Legacy Learning Center’s Vision, Mission and Goals​ 

Vision

Legacy’s philosophy is rooted in the belief that every student has the right to the best quality of education available, and that education is a process which encompasses the entire experiences students encounter in their school. Legacy’s philosophy is also rooted in the belief that classroom instruction is only one small aspect of a student’s educational experience, and that students learn from the behavior and actions of the adults around them more than they learn from books. Finally, it is rooted in the belief that student’s knowledge and pride in their religion and heritage are key to their well-being and success. It is part of Legacy’s philosophy that:

1. Each student is a unique individual with different needs.
2. Legacy School must be able to serve the needs of each and every student accepted into its programs.
3. The school strives to assist the students in the discovery of their individual potential and their own personal worth. 
4. The school should encompass a balanced curriculum of academics and arts, clubs and activities, competitive sports and community service.
5. The teaching of religious tolerance and ethnic/cultural equality leads to an improved society. 
6. The school should guide its students in their academic and spiritual endeavors and help them become well-balanced individuals.
7. Students achieve more when challenged with high expectations.
8. Problem-solving and critical-thinking skills are essential for the success of students.
9. Legacy faculty and staff should all be positive role models for the students.
10. Parents and community members are an integral part of the education process.

 

Legacy Objectives

To instill in our students a real love of learning to make them lifelong learners, “enjoins learning from the cradle to the grave. Legacy strives to fulfill this command. 

To offer the best possible educational opportunities and experiences to allow our students to reach their highest potential. 

To develop in our students a desire, willingness and ability to be positive, contributing members of their school community and of the community at large. 

To instill in our students a real love for and understanding of the teachings and practices of Islam, with particular emphasis on respect, effective communication, and cooperation. 

To develop in our students strong leadership skills by fostering self-discipline, self-motivation, strong work habits, the ability to think critically, and the desire to do one’s best. 

To encourage each student to cherish his/her own cultural values and heritage and to respect individuals with different cultural backgrounds. 

To develop each student’s ability to analyze and solve problems facing individuals in a rapidly changing world. To prepare students to do well on standardized tests. 

To empower students to seek and succeed in post-secondary education. 

To hire the most qualified faculty and staff. To provide faculty, staff, and students access to the best possible resources to enable them to reach their highest educational and extracurricular goals. 

To include parents in the educational process by regularly updating them on school activities; including them in special training and workshop opportunities dedicated to supporting their parenting duties; and inviting them to participate in all school-related activities.

Non-Discrimination Policy

Legacy Learning Center is committed to admit students of any race, color, religion, gender, national or ethnic origin, and accords them all the rights, privileges, programs, and activities generally accorded, or made available to students at the school. It does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, gender, national or ethnic origin in the administration of its educational policies, admission policies, scholarship programs, and athletic or other school-administered programs.

Religious & Ethnic Tolerance

All members of Legacy’s administration, faculty, staff and students are expected to respect the religious beliefs and ethnic backgrounds of all administration, faculty, staff, parents and students. Members of Legacy’s administration, faculty, staff, parents and/or students are not allowed to promote any religious beliefs and/or practices besides those that are accepted and/or taught by Legacy Learning Center while on Legacy property, at Legacy events or to Legacy students and/or staff. Promotion refers to talking about or distributing information about these beliefs and/or on any published medium, including social networking sites.

Mission

Inspire and prepare ALL students to create their own success in and beyond school.

All Students

  • Have their own unique story. 
  • Have voices that are valued and elevated.
  • Have the inherent wisdom and capacity to learn and achieve at a high level.
  • Are supported to engage in rigorous content.
  • Respond to deep, meaningful relationships with teachers, principals, counselors and coaches.
  • Benefit from the support of informed and engaged families, caregivers, and community champions.

Learning is Strongest When

  • High expectations are developed and embraced by students, families, teachers, and community.
  • It is differentiated based on specific needs, interests, strengths, learning styles, backgrounds, and aspirations of individual students.
  • Teaching and systems are culturally responsive.
  • It is connected to the real world.
  • It encompasses the whole person.
  • It occurs in a culture of commitment to adult learning.
  • It is joyful.

