The Policy Team of VASCD is committed to elevating teaching and deepening learning through advocacy work as well as strong relationships with legislators and policymakers. VASCD consistently advances a policy agenda that elevates the education profession and prioritizes the well-being and success of students. Within this broader context, VASCD identifies focus areas that represent specific concerns within our areas of expertise. This year we have six priorities.

Our six policy priorities are:

• Unified Purpose and Clear Standards: Virginia's law and policy makers must clearly define the purpose of education to guide important decisions.
• Aligned System of Accountability: The system to which schools are held accountability must have coherence and alignment between the purpose, the standards, and the assessments.
• Modernizing Virginia's Assessment System: Virginia's student assessment system must support and align with today's student learning goals.
• Outstanding Educators for Virginia's Students: We must elevate the profession and champion autonomy with integrity from policy to the practitioner.
• Personalized Learning Opportunities for Educators: Educators must have relevant, competency-based professional learning opportunities.
• Guidance for Use of AI in Education: All of Virginia's stakeholders must have recommendations for implementation and appropriate guardrails for use of AI in classrooms.

The upcoming General Assembly session will include action on a new biennium budget. THIS LETTER was submitted to Secretary Guidera, Superintendent Coons, members of the VBOE, the Assistant Secretary of Education, and the Department of Planning and Budget Director.

The results for SOL tests and Chronic Absenteeism were release on September 7. The links below are helpful.

• Press Release
• Presser with Governor, Secretary, and State Superintendent (starts at 20 minutes)
• School Quality Profiles

On September 13, the Virginia Board of Education met for its Executive and Work sessions. On September 14, VBOE met for its Business Meeting. Below are relevant links, highlights from both meetings, and relevant time stamps for video playback. As a pro tip, we recommend changing the playback speed to 1.5x or 1.75x.

Click HERE for the Agenda Page.

WORK SESSION (YouTube Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnLAFvV4F0I, starts at 4:11.50)

• Virginia Literacy Act - Screening Measure Update. [Video timing 4:47.53-5:16.05]
• Update on HB 585 (Assessment) Work Group. [Video timing 5:26.32-5:52.50]
• ALL in VA Launch. [Video timing 5:52.52-7:01.57]

BUSINESS MEETING (YouTube Video: )

• Math Textbook Adoption Process. [Video timing 53:18-1:09.01]
• Accountability [Video timing 1:25.05- 4:47.20; lunch break from 2:46.59-3:44.33]; although lengthy, we recommend watching as much of this as possible

Our Executive Director provided the below written comments in advance of the meeting.

During today’s business meeting, there are several agenda items up for First and Final review. Of particular interest to VASCD are the agenda items for the Accountability System in Virginia. We urge the board to honor the process of accepting for First Review this month and Final Review next month to allow adequate time for the public to provide input, feedback, and a response to these agenda items. Our organization values collaboration, input from diverse perspectives and roles, and appropriate time for thoughtful reflection and dialogue. Accepting a topic as important as accountability for first and final review without adequate public input limits the quality of the final product and erodes the decision-making process.

We have previously submitted our considerations for accountability systems position brief and stand by those recommendations. Our organization feels strongly that a summative rating, particularly an A-F model and even a 5-star model, would be detrimental to public education for many reasons. Instead, we recommend a system that reports out a rating for each indicator to give a more precise and transparent description of how each school is performing and to indicate with specificity where the resources should flow.

VASCD urges you to accept the agenda items for First review only and defer to a future meeting for Final review.

Thank you.