SALT LAKE CITY — No Utah school wants to be known as a "turnaround school."
But for schools that invest in the work of turning failing school grades into passing grades, the journey can be highly rewarding.
"Although the journey has been difficult, the school community that we are today is amazing and completely unrecognizable from who and what we were three years ago," said Seth Allred, principal of Mont Harmon Middle School in Price.
The Carbon School District middle school earned an A on its latest state report card, up from a D in 2015.
The school's improvement was based on a central belief that "everything we do in every moment of the day is for and about our students," Allred said in a statement.
Two questions guided the educators' approach and actions, he said. They were: "Is this about the student as an individual?” and “If this were my own child sitting across from me, what would I be willing to do to see them succeed?”
Schools identified for the state's school turnaround program are among Utah's worst performing. They are given three years to improve their school grade and given additional to hire private consultants to advise them how to improve academic performance.
Monument Valley High School improved from an F to a C grade. The San Juan School District high school classifies 68 percent of its students as English learners, 70 percent as homeless under the federal education definition, 98 percent Native American and 100 percent as economically disadvantaged.
"Our goals have been to create and maintain high academic standards, create a supportive, restorative justice learning environment where kids can thrive and teachers feel supported, and improve our classroom instruction," said Principal Spencer Singer.
The quality of the school's classroom instruction has "greatly improved," Singer said, crediting the hard work of the staff, help from the school's turnaround partner Innovations Education Consulting and hiring and retaining quality teachers.
"Monitoring data, strengthening teacher collaboration and accountability and schoolwide classroom instructional efforts have made the difference in student growth. It is exciting to see the work that our teachers and students are putting in pay off," Singer said.
The state's School Turnaround and Leadership Development Act, passed by state lawmakers in 2015, identifies and provides outside resources to low-performing schools.
Of the 26 schools in the program’s first group, 18 will exit after increasing at least one letter grade. Among the 18 schools, the vast majority improved by one letter grade although four had a two-letter grade improvement and one improved three letter grades.
Grades at two schools worsened and at six in the turnaround program, the letter grades were unchanged.
One school in the turnaround program, Pioneer High School for the Performing Arts, has closed.
Four schools are eligible for extension in the program, Woodrow Wilson and Redwood elementary schools, both in the Granite School District, White Horse Elementary School in the San Juan School District and Utah Connections Academy, an online school.
State Superintendent of Public Instruction Sydnee Dickson said she has visited many of the schools in the turnaround program and has been “impressed by the strategic work and targeted resources to close achievement gaps and improve academic outcomes for each student."
The State School Board will determine the next steps for schools that did not meet the requirements for exiting the turnaround program.