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OSD Plan B and
ESSA Accountability Plan Update
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General Assembly in Recess
The Georgia General Assembly has been in recess this week while appropriations committees met to consider the AFY 1017 (education begins on p. 106) and FY 2018 (education begins on p. 161) state budgets.
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ESSA Rewrite Continues -- Review UGA CCRPI Study and ESSA Feedback Summaries
The debate regarding the metrics for which Georgia schools should be held accountable and what interventions are appropriate should schools fail to meet benchmarks is more prescient considering the ongoing rewrite of Georgia's school accountability plan, the
College and Career Ready Performance Index (CCRPI).
The GaDOE recently released several important documents with which educators should be familiar: One is a
study of CCRPI and how it compares to other states' school accountability plans. The UGA study found that Georgia's flawed accountability plan is comparatively harsh.
- The data collected for the CCRPI does not accurately represent school quality and cannot be used to compare schools.
- The data collected for the CCRPI includes too many indicators and should be simplified to make it more understandable.
- Minimize the importance of student standardized testing as a summative, punitive measure. Instead, use data as a formative measure, to inform instruction.
- Local leaders should have the ability to make decisions on the assessments offered and used to make decisions.
- The current accountability system is not accurate, is difficult for parents and others to understand and the measures and scores do not necessarily correlate to what people are seeing at school.
- The current accountability index has too many indicators and should be simplified to make more sense.
- The current accountability index does not capture school growth and improvement well enough and the Georgia Department of education should design new measures of true student growth to use for accountability.
- The current accountability index should include more measures of school culture.
- While growth is important, integrate other factors in the system to get a more holistic view of performance.
- Stakeholders believe that multiple measures should be used to determine a school's success or failure. We need more than one definition of success and failure.
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What CCRPI Changes Are Necessary & How Do We Advocate for those Improvements?
After acknowledging that previous school improvement models led to mixed student outcomes, Congress gave states the flexibility to develop their own models through ESSA. It is critical that Georgia identify which schools need more intense assistance and intervention. Unlike other states, Georgia's accountability model weighs student proficiency on standardized tests more than upward test progress in elementary, middle, and high school grades. Other states weigh upward progress more in elementary and middle grades. Much of the confusion and complexity of Georgia's accountability model results from all indicators being crammed into a 100 point scale. Other states (Louisiana 0-150 and Florida 800-1000) have a scaled scoring system. High-performing states use a scaled scoring system with a non-letter grade designation system.
As part of its ESSA accountability rewrite, PAGE believes that Georgia should move away from a compressed 100 point scale and to an accountability system that it easier for parents, educators, and taxpayers to understand. This new model should more heavily rate student growth in the early and middle grades. Any interventions adopted as part of the ESSA rewrite or as part of legislative adoption of an OSD Plan B should be part of comprehensive review of what local factors are barriers to student achievement.
PAGE recommends that education stakeholders continue to advocate for improvements to Georgia's accountability plan by contacting both GaDOE and the House and Senate Education Committee Chairs.
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Join PAGE as well as the Georgia Association of Educational Leaders and the Georgia Association of Colleges for Teacher Education at the Capitol on Tuesday, Feb. 21. Breakfast and lunch are provided free of charge.
Hear from leaders in education such as Buster Evans, the new executive director at the Teacher Retirement System of Georgia, Claire Suggs with the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute, and more! The full agenda will be announced soon.
Click here to register today.
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PAGE's core business is to provide professional learning for educators that will enhance professional competence and confidence, build leadership qualities and lead to higher academic achievement for students, while providing the best in membership, legislative and legal services and support |
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