School Accountability Ratings
In Texas, school accountability ratings have just been released. As a result of COVID-19, schools have not been assigned ratings in 2 years. A scroll through twitter and Facebook shows images of marquees celebrating “The highest Algebra 1 scores in the Region” or improvements from a C rating to a B. One image really stuck out to me of an entire library of teachers on their first day back holding up paper signs of the letter B. The post from the Principal was one of celebration of her amazing team that helped the school improve their rating.
It’s heartwarming to see campus leaders celebrating the efforts of their teams, progress of their students as defined by the state of Texas. There is no doubt how hard these educators and leaders have worked to positively impact student achievement. I would never want to take away from the commitment and dedication of educators across our state as they celebrate these ratings.
But, I can't help but pause for a moment and wonder about the messages we send our staff and students about what we value around success and what is worthy of celebration with the release of these accountability ratings. I worry with the introduction of ratings again that we will miss the stories of students as we chase the almighty scores. I worry staff will be asked to focus on the fuzzy formulas around these ratings and lose sight of their ultimate purpose. I worry, in an effort to keep the scores up and continue this single definition of success, staff will resort to rewarding compliance and confuse test preparation with real world learning.
Bottom line, I fear the single measure of success for students and staff will be their ability to perform year after year on the “test.” What if school marquees celebrated the service of their students to their community, the successful competition of students' internships or practicum experiences, or even invites to student exhibitions as they showcase their learning in unique ways? Where are the measures of student and staff engagement, excitement, and fulfillment? I want to surround myself with leaders who are on a mission to find ways to increase these things and make them just as important as the test score. After all, letter grades and numbers are artifacts of the educational system from hundreds of years ago that we have made absolutes. There are other ways to measure the effectiveness of schools and educators, especially in light of the changing world around us.
If I’m honest, the release of accountability ratings made me a little sad for the innovators and dreamers, for those who are on a mission to reimagine and reinvent, to unlearn and relearn the purpose of school after the past few years. I wonder if our issues with teacher recruitment and retention are wrapped up in the overvaluing of these ratings and scores. Can you imagine how it sounds? “Come join our team! Your success will be measured by scores and ratings we barely understand. Oh and follow this script. It worked for students last year.”
You know what’s interesting, we have not seen a whole lot of public education celebrations over the past two years, yet when the state accountability ratings come out, we are now inundated with this prescribed success from the state. So is the implication that the courageous acts of students, teachers, and leaders as they fought to continue to educate through a pandemic not worthy of celebration? Were there no stories of school, student, and staff success worthy enough to celebrate? Let’s rise up leaders and write OUR narrative of school success and stop allowing the state to write it for us alone!
My hope is that the leaders of public education today are vulnerable enough to admit that we value all measures of student growth and achievement as hard as this may be in a culture where there is immense pressure around the ratings and scores. My hope is that these same leaders will lead their teams in redefining what achievement looks like for staff and students, even when legislators continue to paint a one sided and superficial view of school success. I am ready to rally around leaders who are ready to reimagine the schools of tomorrow.