International Baccalaureate

Community Service 

An essential component of all IB programs is service and action. We aim to make community service a defining feature of Hunt Middle School by offering, encouraging, and supporting community service among our students. 

8th Grade Community Service Project 

Near the end of 8^th grade, students complete a capstone project, referred to as the Community Project. The Community Project asks students to   

1. choose a community to serve working alone, in a pair, or as a trio  
2. conduct an investigation of a community and its needs  
3. set a highly challenging goal to serve a community of your choice  
4. create a plan to meet their highly challenging goal  
5. put their plan into action   
6. document the whole process in a journal  
7. present the story of your community service to a formal audience  

 8^th grade students will do much (but not all) of their community project work in advisory this year. Their advisory teachers help supervise student work. Students can choose to do their project alone, with a partner, or in a group of three. Students will exhibit their work in late spring. 

Academic Honesty at Hunt Middle School

Introduction:
Tacoma Public Schools and IB schools aspire to develop the whole child. Reading, writing and math are very important, but we at Hunt also want our learners to demonstrate good character. We will guide our students to act honestly in their journey as a learner. To be academically honest, Hunt students need to show the following traits of the IB Learner Profile:

Hunt students need to be Principled: This means we act with integrity and honesty, with a strong sense of fairness and justice, and with respect for the dignity and rights of people everywhere. We take responsibility for our actions and their consequences.

Hunt students need to be Reflective: We thoughtfully consider the world and our own ideas and experience. We work to understand our strengths and weaknesses in order to support our learning and personal development.

Hunt students need to be Communicators: We express ourselves confidently and creatively in more than one language and in many ways. We collaborate effectively, listening carefully to the perspectives of other individuals and groups.

Hunt students need to be Risk-takers: We approach uncertainty with forethought and determination; we work independently and cooperatively to explore new ideas and innovative strategies. We are resourceful and resilient in the face of challenges and change.

We must also point out that it is the responsibility of teachers and families to promote academic integrity. There are several important terms around academic honesty we need staff, students and families to know as part of that promotion.

Important Definitions:

Academic Honesty: demonstrating and upholding the highest integrity and honesty in all the academic work that you do

Academic Dishonesty: committing or contributing to dishonest acts, examples may include

-          Plagiarism: Presenting someone else’s ideas or work as your own

-          Collaboration: Loosely defined as working together on a common aim with shared information

-          Collusion: Occurs when a student uses fellow learners as an unattributed source

-          Duplication of work: The presentation of the same work for different assessment components

-          Academic misconduct: deliberate or inadvertent behavior that has the potential to result in the student, or anyone else, gaining an unfair advantage in one or more components of assessment. Behavior that may disadvantage another student is also regarded as academic misconduct.

These terms are important concepts to understand how Hunt approaches its guiding practice towards incidents of academic dishonesty.

Guiding Practice:
At Hunt, we expect our students and staff to give appropriate credit to those whose ideas we want to build on and to be willing to take the risk to share their own ideas. Within Tacoma Public Schools Policy 3240R, a student who represents “another’s language, ideas or thoughts as a student’s own work or using unfair means to gain an advantage in coursework or other school activities” are not demonstrating academic honesty.

In addition, IB Standard C3 Teaching and Learning says staff and students will “promote the understanding and practice of academic honesty.”

The district policy and the IB standard together demonstrate that academic honesty is a clear expectation of all students.

At Hunt, we use failures at academic honesty as teachable moments to guide a student towards being principled communicators and risktakers. It takes practice being courageous at sharing your own ideas. It takes practice learning the expectations around appropriate communication and giving others fair credit. It takes practice learning how to make principled choices while dealing with peer pressure or academic stress.

We recognize that learning how to be academically honest requires repeated and different types of opportunities to practice. We commit to holding high standards of academic honesty while framing those standards with a compassionate lens towards reflection, growth and improvement.

The school librarian will play an important role in supporting the education of academic honesty to all grade levels. This will include designing lessons around appropriate conduct around academic honesty.

Below are multiple examples of academic dishonesty. It is not a complete list of all forms of academic dishonesty, but it serves to give a clear picture of what academic dishonesty can look like in different classes and situations. In all these scenarios, Hunt staff would work with the student, or students, to learn the impact of their failure at demonstrating academic honesty, how to restore the harm caused by that failure, and how to avoid making the same failure in the future.

Examples include but are not limited to: Sharing test questions or answers from an exam, homework or lab with another student. Doing any academic work for another student, such as homework or tests. Allowing another student to copy a solution to a homework problem, exam or lab.

What is Academic Dishonesty

-          Using and submitting purchased papers.

-          Using unauthorized materials or sources of information, such as a cheat sheet, preprogrammed calculator, etc.

-          Copying another student's academic work.

