What's a successful school?

• Should the state intervene in poorest-performing schools?
• Should the state “grade” schools A-F (or rank them 1-7)?
• What’s more important: Students passing test benchmarks, or students showing great academic growth?

Dear members,

The State Board of Education and the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction want your opinion on how to identify successful K-12 public schools.

For example, would you view these two schools as equally successful?

• A school with a lot of students passing tests.
• A school where a lot of students are progressing faster than average (regardless of how they do on tests).

The survey contains several questions about what you value in your public schools. The final selection of values will lead to a better tool for evaluating school performance.

Please take a minute to share your thoughts on this important issue. The survey will be open until February 15. The results of the survey will be available on the State Board of Education website by March 12.

What’s this about?

This survey is a vital part of Washington’s efforts to revise the Achievement Index. The Achievement Index, introduced in 2009, is a valuable tool in recognizing high-performing schools.

With the state’s federal waiver from the requirements of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, the Index will evolve to be an important part of a statewide K-12 school accountability system.

Additional Resources

• A video explanation of student growth vs. proficiency (YouTube)
• An overview of the Washington Achievement Awards (link)

Please, share this survey with fellow PTA members. You can forward this link: Measuring School Performance Survey, this entire blog post, or Tweet the following:

 

• What do you value in Washington’s schools? http://ow.ly/h4Dbu
• Help the State Board develop a new tool for evaluating schools – survey - http://ow.ly/h4Dbu

Help the state make informed choices.