Tennessee fares well
on school accountability measures, earning points for assisting and sanctioning all lowperforming schools.
Not exact matches
And especially in this moment when we really care a lot about
accountability in
schools, there has been an increasing emphasis
on finding
measures — like a student's standardized test scores — to tell us if a teacher is a good teacher.
«Do you support
measures that increase
accountability, transparency and that increase the input of
school district parents in the decision to permit and maintain charter
schools, as well as
measures to reduce the negative fiscal impact
on school districts with large numbers of charters?»
Now, those leaders are beginning to craft their legislative priorities, which will include eliminating the state's cap
on charter
schools, increasing funding for established charters, and establishing more
accountability measures for district
schools and teachers.
Cuomo's campaign spokesperson, Abbey Fashouer, counters that he «has made education equity a central focus of his tenure, investing a record $ 27 billion with a focus
on our neediest
schools, while demanding
accountability measures so that the door to opportunity is open for every child — regardless of income, zip code or ethnicity.
In the remaining nine months of 2014, pro-charter groups focused more
on strengthening
accountability measures for teachers and pushing the state and city to take immediate action to fix failing
schools.
Bloomberg has just three years left
on his mayoral term, and the focus is expected to stay
on items such as boosting charter
schools and working toward
accountability measures.
The
measures used in the NEPC report — whether
schools make AYP, state
accountability system ratings, the percentage of students that score proficient
on state tests, and high -
school graduation rates — are at best rough proxies for the quality of education provided by any
school.
These lessons focus primarily
on the transparency of the systems, but this is just one of several principles that states should attend to (which I have offered previously):
Accountability systems should actually
measure school effectiveness, not just test scores.
On top of the 60 per cent pass rate for GCSEs, Morgan explained the new «Progress 8»
accountability measure for secondary
school's, which is designed to show a child's progress from primary to secondary education.
Partly in response to federal
accountability measures ~ curriculum in many
schools particularly those serving predominantly disadvantaged students has narrowed to focus
on reading and math at the expense of the arts ~ physical education ~ civics and other subjects.
Accountability systems should
measure and reflect this broader vision of learning by using a framework of indicators for
school success centered
on academic outcomes, opportunity to learn, and engagement and support.
Rather than expounding the pains and injustices and prescribing a «sensitivity» reform, however, let's examine various
schools and curricula
on the standard
accountability measure.
The Sunshine State had instituted
school voucher programs, increased the number of charter
schools, and devised a sophisticated
accountability system that evaluates
schools on the basis of their progress as
measured by the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT).
In his new book, Professor Dan Koretz looks at how test - based
accountability has become an end in itself in American education, unmoored from clear thinking
on what should be
measured in
school, harming students and corrupting the ideals of teaching.
• There was a widespread, well - justified concern that prior
accountability measures based primarily
on achievement levels (proficiency rates) unfairly penalized
schools serving more disadvantaged students and failed to reward
schools for strong test score growth.
Perhaps there are some «wrong» answers (such as relying exclusively
on proficiency rates in reading and math to judge
school quality, or
measuring school spending and other inputs and calling it
accountability) but mostly there are a whole bunch of right and partially - right answers, depending
on policymakers» goals and states» idiosyncrasies.
One of only 16 states to reward high - performing or improving
schools, South Carolina also fares well
on measures of
school accountability.
Another study, by Eric Hanushek and Margaret Raymond, both also at Stanford, evaluated the impact of
school -
accountability policies
on state - level NAEP math and reading achievement
measured by the difference between the performance of a state's 8th graders and that of 4th graders in the same state four years earlier.
In contrast, Polikoff's public comment
on draft ESSA
accountability rules drew heavily
on a large empirical literature as it argued against a federal mandate for states to use proficiency rates as
measures of
school performance.
Schools should be permitted to use multiple, locally created assessments instead of «one shot» tests to
measure student progress for
accountability purposes, according to a report released last week by a panel of experts convened by the Forum on Educational Accountability, a group that includes some of the most vocal critics of the 5 - year - old No Child Le
accountability purposes, according to a report released last week by a panel of experts convened by the Forum
on Educational
Accountability, a group that includes some of the most vocal critics of the 5 - year - old No Child Le
Accountability, a group that includes some of the most vocal critics of the 5 - year - old No Child Left Behind Act.
Rather than providing students skills that have real currency in today's labor market and preparing them for gainful employment,
accountability provisions in the federal No Child Left Behind Act and Race to the Top funding program have focused
on increasing short - term gains that
measure success or failure of
schools.
Of the elementary and middle
schools the survey respondents rated, 14 percent received a grade of «A,» 41 percent received a «B» grade, while 36 percent received a «C.» Seven percent were given a «D» and 2 percent an «F.» These subjective ratings were compared with data
on actual
school quality as
measured by the percentage of students in each
school who achieved «proficiency» in math and reading
on states»
accountability exams during the 2007 - 08
school year.
The good news is that, in large part because of NCLB and the
accountability measures that federal law has encouraged at all levels of
school reform — not to mention the dogged efforts of Diane Ravitch and Sol Stern to keep Bloomberg and Klein
on their toes — these arguments are smarter and more refined — and, yes, despite public relations — more transparent.
