accountability

Teacher Effectiveness and Reciprocal Accountability

Submitted by Gamal Sherif on Wed, 03/10/2010 - 10:31pm.

According to an article in the Washington Post (Mar 2, 2010), President Barack Obama has condoned the mass firing of teachers at Central Falls High School, one of RI's poorest high schools:

"If a school continues to fail its students year after year after year, if it doesn't show signs of improvement, then there's got to be a sense of accountability," he said. "And that's what happened in Rhode Island last week at a chronically troubled school, when just 7 percent of 11th-graders passed state math tests -- 7 percent." 

-Barack Obama

Of course such low scores on the state's math tests are sad.  However, before we conclude that the teachers are accountable for such low scores, we should consider the issue of reciprocal accountability. 

Specifically, we can ask what kinds of supports were in place to make sure that teachers could be effective.  If teachers are going to be accountable for student achievement, then teachers can require that schools, LEAs and state education departments provide the context for student achievement.*  Within schools, reciprocal accountability can mean many things.  Most importantly, teachers need to have the time to co-plan and influence school-wide policies.  I wonder if Central Falls had any reciprocal accountability in place?

Questions to consider with regard to reciprocal accountability:

  • Professional development (PD):  Are teachers involved in creating and facilitating their own PD?  Teachers are in a perfect position to align district priorities with the interests and needs of their students.  Why not create working groups in which teachers run PD alongside school and district administrators?
  • School Climate: Are teachers examining the research on school climate and then developing policy that matches their school's needs?
  • Assessment:  Arguably sub-set of PD, teachers could be looking at a variety of assessments that help them know how students are growing academically - - - and socially.  Everything from state-level standardized tests, district-mandated tests, formal and informal assessment, portfolios, rubrics and project-based learning should be up for discussion.  Each of these has a profound impact on how teachers organize their curricula and how students experience their learning. 

By providing time for teachers to reflect and co-plan,  schools and districts will be providing one aspect of reciprocal accountability.  What does reciprocal accountability look like to you?

 * Up next: considering society's reciprocal accountability to teachers.

Raising the Bar or Building Thier Own Course

Photo by Andy Gray

A former state superintendent will be coming to my Politics of Education class next week. I feel like I have gotten to know her well enough to know that she will ask more than one tough question. I think I know one she will ask.

Virginia was a leader early in the standards based education reform movement. It’s infrastructure for developing and administering effective accountability measures is strong. Currently our third grade reading pass rate is hovering in the 80% range through out the state. The advanced pass rate, students who answered more than 31 out of 35 questions correctly, has been steadily increasing since 2005 from 18.8% to 38.9% in 2008.

I can just hear it now. Dr. Demary will ask us, “So, almost everybody is passing. Isn’t it a good time to raise the bar?”

Every fiber of my teacher being wants to say no, but all of my learning in educational leadership says yes. I am torn. I believe in high standards but, I am not convinced that raising the bar is the best way to get teachers, and more importantly kids, to jump higher.

I think the reason for this internal struggle is that I am not sure that the bar is worth jumping over. It is not what we should be teaching kids to do to prepare them for their future. I think we need them to build their own obstacle courses, not just master hoop jumping. As it stands now, on reading tests kids are asked to identify characters, setting, conflict, etc. They are required to read for comprehension, all worthy goals. We are not asking them to write their own stories, to tell the story where they are the main character. It is as if they are the actors in someone else’s play.

If we buy into the post-modern perspective, that there is no single over arching story, then the reasons for assessment change a little. Our nation is a teaming tangle of stories. Maybe this is why fame has become such a fascination for our young people. The goal is not to help move the plot of the greater human story along but to be famous enough to be featured in the individual stories of the nation.

So what would I do? If it were my decision I would start evaluating beyond basic skills in areas closer to 21st century skills. Maybe it is a voluntary assessment for an additional ribbon on a degree. Maybe it is the certification movement pushed down into high school. Maybe a kid runs track, is in the debate club and earns a social media certification in order to make himself more competitive in college.

When Dr. Demary, (one of my education heroes) asks what do we do now that most of our students are passing the SOL tests, this is what I will say. “When students in your class pass a test you have prepared them for you don’t give them the same test but raise the number of correct answers needed to pass. You teach new content, you expand on their solid foundation evidenced by their test scores. You start teaching them something new, something that might be even more important than what they mastered already, like critical thinking, creativity, and team work. There is only one problem though, it is hard to test those kinds of skills. Maybe the tests have outlived their usefulness? Maybe the kids could help build their own obstacle course to test their learning.”
Image: http://www.japanwindow.com/images/20051012002715_051008_undoukai_041.jpg

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