MetWest High School Story (Part 4)
Big Picture Learning schools have as part of their design “Authentic Assessment.” It means that “[s]tudents are assessed not by tests, but by public displays of learning that track growth and progress in the student’s area of interest. Assessment criteria are individualized to the student and the real world standards of a project. Students present multiple exhibitions each year and discuss their learning growth with staff, parents, peers, and mentors.”
At MetWest, “authentic assessment” is the Senior Thesis Project and the end-of-the-year Exhibition. I sat in one student-driven Senior Thesis Project Defense. Here I what I observed in March 2019.
As in other Big Picture schools, all MetWest 12th graders must do a Senior Thesis Project (STP). [i]
Seniors present their projects to a group of teacher/advisors, administrators, and staff who judge the worth of the presentation and determine whether student has passed or not. Each Defense has to include an action project linked to their research and anchored in social justice. Each student gets three chances to pass. Most often the STP is anchored in the student’s Learning Through Internship (LTI). Passing the STP prepares seniors for their final Exhibition, usually on the same subject, before an audience of students, teachers, family, and invited guests.
Each STP has a format in which the student prepares his or her slides to the jury of teachers. Each project has to have a question, a way of answering the question, the theory behind an answer, gathering evidence, analysis of data presented, and a conclusion. It is a format familiar in college and graduate work. MetWest CONTINUE READING: MetWest High School Story (Part 4) | Larry Cuban on School Reform and Classroom Practice