A large percentage of state and federal budgets are devoted to public education and, thus, the education of the future of this state and nation. When there’s that much money involved, accountability is important to reassure the taxpayers that they’re getting a good return on investment.
For more than 20 years now, mostly all of public school accountability has been tied to standardized testing. This is the law of the land. This was really just getting started when I was finishing school.
From the beginning of the school accountability push in the early 2000s and continuing into now, an individual familiar with how accountability numbers are calculated and grades assigned could pretty much look at zip codes and, with a little study, give you a pretty accurate prediction of what that community’s school accountability would look like.
In general, the model is built to ensure there are always winners and losers regardless of what ever progress may or may not be made. This is an economic development and equity nightmare. This “one size fits all” accountability makes no sense in a country like ours with so much diversity to be celebrated. Every community has different needs and to believe that one monstrous and confusing model could accurately measure success, or lack thereof, is simply out of touch.
It’s my contention that levels of proficiency and indicators of readiness for success at the next level and in the workforce should always be a part of accountability. However, I also contend that local communities should be able to develop and include specific indicators that may be unique or important to those individual communities. After all, the mission schools should be to prepare the next generation of community leaders and workforce.
Just before Christmas in 2021, the U.S. Department of Education released guidance saying states, and the schools within them, must restart their accountability models this school year (2021-2022). The guidance used a frequently asked questions (viewed here: https://oese.ed.gov/files/2021/12/DRAFT-Accountability-FAQ-12.15.pdf) approach to communicate the federal rules for school accountability in 2022. You’re welcome to take all the time you like to read it, but it’s about as boring as you’d imagine. Here’s a summary (https://www.nciea.org/blog/accountability/charting-course-school-accoun…), if you’d rather go that direction.
I think if you take the time to read all that, you’ll agree with me that a new look at accountability is needed, and I’d contend again that it needs to be community-minded and student-oriented. In other words, we need to help cultivate a love for learning in students that helps drive communities forward now and in the future.
Here are some additional thoughts. ESSA, the federal law overseeing education in the U.S., requires each state’s accountability system to include several specific indicators. 49 out of 50 states use “growth” as one of the indicators in the model. In Mississippi, “growth” counts more heavily in accountability than proficiency. By definition, “growth” requires at least one prior score. The few states with essentially full test participation (e.g., greater than 90%) in 2020-2021 should be able to calculate student growth assuming nearly full participation on the 2021-2022 test as well, but for the majority of states, it will be challenging to calculate growth validly for all schools and districts because of missing data.
To me, this begs the question of why? Why are we using bad data? Just because? Why not use this opportunity to do something awesome for students, and in the process, what’s right for communities?
What would it look like if we took this opportunity with the current model destroyed by the pandemic to shift focus, to include more aspects that are important to communities, parents and teachers ... and especially students? After all, students are the reason we’re here.
What if learning goals could be more individualized and tied to interests? What if communities came together and constructed a portrait of a graduate (read more here: https://www.battelleforkids.org/how-we-help/portrait-of-a-graduate). Then schools worked with parents, the community and students to mold and equip students to fit that “portrait” complete with the knowledge and skills necessary to head into whatever is next for them?
I think the time is now to move beyond looking simply at performance in ELA and math and measuring that by a kid’s performance on one day out of the 180 days they attend. Let’s let students work on passion projects to show what they have mastered. Let’s focus on strengths and weaknesses and care as much about what students CAN do and are passionate about as we do about what they have yet to master and still need to work on. Let’s let students write and reflect on the world they live in.
It’s my contention that academics and non-academics can be meshed to yield high performing schools that do what they’re designed to do, prepare the next generation.
We can do this! The time is right!
Tyler Hansford is the superintendent of schools for the Union Public School District. He can be reached at hansfordt@unionyellowjackets.org.