2020 Equity Indicators: Where are we going?

100% college acceptance all students should have the opportunity and skills to CHOOSE to go to college and succeed. A change in mindset to promote a community-wide expectation that our students will go to college will elevate all students, including those who ultimately – for their own reasons – choose not to attend college.

Strategy 1: Put Students at the Center of their learning

Students will thrive when teaching and learning is responsive to their individual interests, strengths, needs, learning styles, cultures, backgrounds, and aspirations. By understanding each student as an individual, we can provide the skills, knowledge, confidence, voice, and social emotional support that each individual student needs for self-agency and to achieve, contribute, and ultimately succeed as an adult in transforming her or his world.

High Leverage Action 1: Fully Implement Student Success Plans 

  • Starting in 6th grade, through graduation.
  • Ensures every student has a personalized pathway to success.
  • Co-create with students, continuously evolve.
  • Based on individual interests, strengths, needs, learning styles, cultures, backgrounds, and aspirations. 
  • Address academics, transition to high school, social emotional goals, and post-high school options.
  • Each student’s Success Plan will be embraced and monitored by at least one caring adult.

High Leverage Action 2:Refocus on Literacy & Language

  • Infuse literacy across every subject area, based on new standards.
  • Create the foundation for helping students read, write, listen, speak, think, and lead.
  • Develop critical thinking and problem solving skills.
  • Teach students how to work, communicate, and collaborate with each other, skills they will need in the world of work.
  • Build student voice, self-efficacy, self-reflection, and change agency skills.
  • Focus on language acquisition skills that are necessary for all students, especially our English Language Learners.

High Leverage Action 3: Propel Students through Customized Experiences

  • Assist students with finding, pursuing, and being ready to enter their own individual post-graduation path.
  • Identify, co-create and implement differentiated learning experiences and opportunities in partnership with students, families.
  • Comprehensive, student centered, balanced, grounded by the CT Core Standards.
  • Integrates Next Generation Science Standards and C3 (College, Career, Civic) Social Studies Standards in content aligned topics.
  • Meets developmental needs of early readers through in-depth foundational skills and balanced literacy approach.
  • Culturally responsive literature and informational texts that increase in complexity.

Strategies in Action: New Legacy Designed K – 2 Literacy Curriculum 5 

  • Include capstone experiences, advanced coursework and internships, Universal Design for learning to reach students with special needs and ESL within our classrooms, blended learning through our RazKids Reading Literacy program for our English Language Learners, and school day opportunities for taking college entrance exams.
  • Ensure that customized experiences are available to all students as a matter of equity.

Strategy 2: 

Develop Leaders to Lead for Learning Student success depends on high performing schools, which are driven by high performing leaders.
Leaders in our school will have a mindset of focusing their leadership on learning.
We will liberally provide those leaders with the new learning and a wider array of internal and external resources they need to continuously support their focus on learning.

High Leverage Action 1:Expand Adult Learning and School Support Networks

  • Share effective school improvement practices among principals, teachers, parents, community leaders to improve student learning.
  • Provide the structures and processes for collaborative adult learning, problem solving, sharing successes within and across schools, and managing partner relationships.
  • Embrace greater cultural responsiveness to understand biases and assumptions, value diversity and develop and implement practices, systems and policies necessary in cross-cultural settings.

High Leverage Action 2: Engage Families and Community in Meaningful Partnership

  • Develop Learning-Focused Family and Community Partnerships (School, Families, Partners, Central Office), based on a shared understanding of the needs of students and the school, and collaborative implementation and monitoring.
  • Positively impact achievement, attendance, and behavior.
  • Strengthen and contribute to stronger schools and communities.
  • Seek the shared commitment and investment of the entire community.
  • Adopt the Dual Capacity-Building Framework to build capacity for engagement among families AND schools.
  • Increase capacity and effectiveness of School Governance Councils as a cornerstone of engagement.
  • Support Community Engagement Teams to address community challenges that impact students.

