School improvement is a structured process that identifies underperforming schools and implements evidence-based changes to raise student achievement. Under federal education law, every state must evaluate school performance, flag schools that fall below certain thresholds, and direct resources toward helping those schools get better. The process touches everything from how teachers deliver instruction to how a school spends its budget, and it follows a defined cycle of assessment, planning, action, and review.
How Schools Get Identified for Improvement
The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), the main federal law governing K-12 education, requires states to sort schools into support categories based on performance data. States look at test scores, graduation rates, and other indicators they choose, then flag schools that need help. There are three main designations.
Comprehensive Support and Improvement (CSI) applies to the lowest-performing 5% of schools that receive Title I funding (federal dollars directed to schools with high percentages of students from low-income families). Schools with graduation rates below 67% also land in this category. CSI is the most intensive tier: these schools need broad, systemic change.
Targeted Support and Improvement (TSI) identifies schools where specific student groups are consistently underperforming. A school’s overall numbers might look fine, but if one subgroup, such as students with disabilities, English learners, or a particular racial group, is falling behind year after year, the school gets flagged. States identify TSI schools annually, and they have flexibility in how they weight different performance indicators.
Additional Targeted Support and Improvement (ATSI) is a more serious version of TSI. A school earns this label when its underperforming subgroup is doing so poorly that the group’s performance alone would place the school in the bottom 5% statewide, using the same methodology as CSI identification. ATSI schools face more accountability requirements than TSI schools and may need to adopt more aggressive interventions.
The Continuous Improvement Cycle
School improvement is not a one-time fix. It follows a continuous cycle that schools repeat each year, refining their approach as they learn what works. Most states organize this into five phases.
Needs analysis comes first. School staff, often working alongside district leaders, conduct a comprehensive needs assessment. They examine student performance data, school climate surveys, teacher effectiveness measures, and how well previous strategies actually worked. The goal is to identify specific problems, not just symptoms. A school might notice low math scores, but the root cause could be inconsistent curriculum, high teacher turnover in the math department, or students arriving without foundational skills from earlier grades. This deeper investigation is called root cause analysis, and it shapes everything that follows.
Selection is the phase where schools choose interventions that match their identified needs. If a school wants to keep using a strategy from the previous year, it needs data showing that strategy is working. For new interventions, the school must demonstrate the approach is likely to be effective in its specific context. Federal law requires that improvement strategies be backed by research evidence, which brings its own set of standards (more on that below).
Planning turns the selected interventions into a concrete action plan. Schools typically choose two to three strategies per goal and map out exactly how they will carry them out over the year. This includes setting interim benchmarks so progress can be measured along the way, not just at the end of the school year. Planning generally wraps up before the school year begins so that implementation can start on day one.
Implementation is where the strategies go live. Teachers adopt new instructional practices, schedules may shift, professional development programs launch, or new support staff are brought in. Schools track formative data throughout this phase and can adjust their approach if something is not producing results.
Analysis closes the loop. Schools evaluate whether the strategies moved the needle on the problems they identified. The findings feed directly back into the next round of needs analysis, and the cycle starts again.
What Counts as Evidence-Based
ESSA does not let schools try just anything with federal improvement dollars. Interventions must meet one of four tiers of evidence, a framework developed to ensure that strategies have research behind them. The Institute of Education Sciences evaluates interventions based on five factors: study design, results, findings from related studies, sample size and setting, and how closely the students in the research match the students in the school considering the intervention.
Tier 1 (strong evidence) and Tier 2 (moderate evidence) require well-designed experimental or quasi-experimental studies showing positive results with adequate sample sizes in settings relevant to the school. Tier 3 (promising evidence) covers studies that show positive effects but may fall short on sample size or the match between the study population and the school’s students. Tier 4 (demonstrates a rationale) is the most flexible: it allows newer or innovative approaches as long as they are grounded in a clear logic model built on rigorous research, and there is already a plan in place to study whether the program actually works.
In practice, this tiered system means schools with the most severe needs, those in CSI, are generally expected to use higher-tier evidence. Schools in TSI categories may have more room to try Tier 3 or Tier 4 interventions, depending on state policy.
How Improvement Work Gets Funded
The primary federal funding stream for school improvement is Section 1003 of Title I. States receive these dollars from the federal government and distribute them to districts with identified schools. The money supports the interventions, coaching, and professional development that improvement plans call for.
Funding is competitive in many states. Districts submit applications describing their identified schools, the strategies they plan to use, and how the money will be spent. Grants often prioritize schools in CSI or ATSI categories, though TSI schools may also be eligible depending on the state’s approach. Application timelines and award amounts vary by state and year.
Beyond Section 1003, districts can also direct portions of their regular Title I allocations, state funding, and other federal grants toward improvement work. Some states offer their own improvement grants or provide in-kind support such as coaching networks, leadership development programs, or partnerships with external organizations that specialize in school turnaround.
What Improvement Looks Like in Practice
On the ground, school improvement can take many forms depending on what the needs assessment reveals. Common strategies include restructuring the school schedule to create more instructional time in core subjects, implementing new curriculum aligned to state standards, and providing intensive tutoring or small-group instruction for students who are furthest behind.
Leadership changes are another frequent lever. Research consistently links school performance to principal effectiveness, so improvement plans often include leadership coaching, mentoring for assistant principals, or in some cases replacing school administrators. Teacher professional development is almost always part of the plan, but effective improvement efforts move beyond one-off workshops toward sustained coaching where instructional specialists observe classrooms and give teachers regular, specific feedback.
Schools may also address non-academic barriers. If attendance data shows chronic absenteeism is a root cause of low performance, the improvement plan might fund attendance counselors, family outreach programs, or partnerships with community organizations that can help with transportation, health care, or housing stability.
Timelines and Accountability
Schools identified for CSI typically have three to four years to show meaningful improvement before facing more serious consequences. If a school does not exit CSI status within that window, the state must take additional action, which can range from requiring a new improvement plan to more dramatic interventions like restructuring staff or converting the school to a different governance model.
TSI and ATSI schools also face timelines, though they vary by state. An ATSI school that does not improve may be reclassified as CSI, which brings stricter requirements and more state oversight.
States publish school identification lists, usually annually, so parents and community members can see which schools are in improvement status. Report cards with performance data for every school are available on state education department websites, giving families transparency into how their school is performing overall and for specific student groups.
Who Is Involved
School improvement is not something that happens to a school from the outside. While state education agencies set the framework and provide oversight, the actual planning and execution happen at the school and district level. Principals lead the work, teachers participate in selecting and carrying out strategies, and district staff provide coordination and resources.
Parents and community members also play a role. Federal law requires that stakeholders, including families, be involved in developing improvement plans. In practice, this might mean parent surveys during the needs assessment, community input sessions when choosing strategies, or parent representation on a school improvement team. The depth of engagement varies widely, but the expectation is that improvement planning is collaborative rather than top-down.