Too many states try to include too many
measures into their
accountability system, and then none of the individual
measures are really important or really guide
schools on what their learning outcomes need to be.
Longtime Chicago mayor Richard M. Daley had won control over the
school system in 1995 and generally received accolades for rising scores
on state tests; hard - charging superintendents, including Paul Vallas and Arne Duncan; tough
accountability measures such as reduced social promotion; and a slew of new
schools and shiny buildings.
As a result, trying to assess if a
school is «good» or «bad» relies
on a complex web of preferences and objective
measures that, quite frankly, can not be taken into account in a centralized
accountability system.
The exclusion of creative subjects from the EBacc remit; subject silos; out - dated subject orthodoxies; teacher shortages and financial and academic pressures
on schools weighed down by
accountability measures are creating a perfect storm in which students will be those affected in the short term and society in the long term.
As we continue to study choice - based policies in K — 12 education, one challenge we must confront is the push - pull created by high - stakes
accountability measures designed to assess
schools, students, and educators, based solely
on test scores — an area where choice proponents and opponents often find common ground.
It would make matters more difficult because the most important flaw of the No Child Left Behind
accountability system is its reliance
on the level of student achievement at a single point in time as a
measure of
school performance.
States could also create entirely separate
accountability systems for alternative
schools, weighting existing
measures differently (e.g. placing less emphasis
on proficiency and placing more emphasis
on academic growth) and using different indicators, such as high
school completion rates instead of cohort graduation rates.
The aim of Progress 8 is to replace the percentage of pupils gaining five good GCSEs as the headline
measure of
school accountability, instead judging
schools on «value added» through the duration of a pupils time there.
Standards - based reform was fed by three factors: increased expectations for learning beyond high
school, which led to a focus
on college readiness for all; the availability of reliable and cheap
measures of student proficiency in reading and math; and the push for teacher and
school accountability.
The study says: ``...
schools were more likely to be renewed if they had a higher [SPS](a state - determined
school accountability measure based
on test score levels), higher
school value - added, or a higher NACSA rating (emphasis added).»
Current time - and age - based
accountability measures have a stronghold
on schools, even those trying to break away from the factory model of education.
We bury them in committees, schedules, supervision, volunteer programs, data analysis, before -
school and after -
school meetings, materials, activities and evening events, training, special programs — and sprinkle a little goal - setting, demands, testing,
accountability, evaluations, and relentlessly high expectations for change and improvement
on top for good
measure.
Within a state's
accountability plan, «substantial weight» would have to be given to quantitative
measures, such as graduation rates and performance
on state tests, with much less weight allotted to subjective
measures, such as
school climate and educator engagement.
Reblogged this
on Afield in Iowa and commented: A great article
on School Choice and «
accountability»
measures.
The Council of Chief State
School Officers has worked with several partners over the past few years
on recommendations for those CCR
measures best suited for state
accountability systems.
Some civil rights advocates have voiced similar concerns about
accountability systems that rely exclusively
on growth
measures, which could allow
schools serving disadvantaged students to avoid sanction even if their students» academic progress is insufficient to close achievement gaps.
For almost two decades,
school accountability has focused
on creating clear content standards for what students should know and when they should know it, testing to
measure their mastery of those standards, and applying consequences and rewards to those responsible for the success of students in meeting the standards.
He viewed the Louisiana results as commentary
on accountability as much as
on vouchers, hypothesizing that it could have been the increased regulations and
accountability measures, which affected both public
schools and private
schools receiving voucher students, that led to performance gains.
Some
measures in the bill, such as new transparency requirements
on finances and contracting, represent healthy new
accountability bringing charters in line with district public
schools.
Base any
accountability system designed to
measure school and / or state performance
on multiple
measures of student growth and learning.
Almost every state is now instituting
accountability systems to
measure progress in standards - based reform, and almost every such system depends heavily
on testing as an indicator of student or
school performance.
Among them are a focus within preschool programs
on teaching pre-academic skills; the conceptualization of the role of the adults who provide center - based care as that of a teacher; a bias towards delivering pre-K services through
school districts; a press towards common standards and curriculum across pre-K providers;
accountability regimens that are tied to children's performance
on measures that correlate with later
school success; disproportionate spending
on four - year - olds as opposed to younger children; and marginalization of the family's responsibility.
California's new
Accountability and Continuous Improvement System helps educators and the public to see how districts and
schools are performing
on test scores, graduation rates, and other
measures of student success.
We
measured actual
school quality as the percentage of students in a
school who achieved «proficiency» in math and reading
on the state's
accountability exams (taking the average proficiency rate across the two subjects).
In Michigan, for instance, the new chief state
school officer recently replaced the test - focused
accountability system with a new grading system that relies
on a broader set of
measures of
school quality, including family involvement, the quality of professional development, attendance, and dropout rates, among others.
To examine the correspondence of citizen perceptions of
school quality and
measures of test - score growth, we turn to our representative sample of residents of Florida, where the state
accountability system evaluates
schools based
on both test - score levels and test - score growth.