Creating a School Culture Where Progress Is Valued

Last summer, our administrative team combed over our school’s state testing results. Although we saw some growth, most of our students still performed below proficiency in math and English. We questioned what we could do to improve and turned to our incentive program. Here, we noticed an issue: We only celebrated students who were already successful. We did little to motivate those who needed it the most.

My principal, Candice Steele, and I decided to tackle this issue by creating a new reward system. Instead of focusing only on recognizing the high achievers, we started acknowledging growth and progress too. Adjusting to this mindset helped us create a culture where students demonstrating progress—not just those at the top of the academic food chain—are valued. This has ultimately led to higher standardized test scores for almost all students. 

ACKNOWLEDGING GROWTH AND PROGRESS ACROSS THE SCHOOL

As we started to create our new incentive system, we wanted to ground it in our school’s identity. Our school mascot is the wolf, so we decided to create a wolf-themed program that would help all students feel seen as they progressed through their academic journeys. The system has four components: Pawsitive Communication, Paws of Progress, Wolves on the Rise, and The Howl of Fame Ceremony. Schools can adjust these to fit whatever theme they want, or skip the theme altogether.

Pawsitive Communication. Too often, schools use phone calls home to address negative behavior. Many administrators will even suggest that teachers utilize phone calls as an intervention to inform families of their child’s undesirable conduct. Although these contacts are necessary, using them to only address negative concerns can cause schools to miss out on the opportunity to create academic motivation.

Our school now encourages teachers to actively reach out to families to celebrate the students who are showing progress toward improved academic achievement. These students may be participating more in class or starting to hand in their homework assignments more regularly. These students are not necessarily the top performers, but they are actively showing improvements.

And it doesn’t just need to be a phone call home. Our teachers use a variety of platforms—email, postcards, our learning management system—to communicate academic growth, and our administrative team reaches out to families too when we see these behaviors or hear about them from our teachers. This has created a sense of pride for the kids who aren’t normally recognized. Students now want their teachers to call home.

Paws of Progress. Traditionally, schools send students to the office for discipline issues. Although students should absolutely be held accountable, we also wanted our students to see this space as a place to celebrate academic success. Therefore, we started sending students to the office for academic progress. These positive office referrals, which we call Paws of Progress, are given to students who demonstrate academic growth.

For example, when a student retakes a quiz and scores higher, they can earn a Positive Paws office referral. The teacher will fill out a small premade certificate and write a short description of why the student received a referral. The student is then sent to the office, where they are recognized by the administrative team, receive a prize, and have their picture taken. This communicates that we value effort and persistence, not perfection.

Wolves on the Rise. In West Virginia, middle school students take three benchmarks and receive one of the following scores for math and English: does not meet standards, partially meets standards, meets standards, or exceeds standards. These assessments provide teachers with valuable data to help guide their instruction and focus on areas of need. To motivate all our students to do their best on these assessments, we created level-up cards.

We as the administrative team introduced the idea of these cards to students before their second assessment: If a student moves up a level, say from “does not meet standards” to “partially meets standards,” they earn a level-up card. These special cards provide students with fun perks for their hard work, including leaving first at dismissal, free game passes, and monthly treats. Students love these cards and are motivated to level up. This helps us celebrate those students who are working hard to improve but have not yet reached proficiency.

The Howl of Fame Ceremony. The end of the year is a special time for teachers and students. It provides an opportunity for students to reflect on growth, acknowledge the challenges they overcame, and celebrate their success. It can also be an opportunity to remind students that academic growth, no matter how small or large, deserves to be acknowledged.

We decided to put together a special ceremony for our students that not only recognized students who excelled academically but also recognized those students who showed progress throughout the year. We gave medals to students who showed growth from the beginning of the year benchmark to the end of the year benchmark—they didn’t have to meet standards or exceed standards, they just had to show improvement.

We also gave pins and certificates to those students who showed grit and effort. At the end of the ceremony, students understood that growth and effort matter just as much as scores.

This ceremony was a collaboration between administrators and teachers, as teachers shared which students should be recognized and why, and the administrators planned and facilitated the ceremony.

Schools can use these simple ideas to refine their reward system to ensure that it motivates all students, not just those who are already proficient. When progress and growth are valued, the whole school wins.