A-F Report Card – Blue Cereal Education

The Oklahoma State Department of Education recently released its infamous “A-F Grade Report” for districts across the state. Why?
Let’s look at their own A-F Frequently Asked Questions page, shall we?

Note three things about this, keeping in mind the OKSDE chose the question, wrote the answer, and put it first on their own FAQ:

1. The A-F system is designed so parents and others can get a quick & easy idea how schools are doing. If you know anything about public education at all, you know that how we’re doing is anything but easy to measure. Half the time we can’t even agree about exactly what we should be doing. But the whole purpose of A-F, according to this, is to more conveniently label HOW SCHOOLS ARE DOING – minus context, nuance, causes, solutions, etc. This is repeated throughout the FAQ. Parents or community members could, of course, quickly and easily determine how local schools are doing by visiting and asking how it’s going, and what they could do to contribute – but that would be expecting someone outside the school itself to do something other than offer criticisms and blanket condemnations from afar.

2. The report card is a measurement “for challenging students and communities to strengthen the effectiveness and performance of public schools”. What does that mean, exactly? More importantly, now that we’ve done this a few times, what signs are there that each year with the A-F report cards come out, students rise up and communities mobilize to begin “strengthening” their schools? Does the SDE have even anecdotal evidence suggesting anything positive happens as a result of these press releases? If not, then by its own defintion the process is a failure and we can stop. If, on the other hand, students and communities are having montage moments over school effectiveness, then we should see very few schools on the ‘F’ list twice, yes?

3. The primary indication of success is standardized test scores. That’s a world of issues in and of itself.

Let’s look at another question from the FAQ:

Wow. Where to begin?

4. Of course there’s a loss of funding. The state keeps cutting education budgets across the board. The only distinction is that they cut funding for all schools, not merely those labeled ‘D’ or ‘F’. This is the opposite of what a teacher – even a mediocre teacher – does with a student who’s trying, but not finding success. Imagine me bragging to a parent or administrator that although a specific child is in grade trouble, I’m not reducing the time and energy I spend trying to help her! Well – I am, but I’m reducing the time and energy I spend helping every other kid also, so let’s just pin on that Excellence Through Equity medal now!

5. If kids don’t hit those nebulous testing targets, we send in the REAL experts – the folks at the SDE – to educate the teachers. Of course the SDE has held the key to student success all along, but they’ve been keeping it super top secret to give those poor struggling teachers a chance to try it THEIR stupid way. Do we have any stats on the impact of this visit from the SDE on student test scores the FOLLOWING year? I mean, if the problem is that the teachers need some “spurring,” and the SDE’s done come and “spurred” them, scores should soar, yes?

6. Can you tell the ‘spur’ thing bugs me? You spur a horse that’s not trying very hard or moving very fast. You spur a horse because horses are too stupid to know which way they’re supposed to go on their own. You dig your metal into its flank and keep your bit in its mouth so it will remain compliant – an extension of your own purposes. Spurring suggests schools and teachers get F’s because they’re just not trying very hard. They’re meandering, munching some grass, peeing a long time – just standing there until the SDE comes to do some spurrin’. Giddy-up go, Ms. Hernandez – giddy-up, go! Because you know what grade a horse really wants? A neighhhhh…

7. Choose any “low-performing school” near you. Give them a call and ask what the OKSDE has done to “support” them lately – or the state for that matter. Teachers are expected to address problem areas, find solutions, build success; all state leadership seems willing to do in practice is label and publish. Useless.

8. Grants to the good schools? I’d never heard of this one before. How adorable – it’s the White Man’s Burden, Education Edition. We’re going to further reward upper-middle-class-two-parent-family schools for explaining to the high-poverty-broken-world schools what they’re doing so badly! “Have you tried getting your kids to be less… poor? Are you familiar with the need for more ‘grit’?”

9. May I see the numbers on increased parent and community involvement based on low scores on this “report card”? Can I get in on this “conversation”? Dr. Barresi echoes this talking point in the Tulsa World when asked about the mass of research demonstrating the “grades” with which she bludgeons schools are not merely pointless, but demonstrably harmful and deceptive:

“The grade card may be cursed, it may be praised, but it sure is causing conversation in the state of Oklahoma,” Barresi said.

Adrian Peterson should try this approach: “Well, my disciplinary techniques may be cursed, or they may be praised, but they’re sure… (*patronizing chuckle*) causing conversation.”]

