Week 5: Putting It on the Record

Before anything else, today marked twenty-five years since September 11, 2001. Patriot Day is not among the state's required instructional observances, so how the day was handled belonged to each of you, and I am grateful for the care you gave it. Every student in our buildings was born after that morning, which means the adults in our schools are the ones who remember it firsthand. A moment of silence, an honest answer to a student's question, or a word of thanks to a first responder or veteran in our community was enough. Our standards ask our students to know what happened. Our work is helping them understand why it still matters.Happy Friday!Five weeks in, the short week felt like we were moving from starting school to running with purpose and intent. Thank you for the work that got us here. Routines are settled enough now that instruction, not logistics, is what fills the day, and that shift is what makes the rest of the year possible. We are still working toward the same three targets: continued academic growth, daily attendance at or above 93.5 percent, and steady improvement in behavior and school climate. Attendance is the one I want on your mind this month, because September sets the pattern for the year. Every conversation with a family about getting a student here on time is a conversation about all three targets at once. Two items in this Wrap-up deserve your attention, and both come down to the same idea. Good work that is not documented is difficult to recognize, and requirements that are not planned for become last-minute scrambles. Leveling-Up means putting things on the record before the deadline arrives rather than after.Mena’s Merit Pay PathwayState growth scores will be released on September 17, and once they arrive, we will calculate local VAM scores using the process I presented to you before school started. Teachers who receive a state three-year growth average are automatically eligible for merit-pay consideration and do not need to do anything. Contracts for that group were already formed using the adopted index scale applied directly to the state growth measure. That is the straightforward half of the system.The other half is the reason we built a district pathway. A merit pay model should not reward only the teachers who happen to receive a state-generated score. Many of you influence student growth every day without teaching a directly tested course, and if merit pay were tied only to state VAM, opportunity would be uneven before the conversation ever began. Our District VAM and Educator Impact pathway exists to close that gap. It is equal opportunity, not lower standards, and I want to be honest that it is not the easier route. It asks for documentation, artifacts, and principal approval that the state pathway does not require.If you do not receive a state VAM score and you want to be considered, complete the Merit Pay Intent Declaration Form, sit down with your building principal to discuss it, and put your intent on record for the remainder of this school year. The form is linked in this Wrap-up so you can pull it up and get started today, and completed forms are due to your building principal by 4:00 p.m. on Thursday, October 1, 2026.The form asks you to name one growth focus area in English Language Arts, mathematics, or science, explain how your course, program, intervention, or instructional role connects to growth in that area, identify the student outcomes and strategies you intend to use, name the students or groups through which your impact will be documented, and mark the evidence you will maintain in the Educator Effectiveness System. Your principal then reviews and signs it. Filing the form declares intent and begins the evidence process. It does not guarantee merit pay, because final eligibility still depends on growth data, documentation, and administrative review.What Our Social Studies Teachers Need on the CalendarArkansas released its 2026-2027 social studies instructional observances last week, and two of them arrive within days. Constitution Day falls on Thursday, September 17, and federal law requires every district to hold an educational program on the United States Constitution that day, commemorating the signing in 1787. Celebrate Freedom Week follows September 21 through 25, when state law directs every social studies class to include instruction on the freedoms we enjoy and the sacrifices that secured them. The state resources for both are organized as general K-12 materials, so our elementary teachers have something usable as