Last year, the Richard Gird Elementary School staff began the process of "collaboration" through grade levels. Grade levels began to have discussions about student work, standards, rigor and best teaching practices. Through these "collaboration meetings", the staff realized how powerful and beneficial it is to look at current student data, analyze it and reflect on teaching practices.  Although it was introduced as "collaboration", the staff had already begun the process of doing PLC. This year, the staff has continued on the PLC mode, but with a much stronger emphasis on academics and teaching. The teachers are completing a "cycle" where they talk about the standard, they deconstruct it, decide on the curriculum and on the assessment, teach the lesson (s) and reflect on students' results. Through this process, the school was able to grow 40 points last year on the API and we are expecting to grow as much this year! (If not, hopefully more).