-          Unauthorized communication during an examination.

Extra definitions:
Authenticity: Being true to your own thoughts and ideas

Copyright: the exclusive legal right, given to an originator or an assignee to print, publish, perform, film, or record literary, artistic, or musical material, and to authorize others to do the same.

Intellectual property:  a work or invention that is the result of creativity, such as a manuscript or a design, to which one has rights and for which one may apply for a patent, copyright, trademark, etc.

 

Hunt Middle School MYP Assessment Policy

Aims of Assessment (Philosophy of Assessment)

A.      Supports student learning by providing opportunities for students to show their learning across disciplines.

B.      Promotes positive student attitudes towards learning that develop critical- and creative- thinking skills.

C.      Embraces a variety of cultural and linguistic contexts that reference the internationality of the program.

D.      Incorporates a variety of levels of knowledge and skills–recall, adapt and apply—to address questions and context.

E.       Facilitates student inquiry set-in real-world contexts.

F.       Encompasses understanding of the whole course and not individual components.

G.      Informs, enhances, and improves the teaching process.

 Common practices in using MYP assessment criteria and determining achievement levels.

A.      Rubric scores and overall level performances are based on Hunt IB Continuum of Learning.

B.      Hunt IB Continuum of learning posted in all classrooms, reviewed with students and parents multiple times a year.

C.      Formative assessments are measured by the IB criterion of the overall unit rubric. Summative assessments are measured by the full criteria on the IB  Continuum of Learning.

D.      Hunt uses standards referenced grading; we use the IB 1-8 Continuum to reflect proficiency levels but use traditional (A-E) grading scale on report cards.

E.       Common agreements of Standards Based Grading are established by staff based on the book, A Repair Kit for Grading: 15 Fixes for Broken Grades by Ken O’Connor.

F.       Students can retake assessments until they achieve proficiency.

G.      Thunder Rolls: at the end of each quarter, students can have a fresh look, relearn, and redemonstrate their understanding of skills learned within the quarter.

H.      Reflection Collection: once per quarter, students create a digital portfolio of a sample of their best work from each class.

I.         Each strand of each IB Criterion will be assessed twice a year.

J.        Standardization of assessments are calibrated through collaborative planning, data analysis, and reflections.

K.       Students will be compensated with a grade based on what their performance most fairly reflects.

 

Assessment Timeline

A.      Formative and Summative assessment will be on going throughout the year.

B.      State and district mandated assessments occur at times prescribed.

Assessment Implementation

A.      Formative assessments are the daily activities provided to enhance instruction and achievement. These assessments are used to track student progress. Formative assessments play a lesser role in the calculation of students’ final grades.

B.      Summative assessments take place as checkpoints throughout the unit to provide students with the opportunity to demonstrate what they have learned against a fixed set of standards.

Assessment Reporting

A.      Teachers post grades on Schoology that are accessible for families.

B.      Interim grades are mailed at the end of the 1st and 3^rd quarter.

C.      Final grades are mailed at the end of each semester.

D.      Assessment information will be reported to students and parents through Schoology, Home Access Center, conferencing, and/or reports sent home.

E.       Teachers and support staff will work with each student to calculate and understand their Grade Point Average (GPA) using their final grades.

Assessment Recording

A.      Teachers must translate achievement levels attained on an IB rubric into point totals that can be entered in the online grade book.

 

IB 8 A IB 7 A- IB 6 B+ IB 5 B- IB 4 C+ IB 3 C IB 2 D+ IB 1 D

 

Types of Assessments

	Formative	Summative
Define	Formative assessment provides feedback and information during the instructional process, while learning is taking place, and while learning is occurring. measures student progress but it can also assess your own progress as an instructor. Identifies areas that may need improvement. may be graded and act as a gauge to students’ learning progress and to determine teaching effectiveness (implementing appropriate methods and activities).	Summative assessment takes place after the learning has been completed and provides information and feedback that sums up the teaching and learning process. High-stakes summative assessments typically are given to students at the end of a set point during or at the end of a unit of study to assess what has been learned and how well it was learned.  Grades are usually an outcome of summative assessment: they indicate whether the student has an acceptable level of knowledge-gain – is the student able to effectively progress to the next part of the class?
Examples	INBs, homework, labs, writing samples, quick write, exit tickets, observation,	Quiz, test, writing samples, project, performance, labs, exit tickets
Entry	When graded, Formative scores will be entered into the Schoology grade book	All summative scores will be entered into the Schoology grade book 1-8

 

*This will be reviewed yearly by the whole staff

Updated 6/7/22

Hunt MS Inclusion Policy

Hunt MS believes that creating an inclusive environment is important for providing all students the opportunity to meaningfully participate to the fullest extent of their ability. In order to achieve this the following guidelines need to be in place:

