Serving 2,400 students in central Michigan, Big Rapids Public Schools has built a strong culture of collaboration around its multi-tiered system of supports (MTSS). After using Panorama to support student interventions and data-driven decision-making, district leaders expanded their work with Solara, Panorama's AI platform.
When Michigan's new literacy requirements prompted the district to redesign its elementary curriculum, Big Rapids Public Schools used Solara to build a new K-5 scope and sequence, streamline intervention planning, and give educators more time to focus on students.
Challenges
- New state literacy laws required Big Rapids Public Schools to redesign its K-5 literacy scope and sequence and align instruction with evidence-based reading interventions before the start of the new school year.
- Educators were spending significant time creating curriculum resources, intervention materials, and planning documents from scratch, leaving less time to support students.
- Title teachers were responsible for creating Individual Reading Improvement Plans (IRIPs) for as many as 100 students in a single grade, requiring the district to temporarily reassign Title math teachers to help complete the workload before state deadlines.
Solution
Results
- Big Rapids built a state-compliant K-5 literacy scope and sequence in a single day instead of spending the entire summer building it manually.
- The district created an IRIP tool that eliminated weeks of documentation work, allowing Title teachers to spend more time delivering interventions and supporting students.
- Teachers optimized time-consuming work with Solara, using it to create Lexile-adjusted text sets, generate standards-aligned science resources, and develop data-informed seating charts.
- By combining district curriculum, student data, and state guidelines in one platform, Big Rapids transformed Solara into a districtwide resource for curriculum development, intervention planning, and instructional decision-making.
Challenges
As Big Rapids strengthened its MTSS implementation, educators found themselves spending significant time creating and sourcing resources. Teachers managed curriculum documents, intervention materials, and planning tools across multiple buildings, often using their own spreadsheets or notes.
"We were creating all of these things from scratch," said Elizabeth Robinson, MTSS Coordinator. "Most of our time was just spent creating something and not even using it yet, because it just took a long time to input data or create a structure."
The challenge became even greater as Michigan's new literacy requirements prompted the district to reevaluate its elementary literacy curriculum. Big Rapids needed to identify instructional gaps, incorporate a new phonics curriculum, and redesign its K-5 scope and sequence—all before the new school year.
At the same time, the district faced another significant challenge: creating Individual Reading Improvement Plans (IRIPs) for students requiring reading intervention. In some elementary grades, as many as 100 students qualified for IRIPs. The workload was so substantial that Big Rapids sometimes reassigned Title math teachers to help write reading plans in order to meet state deadlines.
District leaders needed a faster way to organize curriculum, generate documentation, and personalize instruction without adding to teachers' workloads.
Solution
Big Rapids had already established Panorama as a key part of its MTSS framework, using the platform to identify students needing additional support and create consistent systems for intervention planning. When Panorama introduced Solara, district leaders saw an opportunity to build on that foundation by combining AI with the district's curriculum, resources, and student data.
The district evaluated Solara through its MTSS decision-making process and involved educators across the district before moving forward. “We looked at Solara, and it was a winner,” Robinson said. “There was really no other option that could do the things that we needed it to do and still be linked to all of our student data."
Big Rapids partnered with the Panorama team to create tools that integrated district curriculum and instructional resources. When the district adopted UFLI Foundations to strengthen foundational literacy instruction, Solara helped educators map the new materials alongside their existing curriculum, identify where new lessons were needed, and generate a complete K-5 scope and sequence aligned to district goals.
District leaders appreciated that Solara was purpose-built for education. Unlike generic AI tools, Solara keeps educators focused on instructional work and student outcomes. “What I like about Solara is that it will say, ‘That's not an educational question. I can't answer that.’ It's an accountability measure. It allows us to keep using our critical thinking skills and be intentional with how much we're using AI," Robinson said.
Those guardrails gave educators confidence to expand Solara into new use cases, from differentiated instruction and intervention planning to science lessons and classroom organization. For Samantha Lipscomb, a high school science teacher, that meant using AI to handle the time-consuming groundwork while she remained responsible for instructional decisions.
"I always joke and say that Solara is my clerical assistant," Lipscomb said. "It gives me that data right away, and then I can make my decisions from there."
Results
Built an elementary literacy framework in one day
To meet Michigan's new literacy requirements, Big Rapids used Solara to build a complete K-5 scope and sequence and pacing guides before the start of the school year.
“We were able to take the Public Act and plug it in [to Solara] to create resources that we know the state of Michigan would approve,” Robinson explained. “Then we could plug in the UFLI curriculum and have Solara fill in the holes to make us an entire curriculum for next year.”
To prevent teachers from spending their summer rebuilding the curriculum, Robinson and MTSS Director Jaime Knape completed the work themselves in Solara in a single day. When asked how long the project would have taken without Solara, Robinson's answer was immediate: "The entire summer."
Saved weeks of work creating IRIPs
Using Solara, Big Rapids transformed one of its most time-intensive literacy workflows. Big Rapids developed an IRIP tool that generates draft reading plans using student assessment data, allowing educators to review and refine plans rather than writing each one from scratch.
The process now saves Title teachers weeks of work during one of the busiest times of the school year.
Instead of racing to complete paperwork before parent conferences, Title teachers can now focus on providing interventions and supporting students.
Expanded Solara into everyday teaching
Once educators saw what Solara could do, they began applying it to challenges across the district.
Lipscomb uses Solara to streamline lesson planning while keeping her own expertise at the center. For one earth science unit, she input notes from her textbook and information from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to generate standards-aligned text sets tailored to her students’ Lexile levels.
"It's been really helpful because finding good texts that then can be adjusted based on Lexile level is invaluable," Lipscomb said. “What I really like about Solara is that I can attach a class and say, 'How can I address this particular text with this group of students based on NWEA MAP scores?'”
Lipscomb has also used Solara to generate unit-by-unit laboratory activities that fit within a 60-minute class period, helping her incorporate more hands-on learning while staying aligned to her curriculum.
At the start of the school year, she even used attendance, behavior, and academic data already in Solara to create classroom seating charts tailored to her students' needs. "The first time I did it, I did not have to change the seating chart for weeks," Lipscomb said. "It was a total lifesaver."
What began as a solution for one literacy initiative has become part of how Big Rapids approaches problem-solving across the district. "We have thrown absolutely everything at it," Robinson said. "Now if we have an idea, we wonder how Solara can make this easier for us."
