DSST Mid-Year Survey: Celebrating successes and addressing concerns

Thank you all for your participation in the Mid-Year Survey -- 88% of you completed the survey, providing invaluable insights that shape the course of our journey.

Below, you will find a summary of what we heard in the survey and how we are responding. 

Bright Spots:

Our survey revealed several bright spots, showcasing the positive aspects of DSST:

1. Mission and College-Going Culture: 86% of DSST staff affirmed that their school actively fosters a college-going culture inclusive of all students. Your commitment to our mission is truly commendable.

2. Strategic Priorities: The three questions with the highest year-over-year increase were all associated with a strategic priority:

   • Transformational Talent: “I know about the different leadership pathway opportunities available to me.” (+0.22 from 22-23 to 23-24)
   • Excellent Instruction: “I am invested in my school's literacy curriculum.” (+0.11)
   • Transformational Talent: “DSST values the differences in life circumstances, such as caring for a sick loved one, a death in the family, etc.” (+0.10)

Opportunities for Improvement:

In carefully reviewing your comments, two predominant themes emerged, guiding us toward meaningful actions:

1. Staff well-being and authenticity at work: Numerous comments expressed concerns about overwork, burnout, and a lack of perceived value or compensation for contributions. Equally distressing were declines in team members feeling fully accepted for their identities. This is unacceptable, and we are committed to addressing these concerns:

   • Compensation: Compensating our DSST team to the best of our financial means continues to be an important priority for DSST. We are in the process of getting input on options for how to further increase compensation, and we are planning input sessions with all stakeholder groups before taking next steps. We know how important it is to move quickly, yet deliberately, to make sure we collect broad input before decision-making discussions. We will have more information to share in the coming months.

   • DSST Network Equity Audit: We've partnered with Systemic Educational Equity, LLC, for a third-party equity audit, seeking input from staff, students, and families to ensure our DEI efforts align with our core values.

Training and Development: Your feedback on training and development has spurred strategic initiatives:

• Professional Development Plan: We know we need to get better in this area. Your feedback validates that. Currently, we are creating a coherent plan to strengthen professional development for teachers as part of our strategic plan work. One focus in this work is creating more differentiated pathways for teachers.
• New Teacher Development: We recognize we have significant work to do to strengthen our development of early-career teachers and are currently working on revamping our approach for next year. One key element of this is creating a sustained development pathway for new teachers over several years, including introducing a teacher advisory group to inform our Teacher Leadership Institute (TLI) this summer.

Your feedback is invaluable, driving our commitment to continuous improvement. Thank you for being an essential part of our DSST community. To read the full email update, click here.