Strategies In Action: Acceleration Agenda 

  • Schools engage in continuous improvement with nested supports at the school, classroom, and student levels to boost performance and outcomes.
  • Focused efforts and resources around improving instruction, leadership and student support practices.
  • Customized, case-management approach to personalize solutions and implement turnaround best practices.
  • Additional time for collaborative practice, dedicated student/family support services, tailored professional learning opportunities within and outside of the district, dedicated technology resources and network support.

6-High Leverage Action 3: Broaden Our Use of Data and Teams

  • Redefine instructional leadership so that leaders are leading high functioning teams that are guided by a shared vision, and engage in the planning, implementation and monitoring of school improvement through collaboration, networking, and inquiry to attend to student and adult learning needs.
  • Elevate the importance and practice of collective commitment in high functioning teams – no one person can do this work alone.
  • Form data literacy and instructional leadership and student support teams.
  • Engage in Cycles of Continuous Improvement through the Data Wise process.
    adopt and put in practice a consistent and continuous inquiry process that requires us to use various data to identify problems, to make decisions, to understand where we are succeeding and where we need to course correct and to learn from implementation.
  • Dis-aggregate data by race/ethnicity, socio-economic status, residency, ELL and special education status to ensure that ALL students are making progress to achieve at high levels.

Condition For Success: 

  • Change in mindset.
  • Learner needs come first.
  • A safe learning environment.
  • A culture of trust that encourages taking risks.
  • Operational excellence. 
  • Adequate and stable resources. 
  • City-wide commitment and collaboration. 
  • Stay FOCUSED on our goals. 

7-Implementing for Equity:

 As several participants in the planning process noted, the measure of a plan’s success is in its implementation. Now that we have a plan that defines where we want to go and the strategies for how to get there, we turn to mobilizing everyone in the Legacy Learning Center Community to do the work of getting us there.
We will operationalize our plan in a way that teachers, administrators, parents, community partners, friends, and students know exactly what to do and what resources they can access to implement the plan effectively at the system level, throughout our schools, and in the classroom.

Our key implementation principle:
Legacy Learning Center is committed to equity.

 We will differentiate and customize support for schools and students, just as we differentiate teaching and instruction.
We will identify and remove subtle institutional biases that populate all contemporary organizational systems.
Guaranteed High Quality Services for All Students Need-Based Supports Increased professional learning (i.e., instructional practices, data literacy, coaching).
Access to additional tools and instructional resources.
Enhanced student support services.
Intensive Need-Based Supports Individualized plans for student and family support and enrichment.
Powerful cycles of data-driven teaching and learning.
More time for collaborative practice.
Coaching for teachers and for leaders.
Access to a national network of schools for learning and problem solving. Optimized community partnerships.  

The emphasis will be on service: 

Developing and providing access to a menu of tools for schools, and to provide perspective and guidance on how to use those tools.
Reflecting this strategic plan in individual School Improvement Plans (SIPs) is fundamental. This is where educators will define their role in bringing Student Success Plans to life, understand their students’ strengths and needs, track student progress, engage more effectively with families and community partners, make better use of data, and participate in their own professional learning related to their instructional focus.
We are ready to help our community and answer the questions “what is my responsibility” and “what my opportunities are?”
We will help parents, partner with and our schools accountable to the goals of the plan.
 We will help partners extend and enrich their services to better achieve our mutual desired outcomes. Together, as a community, we will act with a singular purpose: to enable every student to thrive and for every school to be high performing.

 SUPPORT FOR LEARNING DIFFERENCES

The Legacy Learning Center community embraces individual ways of learning and is committed to supporting children in an inclusive classroom with additional supports. The professionals in Student Support Services collaborate with students, parents and faculty members to create student-centered learning plans, which guide teachers’ instruction and increases students’ application of learning skills. These plans are designed to increase student opportunity to show mastery of content through multiple means.

