Leadership Group
A leadership group representative of each school staff (classified and certificated) is the active governing body for the work across the Flight. Leadership groups met several times during the 2005-2006 school year to gain an understanding of flight goals, to complete exercises that assessed current programs that are working well in these schools, to determine specific areas of focus that would benefit students and families, and to plan a series of work-sessions throughout the year about family engagement, cultural competence, and curriculum alignment.

Family and Community Partnerships
During the summer of 2005 all staff from these schools (approximately 250 staff members) came together for one-week symposium. During the first part of the week all staff learned about communicating with the diverse families in their school populations and then conducted home visits of students who would be attending their school in September. Families received a visit in their home or other agreed upon site by a member of the staff. This week marked the beginning of the work that is taking place between schools and families to support smooth positive transitions for student from home to school and from school to school.

Curriculum Alignment & Professional Learning Communities
A second initiative was based on the need to have clear curriculum expectations across all flight one schools. To begin this work a group of designated teachers representing all eight schools attended a national Curriculum Mapping Conference together. During the year all staff attended local training and professional development sessions where grade level teachers across the flight met to discuss state Grade Level Expectations, examine student work, and determine common expectations through curriculum alignment. Additionally a one day symposium was held to discuss vertical alignment K-5 across the flight.