• We will meet all local and state legal obligations for all students to be included with meaningful and appropriate access to the IB program
  • We will adhere to guidelines as laid out by the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).
  • We will meet the requirements of students’ IEP/ 504 Plan
  • We will utilize collaborative planning to meet the unique needs of all students
  • We are a public school and include all students regardless of special status, income status or housing status

 

• We will articulate our inclusion policy to the broader Hunt community
  • We will build a community that intentionally includes all learners
  • We will include all learners in our school-wide documents, with intentionality surrounding students with a wide variety of needs, represented cultures and languages, and members of the LGBTQIA community
  • We will ensure students with disabilities are present and visible in all aspects of the school community (foundations courses, expressions courses and after-school enrichment)

 

• We will use high yield strategies to include a variety of learning needs
  • We will utilize the IB Learner Profile to identify and guide student attributes
  • We will apply our understanding of learning styles to our instruction and allow students to demonstrate their learning in a variety of ways
  • We will utilize universal design for access and learning to allow students to participate to the fullest extent of their ability
  • We will tailor our curriculum to the individual needs of all students

 

• We will take responsibility as a school community for all students’ learning
  • Students learning needs range from above grade level to significantly below grade level
  • Students' needs are met in the general education classroom, push-in support model, pullout support classroom (LRC classroom) and the self-contained classroom (ACCESS classroom)
  • STAFF: all staff are committed to meeting students’ needs; teachers will adapt instruction to meet the educational needs of all students; regular collaboration will occur between Special Education and General Education teachers
  • STUDENTS: work with the Hunt staff and MYP curriculum to the best of their abilities
  • FAMILIES: work with Hunt teachers and attend meetings (IEP, 504, etc.) and conferences

 

• We will collaborate to access expertise in inclusion
  • Hunt Middle School Inclusion Team includes the following and works collaboratively to meet the needs of all students at Hunt:
    • Special Education Department
    • School Psychologist (School Psychologists administer cognitive and behavioral testing)
    • Building Instructional Coach
    • School Counselor
    • English Language Acquisition teacher
    • Occupational, Physical and Speech Therapists (Specialists administer service specific assessments to measure student need for each service)
    • Classroom teachers
    • District departments: (English Learners/Second Language Acquisition, Curriculum and Instruction, Indian Education, Tacoma Whole Child and others as needed)

(June 7, 2022)

Hunt Language Policy

Philosophy - Hunt Middle School believes that all teachers are language teachers as the study of language is the foundation for all learners. The focus in all classrooms includes the study and practice of communication, listening, comprehension, and collaboration. Incorporating the study of a second language provides students the opportunity to develop respect and understanding of international cultures.

Language of Instruction - The language of instruction at Hunt Middle School is English. 84% of the student body speak English as their primary language.

Language A Resources – The Hunt Middle School staff includes literacy specialists, including literacy and language teachers, literacy specialists, an instructional coach, teacher librarians, an ELL teacher, special education teachers, and teachers in all subject areas.

Second Language Course Offerings - Hunt Middle Schools uses the Edgenuity World Language online program to provide Spanish and French instruction weekly via advisory. The school district's late start Wednesday enables students to dedicate time to study a second language using the Edgenuity resource. An enrichment program is being developed to incorporate study of Coast Salish languages including an introduction to the local Puyallup tribe’s Twulshootseed language.

Waiving Language B - Based on the students’ individual IEP goals, some students with IEPS may waive a Language B course. Students that are English language learners will be supported with English language acquisition in place of the Edgenuity World Language program.  

English Language Learners – Hunt Middle School has (2 Arabic, 2 Cambodian, 1 Chinese, 1 Nepali, 19 Spanish, 1 Swahili, 1 Thai, 2 Vietnamese, 1 Russian). English language learners will be supported by an ELL teacher and school-wide GLAD (Guided Language Acquisition by Design) strategies.

Language Diversity – Hunt Middle School has (2 Arabic, 2 Cambodian, 1 Chinese, 1 Nepali, 19 Spanish, 1 Swahili, 1 Thai, 2 Vietnamese, 1 Russian)

Interpreters – Families whose first language is not English will have access to all areas of their students’ education. Tacoma Public Schools uses Language Link Interpreting Service. There are teachers on staff that speak Spanish and Chinese (Mandarin). Parent updates will be delivered via robocalls that can be translated into a variety of languages.

Parents’ Assistance at Home - Edgenuity World Language Program can be supported by parents at home as it has a self-paced/independent component to the program.

Review and Update Plan - The Hunt Language Policy will be updated at the start of the school year once enrollment is solidified. Once enrollment is stabilized, the language policy will be reviewed every year. by the MYP Coordinator and the literacy specialists.