When it has been determined that a student can benefit from academic accommodations such as extended time, visual aids, enrichment, or a modified workload, Student Support Services works with teachers to implement these plans. Additionally, it provides remedial and enrichment opportunities for students K-12. This can take the form of co-teaching in the general classroom, meeting individually or in small groups with students or mentoring students after school.  

8-Measuring Progress:

 How will we know Legacy Learning Center and the system are high performing? The framework for monitoring our progress toward achieving this plan’s goals includes four elements that rely on multiple sources of data. Student outcomes are the ultimate measure of success and correlate to our equity indicators.
Leadership is the foundation for driving toward those goals at the system, school, and classroom levels through capacity building and how we change adult practice. Perceptions of students, families, staff, and partners, and implementation data indicate how effectively we are implementing strategies, how our stakeholders experience the changes and impact in culture and practice, and ultimately, how we are in fact leading for learning.

Why do we need this building?

The main two reasons to build a school in the area are as follow:
 To accommodate the needs of our community who’s educational needs go beyond mastering academics standards only and fall in between accommodating a special attention to mastering the English language, the American culture, and thus fully be able to immerse themselves in the society as full-fledged citizens of the United States.

Such needs can be summarized below:

Assess needs
Empathize
Foster a sense of belonging
Provide opportunities for Success
Value bilingualism
Encourage the family’s involvement
Foster an appreciation of cultural diversity    

 Legacy Learning Center’s beautification of the neighborhood:

This project goes hand in hand with the John Boner Neighborhood Centers. The John Boner Neighborhood Centers are partnered with the Riley Area Development Corporation. The Legacy Learning Center’s Board has been working very closely with the Director of Neighborhood Engagement CoraLyn Turentine and with the Deputy Director at Riley Area Development Corporation Emily Scott. Ms. CoraLyn Turentine, the John H. Boner Center’s Director of Neighborhood Engagement, is leading efforts on some educational initiatives on the Near East Side. Both have visited the school and have asserted that they were very excited by how comprehensive the school is in providing education for all levels and interests. They also mentioned that as the Legacy Learning Center moves forward with state accreditation it was beneficial to keep in mind that LLC falls in a federally designated Promise Zone.

How many students are expected?

 In 2016-2017 school years, up to 110 students are expected to be enrolled in Legacy Learning Center in grades Pre-K-12.

How many students per class?

 Each class has between 8-12 students.

How many staff are expected?

 Total of 23 staff expected to be employed in 2016-2017 school year. All administrators, teachers and volunteers are expected to teach 1-5 classes per day.

Who are the key administrators?

The Legacy Learning Center has committed Executive Board, Strategic Planning Board, Academic Board, and a Finance Manager and employs a payroll company.

The Executive Board oversees the overall operational and educational well-being of the school.

The Strategic Planning Board lays out the strategic plan for the school.

The Legacy Learning Center Academic Board (LLCAB) oversees Legacy Learning Center’s academic and curricular state as per IDOE and SBOE regulations.

The Payroll Company “PAYCHEX" oversees the day-to-day and overall monetary state of the school.

The Meredith Bovin State Data Reporting Services:

 Is contracted by Legacy Learning Center to oversee every state mandated reports of the Legacy Learning Center. The MB Reporting Services submits school related reports to the IDOE on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis. Meredith Bovin is a distinguished former IDOE data analyst who was employed by the IDOE for 6 years.

The School of Fish for academic mentoring:
 Is employed by Legacy Learning Center to help train, educate, and help LLC teachers to become more efficient educators. Debbie Fish, the founder of School of Fish, is former employee of Central Indiana Educational Service Center with 30+ years of experience in the field of education. She had previously served as a school principal, academic advisor for the Indiana Department of Education, and academic mentor of excellence at the Central Indiana Educational Service Center. Debbie Fish also serves as an advisor in our Legacy Learning Center Academic Board.

Legacy Learning Center is also a member of INPEA:

 (Indiana Non-Public Education Association). The INPEA executive director, Mr. John Elcesser, has served as our advisor between January 2015 and May 2015. With his advice and guidance as well as his support, Legacy Learning Center was able to set up and equip the school with the necessary furniture and logistic support with other Catholic and private parochial schools such as Lake View Christian School and its principal Dr. Doug Ballinger. To this day, both Dr. Elcesser and Dr. Ballinger remain LLC advisors.

