In the summer of 2020, Shaker Heights Schools Superintendent Dr. David Glasner announced that the District would eliminate racially segregated classes and begin to consolidate leveled courses for students in Grades 7-12. We call this new path forward “Shaker Rising” and it has become the District’s call to action that every student is afforded the opportunity to rise up and meet their potential.
Beginning in the 2020-21 school year, the District’s Learning & Teaching Department, with the support of the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, took its first steps to eliminate racially segregated classes and to better understand instructional practices that support learning and positive outcomes for all students:
In October 2020, District leaders participated in the Harvard RIDES Intensive Clinic. The Reimagining Integration: Diverse and Equitable Schools (RIDES) Project aims to create diverse, equitable and inclusive schools.
The District has joined The Century Foundation’s Bridges Collaborative, a two-year effort that unites a cohort of 56 schools and organizations from across the nation to integrate schools and create diverse neighborhoods.
In the fall of the 2020-21 school year, the District began a Shaker Rising video series to address community concerns and questions about detracking. Watch the videos.
In the second semester of the 2020-21 school year, the District will begin a special pilot project that will focus on Grades 7-9 math instruction. This project, which supports the District’s efforts to improve math instruction for all students, has been made possible by a $117,000 grant awarded to the District by the Ohio Collaborative for Educating Remotely and Transforming Schools (OCER). The grant proposal was a collaborative effort of administrators from the District’s Learning and Teaching and Diversity, Equity and Inclusion teams, and the Shaker Schools Foundation.