Privately funded CT RISE program raises a number of key issues in public education
Source: NHPS (New Haven Public Schools) Advocates
Complete report The CT RISE program interacts with a number of key issues in public education, including: how we define, quantify, and measure student learning; teacher autonomy; teacher morale; student data privacy; and the role of philanthropists and other external and private interests in our public schools.
This report takes CT RISE as a concrete and revealing case study. NHPS (New Haven Public Schools) Advocates are volunteers, who do not have access to all the potentially relevant information and have not undertaken exhaustive research. Accordingly, this report is “preliminary” in that it summarizes emerging findings, based on the available information. It does not supply a comprehensive overview, but is aimed at contributing to ongoing discussion.
The CT RISE program—currently being piloted at high schools in New Haven (Career), Meriden, Hartford, and East Hartford—is under consideration for expansion in NHPS. The core of the CT RISE program is a “data dashboard” that collates data such as grades, test scores, attendance data,course credits, and behaviors. The program provides a number of potential benefits, including streamlined access to student data and added supports for students and teachers. NHPS Advocates also note concerns in the following areas:
1. Instruction : There is no compelling evidence that the CT RISE program improves student learning. At the same time, its dashboard may bring unintended consequences, such as distracting from teaching and learning, prioritizing engagement with data profiles rather than human connections, steering teachers’ attention toward discrete data points and away from holistic development, and focusing excessive energieson narrow and/or standardized metrics.
2. Governance : Though it provides data in a useful collated format, the CT RISE dashboard essentially duplicates existing NHPS services. The RISE program also operates without oversight structures thatincorporate key participants, such as CONTINUE READING: Privately funded CT RISE program raises a number of key issues in public education - Jonathan Kantrowitz