Legacy Learning Center’s Administration:

Sheikh Tewfik Choukri, Dean:
 The Dean of Legacy lead school wide efforts to build and maintain a strong, positive, achievement-oriented school culture where teachers, students, parents grow in a warm and joyful environment. The Dean is responsible for the oversight and management of all Legacy activities.

Mirzohid Mamasidikov, School Adviser: 
 for the overall vision and management of the school in the academic initiatives and programs related to the school that will lead to student achievement. He also help in the development of all instructional staff and coach a portfolio of teachers.

Hocin Debah , Office Administrator:
 To Performs administrative duties for executive management.

 Mona Hussein, Academic Curriculum Administrator:
 Academic Administrator work to ensure that every student reaches ambitious achievement goals for school wide levels of mastery.

 Saleha Ansari Assistant Principal & School Test Coordinator:
 Assistant Principal to correspond with the IDOE and coordinate the administration of all statewide assessments, including preparation, before and follow up after testing windows.

Huma Soomro, School counselor:
 Provide valuable assistance to students regardless of whether they work in an elementary school or middle school, high school or beyond.

What are the hours that the school will be operating?
 Legacy Learning Center’s operational hours are: 8:45:00 am to 5:00 pm.

Are there before or after-school programs?

 The after-school “extracurricular” activities start after 4:15. Such activities include:
Math Bowl (10 students), Spell Bowl (12 students), Vex Robotics (5 students) Science Fair (24 students) Foreign Language (Arabic) (40 students) Indiana Public School Title-1 program for immigrant English learners (13 students ) Boys Scout and Girls Scout (20 students) Soccer Program (30 students) Reading and Literacy Program (10 students) IUPUI Math Mentoring Program (5 students).

Academic competition:

1. Indiana Academic Spell Bowl
2. Science fair
3. Academic World Quest 2016
4. Indiana Academic Decathlon
5. Math Bowl
6. NHD (National History Day)
7. ICTM Math Competition
8. Future City
9. Siemens Competition
10. The DuPont Challenge Science Essay Competition
11. Toshiba/NSTA ExploraVision Science Completion
12. Arabic Spell Bowl
13. Arabic/ Islamic study competition (in School).

Field trips:

 Can be an excellent way to enliven the curriculum, provide hands-on field experience, spread culture, and strengthen a school’s community by providing enjoyable, inter-personal learning experiences. What’s especially important for Legacy Learning Center, though, is that field trips allow our students to learn more about the wider, non-Muslim community surrounding them. With this in mind, Legacy students have taken field trips to the following sites:

1. Children Museum
2. Apple orchard
3. Zoo
4. Fire Fighter Museum
5. Fire hall field trip
6. Central Library
7. Corner Perrier
8. State Museum
9. Challenger Learning Center
10. Bizz Town
11. Fair Oak Farm
12. Eco Lab, Marian University
13. Holiday Park/Eagle creek Park
14. State house
15. Marengo Cave
16. Family Field Trips
* Skating
* Incredible
* Great Times
* Amusement park
17. UNIVERSITY Field Trip
* IUPUI
* Purdue
* IU Bloomington
* University of Chicago
* University of Notre Dame
* Butler

Legacy Learning Center partnership with Purdue Extension Programs:

Legacy Learning Center is proud to introduce 4-H Purdue extension youth development program for our students. Purdue 4-H programs prepare youth to be leaders in their community and around the world through hands-on experiences alongside their peers and caring mentors. Students will have the opportunity to learn more about a subject matter through completing hands on activities. 4-H offers varieties of projects to suite the interest of Legacy youth. Each project has a beginner, intermediate, and advanced level-this allows youth to build on their knowledge each year and continue to challenge their skills.

Legacy Learning Center has a partnership with the Indiana Association of School Principals:

Per partnership, Legacy Learning Center students in all grades will have the opportunity to compete against the other schools in the city, state, and the nation in subject areas such as Math and Science.

