Principal Raven Jones, who began her position at McLean this past September, held a State of the School Address after school in partnership with the PTSA on Jan. 21. The purpose was to update the McLean community on goals and plans for the coming school year.
During the meeting, Jones provided in-depth information on McLean’s plans regarding building improvements, academic improvement and new safety measures—including the OpenGate detectors system.
“This is the first time a principal has used [PTSA] as a forum to address the entire school,” PTSA president Elizabeth El-Nattar said. “We appreciate the information and time Principal Jones has taken to go above and beyond for our students.”
As the 12th-largest school in the county division, McLean has encountered both notable successes and unique challenges in stimulating academic performance and the well-being of the student body this school year.
“At McLean, we are above the averages in every single area where the district is left,” Jones said. “That includes multilingual learners’ and students with disabilities’ performance and achievement. That is huge.”
Currently, McLean’s student body is composed of 6% multilingual learners (ML), 10.6% students with disabilities (SWD) and a student mobility rate of 6%. At McLean, these types of students have shown much higher academic performance rates compared to countywide averages.
“We are the second-highest growth in multilingual art performance in Fairfax County in the past year,” Jones said. “It’s something that I’m incredibly proud of [because] it is a difficult measure for [schools to] move into.”
While McLean is already demonstrating strong indicators of student success, Jones aims to push McLean’s academic performance to new heights. Specifically, the goal is to increase reading and science proficiency for multilingual learners to a 91% pass rate by the end of the school year—a five percent increase. For students with disabilities, the goal is to reduce the achievement gap by four percentage points.
“These are both very conservative and very durable goals for us,” Jones said. “This is something that we think we can do, and [McLean is] already seeing progress this year.”
Jones outlined specific methods that McLean plans to integrate to meet the needs of the entire student body in the upcoming school year.
“An area that we have identified as needing more attention is our resource allocation,” Jones said. “We are looking at adding more time to [Highlander Time] so that we can build dedicated intervention blocks for students who have demonstrated more need for individualized support procedures in the school day.”
Currently, Highlander Time occurs during 30-minute periods each day. This system, however, has left Jones to notice a pattern of insufficient support for students in school.
“[We hope to incorporate this schedule change] so students do not have to stay after school, [miss] clubs or not be able to play sports because they need additional tutoring outside the school day,” Jones said. “[To help students], McLean is also looking at maximizing our staffing models and allocating staff to our operated areas.”
Developing academic resilience and grit among students through new initiatives is not an easy task for Jones to accomplish. To support this effort, Jones emphasized the importance of parents instilling discipline in their students to lower referral rates across the school.
“32 of [the 280 referrals given during the second quarter] are [a result of] dishonesty. [This includes] cheating on tests, sharing test information with other students or giving other students answers to homework,” Jones said.
Additionally, Jones is working to build a principal advisory committee to receive student and parent opinions on school policies and objectives.
“This committee will be composed of parents, students, community members and staff members who will [help approach] challenges that [McLean is] facing as a school,” Jones said. [They will] advise me, as a principal, on where we should go and what our vision and our mission should be.”
Renovations have also been a persisting concern among students and parents alike—with McLean’s building approaching 70 years old. Jones shared specific efforts she has initiated to improve the academic environment for students despite recent changes to the school renovation requirements across the county.
“One of the [new] installations [at McLean] is the two new chillers. McLean’s temperature varies by about 20 degrees depending on where you are in the building at any given time,” Jones said. “We’re really hopeful that the new chillers will actually help a lot with the humidity in our building [and] with the fluctuating temperatures.”
Through small steps leading up to the full renovation, Jones’s goal is to address maintenance issues such as mold growth in the school building. She is also deeply committed to fostering a safe environment at school.
“If there’s nothing else about my job that I would identify as a main priority, it would be safety and security. [They are] going to be the first thing on my mind at all times,” Jones said. “I take that seriously.”
