will assist the local community and parents in interpreting test outcomes and assessing school achievement. The Superintendent governs mandatory student tests in the STAR program as the law provides.

The Education board expects to optimize the outcomes of the assessment tests to assess the achievement of its students to prosper in major academic courses. Accordingly, the board strongly motivates all students to participate in the STAR tests in a bid to improve the usability of the data and allow the district to attain levels of participation needed for accountability systems of the federal and state (Beisaw& Baxter, 2017). The Superintendent also notifies the learners and their parents about the significance of these tests and develops measures to motivate learner participation.

To sum up, the mission of LUSD is to assure the best education, which will make its prosperous in life. The success of Lodi Unified School District can be attributed to the fact that the unit has put in place programs intended to help members of the Lodi community in addition to providing employment opportunities to the residents.The philosophy of the school grounds on its use of telecommunication and ICT to enhance education programs.The district’s innovative program is also based on the integration of a technology plan to address various components of its technology use for the subsequent three years. In the district, the STAR programmeasures the grade achievement of students in grade two to eleven. The Education board expects to use the outcomes of the school and district assessment tests to assess the achievement of its students to prosper in major academic courses. The main problem the school faces is a shortage of teachers. Truancy also remains a major source of concern.

References

Beisaw, A. M., & Baxter, J. E. (2017). America’s One-Room Schools: Sites of Regional Authority and Symbols of Local Autonomy, after 1850. International Journal of Historical Archaeology, 1-21.

Flores, J. M., & Duran, A. (2014). The Central Valley Dual Language Consortium and the Stanislaus Associación de Investigación Latina: A Map of Our Journey.Multicultural Education, 21(2), 54.

James Areida Education Support Center. (2017). About LodiUSD. Retrieved from http://www.lodiusd.net/cms/page_view?d=x&piid=&vpid=1278766520389

Lodi News-Sentinel, (2017). Lodi Unified board tackles teacher shortages, campus updates and bond funds. Lodinews.com. Retrieved 27 March 2017, from http://www.lodinews.com/news/article_e02eaea2-dd52-11e6-9298-c31afe2f7640.html

Losen, D. J., Martinez, T. E., &Okelola, V. (2014). Keeping California's kids in school. K-12 Racial Disparities in School Discipline.