Montgomery County Public Schools, Rockville, MD

Baldrige Education Criteria for Performance Excellence → Baldrige for Parents

Baldrige: An Introduction for Parents

Parent's Job from a My Job, Your Job, Our Job chart
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Welcome to the Baldrige web site for parents.
This site has been created to help parents understand Baldrige as a way for schools to do a better job of managing the learning of ALL of their students.

Keep in mind that schools may be at very different stages in the implementation of Baldrige. Therefore, your school may not have developed all the parts of Baldrige noted on this website.
What is Baldrige?
How does Baldrige work?
How can parents help their children?
How can parents help their school?


Also On This Website:

What is Baldrige?

Baldrige is a way of focusing our efforts to help all students become independent learners, make good decisions, solve problems and take responsibility for their learning. It requires that we:

  • involve the school community, including students, staff and parents
  • have measurable goals and plans for achieving the goals
  • make sure goals and plans are communicated and understood
  • monitor our progress and make changes to improve results

How Does Baldrige Work?

At the school level

School Improvement TeamYour principal brings together a team of staff members, parents, and other members of the community. This school improvement team reviews how well students are performing, sets goals for increased achievement and plans how to help students and teachers reach those goals. During the school year, the team reviews progress and adjusts the plan as necessary.

At the classroom level

Teacher and students discuss in front of a classroom data centerTeachers and students work together to set classroom and personal goals. They agree on what actions they will take to make sure they meet their goals and use data centers and data notebooks to track their progress. They share information with parents on what and how they are doing and ask for parents’ help in achieving their goals. If teachers and students have trouble meeting their goals, they try to find ways to do a better job.

Parents Can Help Their Children By...

Parent with child
  • knowing their child’s goals and following his or her progress
  • making sure that their child can study and learn at home
  • being in touch with their child’s teacher to know how and what their child is learning and doing
  • helping their child set short and long term goals and developing and monitoring action plans for activities, projects, chores, or career interests

Parents Can Help Their School By...

  • joining the principal’s school improvement team
  • providing feedback about what they believe is important
  • learning as much as they can about the school’s plan and the responsibilities of staff, students, parents, and others in helping to improve student performance

This web site is a work in progress. As the Baldrige Initiative goes forth, the web site will become a forum for staff, students, and parents to share best practices. Parents are invited to share strategies or best practices to link to this web site by forwarding (email) their materials for review to Eva Wetten.

November 23, 2010 | Maintained by Web Services | Content Manager: Michael Perich