After this FAQ, the next item provided to explain the whole A-F system is this letter from the OKSDE’s own “Executive Director of Accountability.” He proceeds to contradict pretty much everything explained in the FAQ.

I’ll excerpt the essentials:

…we must ensure that the A-F system is both understandable and interpreted appropriately. Therefore, it is important to have a clear idea of what it is — and isn’t — intended to measure.
The A-F Report Card is:
* An indicator of the percentage of students, regardless of background, within a school who are currently meeting or exceeding grade-level academic standards.
* An indicator of the percentage of students (particularly the lower performing students) who are at least making significant progress toward meeting grade-level academic standards.
* An indicator of whether schools are exceeding expectations in terms of school attendance, high school graduation, etc…
The A-F Report Card is not:
* A measure of the “school” or “teacher” effect on student learning.
* A statement about a school’s overall quality of services provided.

10. I love his concern that we make A B C D & F somehow “understandable” and “interpreted appropriately.” The reason you choose to format something in terms of commonly recognized symbols and terms is because everyone recognizes those symbols and terms. Divide your class into reading groups christened Eagles, Sharks, Otters, and Turtles, and no one has to guess which group is the slow one. If the OKSDE were worried people might think that A B C D & F means what it obviously and always means, perhaps they could have chosen other terms.

11. Suddenly now this whole A-F thing is about measuring students – are students meeting expectations? Are students making progress? According to the rest of the OKSDE, the only part students have in this whole thing is when they rise up with the community to strengthen… something or other. But according to Dr. Tamborski and his fancy title, it’s all about the students. The only thing schools are directly responsible for is making sure every kid on their roster gets up and to school every day. I assume this involves setting their alarms, maybe pouring them a bowl of Fruit Loops, that kind of thing – stuff it makes complete sense to hold schools exclusively accountable for. Not this other stuff.

12. Lest we continue in our ridiculous delusions, we are explicitly corrected – WITH QUOTIE ACCENTS – not to view these A-F Report Cards as a measure of the “school” or “teacher”. Seriously – why is “school” in “quotation marks”? I’m not “sure” for what “purpose” they’re being “used” here. In any case, I’m confused. If these report cards don’t allow “parents and community members” to “quickly and easily determine how local schools are doing,” what exactly will the students, parents, and communities be rising up to encourage excellence and performance OF?

13. The A-F card is not a measure of “teacher” effect on student learning? This part I can actually believe, since there’s a whole slew of other mechanisms in place to blame teachers for every kid they so much as see in the hallway, for the rest of their lives. Unfortunately he didn’t tell THE ENTIRE REST OF THE OKSDE, the media, the state legislature, or the state. They think it is.

14. These Report Cards are not a statment regarding a school’s quality? Seriously, do these people not even talk to one another? The building isn’t that big.

Perhaps the third and final link for public consumption can act as a sort of “tie-breaker” between the OKSDE and the OKSDE. It’s not a FAQ or a letter, but something called a Quick Reference Guide. Perfect! I can use it to quickly reference what the hell they’re talking about.

1969? What did one use to update web pages in 1969 – a hammer & chisel?

Well, OKSDE, if and when you get back from Woodstock or whatever, please consider reposting that reference guide. I can’t wait to see which side of your conflicting explanations it agrees with. In the meantime, I know I’m feeling much better about the accuracy and consistency of these A-F grades you’ve published now that I’ve seen the care and clarity you bring to explaining what they are and what they aren’t.

Related Post: Assessments & Grades – Why?

The State of Oklahoma, like many others, is determined to assign numbers and letters to the schools and teachers within its purview. Like the standardized testing of students on which many of these numbers and letters are based, the conviction seems to be that if you just keep pretending to measure things in ridiculously oversimplified ways designed to guarantee widespread failure, you’re “reforming” the system and calling forth a brighter future for all. This is analogous to – actually, never mind the analogy. It’s just stupid.

For those of you who are not teacher-types, there are two basic types of assessment. Formative Assessment is primarily intended to ascertain student understanding or accomplishment. Do they understand the material? Can they demonstrate the skills you’ve deemed important? Are they making an effort to plow through whatever you’ve assigned in your efforts to help them ‘get it’?

