BACK TO SCHOOL 2011: Melrose High School

What's new at this year? The principal, for starters.

to takeover Melrose's flagship school from retiring Principal Joe Dillon, and he's had a busy summer so far—mainly from everyone wanting to meet him.

"It’s been a lot of meet and greet, which is good, because rather than having to seek everyone out, they’re coming to me," Richards said with a smile. "I probably have met, to give you an idea, over 60 people. And before that, I spent three days here before the school year ended, before the teachers left for vacation."

Tackling the NEASC report

Number one on Richards' priority list is the special report required by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC) by Dec. 1, a result of the during .

Richards said the school is "well on our way" to addressing the items NEASC is looking for in the special report.

"We’ve been busy trying to chip away at that list and I’ll do a report out in October to the School Committee and it’s going to be a positive report out," he said. "We’ll have more work to do after October, but I can say that the report I’m submitting in December will be a positive report that addresses the issues they're concerned with. That’s really pushing almost everything."

One of the main items that NEASC wants to see is a formal written curriculum for the high school. Richards said that "a majority" of MHS' classes have curriculum written, working on that over the summer.

"We will have that completed, hopefully, by the end of this year," he said. "And then once we get it on paper, do we have common assessments?"

Richards said common assessments require teachers to reflect on their exams, the questions asked and the results, in order to tune assessments and get better student results.

"It could be that 80 percent of the kids miss #9, and they all selected 'C' or 'D,' when the right answer was 'A,'" he said. "What did we do wrong as teachers? And—let’s rephrase that question. That's where common assessment is powerful. We’re definitely going to be getting that in place much more."

Continuing practice of examining student work

Something that will continue from Dillon's tenure as principal will be the practice of —in short, teachers providing constructive criticism to each other regarding their lesson plans. The program is one of the areas commended by NEASC in the accreditation report.

Richards said that coincidentally, he started the same program as assistant principal at Belmont High School, and will continue that program, along with walk-throughs by administrators and teachers to observe classrooms and look for best teaching practices.

"We’re going to be doing a lot more of those, both formal and informal," he said. "That will be an expectation for all the department heads."

Teaching strategies and curriculum

In terms of new initiatives, Richards said he wants MHS faculty to focus on what to teach and how to teach it—strategies around teaching and curriculum, which overlaps with the written curriculum sought by NEASC.

"We’ll be taking a good look at that and getting our curriculum written, solid," he said. "Then from there, once we have that foundation, we’re going to spin off that ... We’re looking at teachers’ best practices in the classroom, because the greatest impact on student learning is the teacher in the front of the classroom."

Richards also plans to focus on literacy, something that he said is fairly new for most high schools, which usually view literacy as a reading program for lower grades and assumes that students have those skills.

"And they don’t necessarily have those skills," he said.