Wisconsin’s new school grading index: ‘a dog’s breakfast of numbers’
Wisconsin cows
Another day, another state comes up with another cockamamie way to grade schools for “accountability” purposes. In this post Gene V. Glass, Regents’ Professor Emeritus at Arizona State University and senior researcher at the University of Colorado-Boulder’s National Education Policy Center, looks at the very large problems with Wisconsin’s new Overall Accountability Index meant to grade public schools. (Read it to see why it is being accompanied by a picture of cows.)
By Gene V. Glass
To receive a waiver of No Child Left Behind sanctions, the State of Wisconsin took steps this year to bolster its accountability provisions by creating a complex system for grading public schools. Its new Overall Accountability Index (OAI) is supposed to reveal to the public
Why MCPS Seven Keys to College Readiness should be tossed
Montgomery County Public Schools in Maryland is one of the most successful districts in the country. On its website you will find a page listing the Seven Keys to College Readiness, which are said to be a pathway for students to follow that will increase their chances of being ready for and successful in college. Here is a piece questioning whether the keys are a reasonable path for students to aspire to follow. It was written by David Bernstein, a nonprofit executive who lives in Gaithersburg, Md., and has two sons, ages 7 and 15. He haspreviously written about how even great schools fail students with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
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