Education is an investment in our children's future, our community's future, and our world's future. Coeur d'Alene Public Schools is committed to investing in educational excellence and leveraging all available personal and financial resources to make an impactful difference in our children's current and future lives. 

Our 2023-28 Strategic Plan sets forth a purposeful mission and vision for the district and measurable priorities in four areas - all focused on meeting our community's achievement goals. 

Mission: We ensure students become lifelong learners - empowered by their knowledge and skills to be responsible citizens.

Vision: Through the work of our students and faculty, we will be recognized as a high-achieving district of choice in Idaho and the Northwest.

Our mission is clear: to ensure every student becomes a lifelong learner, empowered with the knowledge and skills to thrive as responsible citizens. To achieve this, we invest in the systems and supports that elevate both teaching and learning across our district. Here’s how we’re bringing our strategic goals to life:

Instructional Framework: Our shared instructional framework provides clarity and coherence across classrooms. It defines what high-quality teaching looks like and supports educators in refining their craft. This common language helps us align our efforts and grow together.

Professional Learning Communities (PLCs): We believe in the power of collaboration. Our Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) are the heartbeat of continuous improvement, where educators come together to ask the right questions, analyze student learning, and take collective responsibility for the results. This shared commitment ensures that every student receives what they need to succeed.

High-Reliability Schools (HRS): Through Marzano’s HRS framework, we are building schools that are not only effective but dependable. Our goal is for every school to achieve Level 3 certification by 2028, ensuring a guaranteed and viable curriculum is in place for all students. This process is more than a badge—it’s a promise of excellence, backed by evidence and reflection.

Strong Intervention Practices: We are strengthening our Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS) to ensure timely, targeted interventions for students who need them most. Whether academic or behavioral, our interventions are rooted in data and delivered with care.

Each of these investments is a thread in the fabric of our strategic plan. Together, they create a system where every student is known, supported, and challenged.

Student Subgroup Success: Some student subgroups struggle to meet growth targets (Native American, Alaska Native, chronically absent students). Our efforts this year will focus on helping these students succeed.

Student Transition Support: Through strong connections, readiness programs, and collaborative planning with families, we will ensure smooth and supportive transitions for students from early learning through high school.

Highlighting Our Work: We will continue to develop and strengthen community partnerships by sharing relevant and engaging stories and providing information in a transparent and thoughtful way.

Strengthen Interventions: When students struggle or are ready to accelerate, we will identify and implement strategies to support their learning, provide impactful interventions, and share successes with each other.

High-impact Instruction: Every school will strive for High Reliability Level 2 certification ensuring effective teaching in every classroom. We will support our Instructional Framework with quality professional learning for every faculty member.

Our 2023–2028 Strategic Plan is a bold commitment to educational excellence, grounded in four key focus areas: student success, high-performing teams, family and community engagement, and operational effectiveness. At its heart is our mission to ensure students become lifelong learners and responsible citizens, empowered by knowledge and skills to be responsible citizens. With a clear vision to be a high-achieving district of choice in Idaho and the Northwest, the plan emphasizes continuous improvement, shared leadership, and a deep investment in people and resources to ensure every student succeeds.

To achieve these goals, we are aligning all our schools with the High Reliability Schools framework, developed by educational researcher Dr. Robert Marzano. This framework is built around the same philosophy that guides high reliability organizations such as the military, hospitals, and air traffic control systems. These organizations are too important to fail, so they establish specific review processes to ensure that they work at an optimal level.

There are five levels of the HRS framework which are aligned to our strategic plan goals:

Level 1: Safe and Collaborative Culture

Level 2: Effective Teaching in Every Classroom

Level 3: Guaranteed and Viable Curriculum

Level 4: Standards-Referenced Reporting

Level 5: Competency-Based Education

The process of achieving HRS certification involves each school closely examining its strengths and areas for growth against established criteria and providing a portfolio for external evaluation. Even when certification is achieved, leaders continually identify areas we need to grow and verify our strengths are still effective.

We are very proud that all our schools have achieved Level 1 HRS certification. Our goal now is for all schools to achieve Levels 2 and 3 by 2028 to ensure safe, collaborative cultures, effective teaching in every classroom, and guaranteed and viable curriculum across the district.