Story time by Spades Library:

Story time programs introduce young children to books, rhymes and other fun activities. Every month spade’s librarian comes to the Legacy Learning Center to share the story time program with Pre-K students and Kindergartners. Library story times incorporate the early literacy skills, such as vocabulary building, phonological awareness, and letter knowledge that children must master before they can learn to read.

Marion County Public Library Downtown visit:

 Every Month students from pre-K and Kinder grader go to the Central library downtown for various programs which includes reading, learning activities, and games

How do students get to the school?

 The students are dropped off by their parents in the morning 10-15 minutes prior to the morning assembly which starts at 8:50 am.

Where do people park?
 Legacy staff and employees park in the designated parking spot across from the school. Parents will come from the school entrance and come around the valet area and drops off/pick up the students.

How does the drop-off system work?
 The students are dropped-off by the school valet area and the parents drive around and go to the school’s entrance/exit.

How many grades are currently offered?
 Legacy Learning Center is designed to offer education to students in Pre-K-12. Currently, the Legacy is serving students in Pre-K-11 grades.

Where do the kids have recess?
There are two areas where the Legacy students have recess/P.E. activities:
The school gym is where the students go for recess. The school gym area is equipped with one carpeted area which is used for athletic activities and another with “vinyl flooring” which is used for 3 x 3 soccer, dodge ball, and other athletic activities for students in Pre-K-9 grades. The adjacent Indy Parks soccer field is also used for outdoor physical activities. The students are transported there and back in the school bus. In the field, the school holds its soccer and physical activities on every other day basis.

 How many entrances does the school have and how does the school monitor people coming in and out?
The Legacy Learning Center has one main entrance gate to the building, parking lot, and the valet area. Inside the building, there are 4 emergency exit doors and one main entrance double-door. The front desk monitors any people coming in and out of the building with the sign-in sheet for visitors or guests. The Legacy building is equipped with 16 security cameras that monitor the school building inside and outside at all times live and recording in DVR.

 Where do kids go during emergency or fire?
Please refer to the Legacy Learning Center emergence action plan for further details. The LLC conducts quarterly fire drills and tornado drills twice a year.

Goals:

Goals achieved:

  • Legacy Learning Center has received the school zoning variance certificate from the city county of Indianapolis.
  • Legacy Learning School is accredited by the Indiana State Board of Education.
  • Legacy Learning School is eligible for the state Free Reduced Lunch and the voucher program. 
  • New textbooks and revamped curriculum for all grades.
  • Professional training opportunities regularly offered to teachers.
  • Updated building set to meet stringent fire and health codes.
  • School bus for Student transportation and educational field trip
  • Students have partaken in and won multiple contests and scholarships.
  • New college counseling program for all high school students.
  • High school now includes four full years (9-12).
  • New, commercial quality student playground.
  • Full-time Daycare.
  • School Gym (Indoor Soccer Field, Ping Pong Table, Badminton)  
  • More professional end-of-year graduation ceremony.
  • Enhanced janitorial services.
  • School Cafeteria
  • Weekly teacher meetings have helped to create a more unified, stable atmosphere.
  • Updated technology, including laptops for the staff, multiple computer projectors, large flat-screen display at the entrance and in the school cafeteria, and a brand new video surveillance system for student protection.
  • Science Lab.
  • Attractive landscaping for front of school building.
  • Enhanced entryway to add to school’s visual appeal.
  • Improved Arabic language program (Honors)
  • Complete ESL (English as a Second Language) and ENL (English as a New Language) programs 
  • SAT Prep classes in Math and English
  • Rigorous Honors and AP courses starting 9th grade (Online)

Goals in Progress:

  • International Baccalaureate
  • The International Baccalaureate is a non-profit educational foundation whose programs develop the intellectual, personal, emotional, and social skills to live, learn and work in a rapidly globalizing world

    Legacy is working toward the Diploma Program (DP) which is for grades 11-12. The program provides a rigorous curriculum for the students and prepare them well for their futures.