Reports from Monday’s meeting of The Select Committee on Public School Accountability held in San Antonio seemed to indicate Texas would be moving to join Tennessee, North Carolina, Delaware, Arkansas and Florida in using growth models as a way to evaluate student progress.  Several school districts presented and discussed growth models at the meeting.

Harvey Kornberg's Quorum Report posted an article titled “Texas Moves Toward the Use of Student Growth Models in School Ratings”  which reported on the meeting and stated the following:

But the winds in education policy do change. Right now, the Texas Education Agency, and even the federal government, is supporting the creation of models that measure student progress rather than simple proficiency. Now in its pilot stage, statewide growth models are expected to be a permanent refinement to the No Child Left Behind Act if that measure ever gets to reauthorization.

And lawmakers yesterday were able to assemble a full panel of school districts – as small as Kerrville and as large as Houston – to discuss various growth model plans.

“It’s exciting to know that this quality of work is being done across the state,” Shapiro told the panel at the end of its discussion. “We’ve got districts of different sizes and from across the states looking at this… I’ve wanted to look at this for many years.”

And so growth models likely will happen. That moves the discussion to one of division of labor and responsibility: what roles will the state play in such a model and what latitude will local districts be given? It also begs the question, still, as to how this new aspect of the accountability system will mesh with federal standards.

Senator Ratliff was there to testify on behalf of Raise Your Hand Texas (RYHT).  the Ex-Senator's and RYHT's position on accountability, is made clear in the post titled “Recreate the Accountability System” (link below).  Senator Ratliff is usually the voice of common sense.  He sees that the current system is broken. Regarding  our current accountability system the website states, “Over the past decade... as new measures have been continually added, the system has become so complex that it is virtually incomprehensible to most parents, educators, and taxpayers." (Read RYHT Posiition on Accountability)

Read a good overview in a relatively short paper “The Practical Benefits of Growth Models for Accountability and the Limitations Under NCLB” by Pete Goldschmidt  and Kilchan Choi from the National Center for Research on Evaluation, Standards and Student Testing. I read it because I at least want to understand the future references related to this discussion.  The report is only 16 pages, double spaced. 

TASA also reported on the Select Committee actions - their report included some very interesting comments from Bill Hammond as follows:

Bill Hammond stated that the business community is the number one “customer” of public education and that the expectations in our accountability system are too low. Committee member and TASA President Dr. Thomas Randle asked Hammond if the business community was willing to provide the financial support and resources needed for the large number of students who arrive in districts at various levels of need. Hammond responded that the legislature already supplied funding, and that because educators, “aren’t honest about where we are” they shouldn’t argue that more money or resources are needed. Committee member and Lackland ISD Superintendent, David Splitek explained, “No one is happy where we are, but it is important to also recognize the challenging populations that we serve.” Splitek stressed that nothing could change over night and suggested that we should, “Look at meaningful progress towards our aspirations”. TEA Commissioner and committee member Robert Scott noted that Texas is successful because our standards were raised overtime. Hammond responded that this was just “unacceptable” and we needed to move faster. read complete article – js – webmaster@texasisd.com