We’re all familiar with tests and quizzes, but Formative Assessment can be made through discussions, artsy-fartsy projects, tickets-out-the-door, etc. In some cases the grade is the grade, and in others students are expected to redo, relearn, retry, etc. Either way, the goal is to figure out what’s going well and what’s not, and to adjust, or to identify what students do or don’t get, and decide what you – and they – can maybe do about that. The “grades” handed out by the State of Oklahoma make little claim of such goals, and our legislature clearly has no intention of adjusting or contributing in any way. So… THAT’s not the purpose of these statewide ‘report cards’.

Why do students fail? Some kids are doing the best they can, and just don’t get it. They are mostly present and involved, but just aren’t there yet. Our job is to figure out how to help them. Far more fail simply from not doing what they could or should be doing – in other words, by choice or something that looks a great deal like choice. We don’t write them off, or use this as an excuse not to try different approaches, but solutions begin with identifying sources of problems – not with the scores assigned after the fact.

The State of Oklahoma and the OKSDE have shown a determined lack of interest in the underlying sources of low achievement. It would actually be a huge step forward if they merely covered their ears and ran about yelling ‘NANANANA ICANTHEARYOU NANANANA ICANTHEARYOU!’ Even in the classroom, the oversimplification of A B C D F hinders recognition that no two kids excel, survive, or fail in the same way, or for the same reasons. Whatever the root of shortcomings, our question is the same – what can we as teachers, as teams, as districts, do differently so more kids DO succeed? Even when many factors are undeniably out of our control – home life, background, socio-economics, DNA, etc. – any ethical educator asks themselves what they COULD try… what they COULD do.

Which, as I may have mentioned, the state has shown absolutely no interest in considering.

Summative Assessment is the other category. It’s the ‘BIG TEST’ at the end of a unit or a semester. These attempt to document what students “walk away with” in knowledge and skills. The data can identify strengths and weaknesses of individual teachers so we can help each other improve, or help compare classes from year to year. For students it’s generally the finish line, for better or worse – here’s how you did, now off with thee.

What type of assessment you choose depends on your purpose. That sounds rather obvious, but it’s easy to fall into doing stuff mostly because that’s just… how it’s done. But grades should have a purpose. Otherwise, why bother?

Each semester, 18 weeks of a student’s experience in a given class – their effort, their understanding, their organization, their attitude, their ability – is summarized by a single number between 0 – 100, which in turn translates to one of 5 letters. This is, of course, inane. But it’s been how we’ve been doing things for so long it’s rather entrenched. That number and letter could mean so many different things they’re essentially useless as formative assessment. They’re only real functions are as carrots, sticks, or labels.

Most teachers still give these numbers and letters – they’re pretty much required – but we tweak them based on a variety of formal and informal assessments of our own. We tell students their grades, but we spend far more time talking them through more specific, potentially useful feedback about what they seem to be doing well and what they might try instead if they’re not. In other words, while we still retain the trappings of an outmoded grading model, we do our best within structure to more fully discern and more effectively assist.

The A-F Report Card given by the State of Oklahoma to its public schools each year does none of the things assessment is supposed to do. It provides no support, and intentionally limits the data it is willing to consider. There are no adjustments on the part of the state based on how well a given school is doing, and no conversation regarding options for improvement. It’s not even measuring most of the things we claim are most valuable to us. It is merely calculated and published, and each year more and more schools are sent to sit in the corner with their ‘dunce’ caps on.

If the goal isn’t to help struggling schools, and there’s no state interest served merely by comparing apple schools to the orange, what exactly is the purpose? Is the OKSDE going to call our parents and ask for a meeting? Are our state legislators going to suggest we be tested for meds or glasses? Best case scenario, what are we hoping happens as a result?

I suppose they could be onto some cutting edge pedagogy I’ve overlooked. Perhaps if I just keep posting my kids grades in the main hallway outside the front office, I’ll be the highest standards most teachingest educator ever! I won’t even lesson plan or teach anymore, and when kids ask for help, I’ll explain I have so many obligations and just can’t spare the time or resources unless it’s to give them more tests to post.

A teacher who just kept failing more and more kids while providing less and less assistance or supplies would be condemned as completely useless and unethical. A state that just keeps failing more and more schools while providing less and less is the same – but moreso.

Related Post: #OKSDE & The A-F School Report Card

Related Post: He Tests… He Scores!