Paris ISD superintendent explains his startling STAAR letter
A couple of days ago, I posted about Paul Jones, the superintendent of Paris ISD and the remarkably blunt letter he sent to parents about the upcoming release of STAAR data. It’s fair to say that Jones has little use for the current Texas school accountability system. Here’s a representative nugget from the letter:
“These assessments do not reflect the quality of teaching or learning in our classrooms. Instead, they reflect a punitive; one size fits all test-driven system. Our students are much more than a once-a-year pencil and bubble sheet test. Your child means immeasurably more than just a number generated in Austin. There is no test that can assess all of what makes each child unique. The state mandated assessments are used by the state to score and rank our campuses and our district, however, this is not the only assessment we use for Paris ISD students. We have higher standards. Your child’s achievements must be measured by a multitude of accomplishments throughout the year.”
The letter was posted to the district website early Friday evening. By Saturday, it was a thing bouncing around the Internet. And on Monday, Jones said, he came in to the office to find emails from as far away as Thailand. I think it’s fair to say that Jones was a little naive as to the power of social media in 2014: He said he was shocked that anybody outside Paris noticed, much less that he’d become an instant hero for the ranks of the testing pushback movement.
He’s received about 75 emails from teachers, parents and other education professionals. Subject lines include a lot of “thank yous” and “wish I could work for yous.”
Before giving Jones the floor, some context: Paris ISD is a district that has been testing challenged. It’s managed not to dip below the minimum acceptable ratings on the state accountability radar. But its students pass most of the STAAR tests at rates below the state average. While its graduation rate is high, significantly more of its graduates emerged with a minimum plan diploma than the state average. It’s not likely that the release of this year’s STAAR data scheduled for this week will change that record.
So Jones’ letter could be viewed as a combination of “sour grapes” and the sort of pep talk a coach gives a team that’s just taken a bad loss: You worked hard, you can be proud of what you accomplished. I asked Jones about that. Where did that letter come from?
He said he’s not assuming bad news.
“We’re going to celebrate if we knock the roof off, but we know that’s not what it’s all about,” he said.
He’d been thinking about sending a letter out for about a week. On Friday, with the release of the new scores looming large, he decided to write his thoughts down. Initially, he sent it to his principals so they could put it into their weekly newsletters. And then the district tech guy put it on the home page.
Like so many superintendents I’ve talked to in the past couple of years, Jones says he’s in favor of accountability. But the current system, he says, is overly punitive and puts too little emphasis on growth. A student who starts the year a year behind and makes more than a year of progress is a success story, Jones said. But that student still won’t pass the STAAR.
“If we had a test that measures student growth, we’d probably be above the state average,” he said.
Maybe so, though the ability of STAAR (or any standardized test) to measure growth with any precision is a matter of some controversy amongst education professionals.
Jones is not the only superintendent to take a shot at the state system recently. Hudson ISD’s Mary Ann Whiteker sent out a “new vision update” last month that included this:
The results should be considered benchmarks, not the end-all to learning for the year. These exams do not reflect the quality of teaching or learning in our classrooms. Our students are more than one test. Their achievements must be determined by a multitude of accomplishments throughout the year, celebrating academic growth as well as mastery of skills, co-curricular and extra-curricular accolades, experiencing new opportunities/challenges.
But Whiteker has been public and vocal about the state system for a while. Not so, Jones. Before coming to Paris in March 2013, he’d been in tiny Saltillo ISD for 17 years. And unlike Paris ISD, Saltillo Paris ISD superintendent explains his startling STAAR letter | Dallas Morning News: