Partnership for Learning released a new report this week making some recommendations on how Washington can better hold its schools accountable for educating our kids.
“The current system falls short of the rigorous accountability requirements necessary to ensure that all students are proficient and on track to graduating college and career ready,” the report points out.
We hear that. When it comes to the term “accountability,” there is no shortage of finger pointing and assigning blame.
While recognizing the steps that the state Legislature has taken in the last couple of years, PFL says that those efforts don’t go far enough.
1. Ensure that the state’s current accountability system sets high goals, and achieves them.
This measure of proficiency must be based on college and career ready standards for all students.
2. Improvements to the state’s accountability system should include:
• Broader college- and career-ready indicators.
• Measurable performance goals based on key college and career readiness indicators.
• An effective trigger for identifying and supporting students who fall behind.
3. Allow innovative school models when schools demonstrate appropriate capacity and commitment.
Washington should provide autonomy, including freedom from the teacher union contracts, to schools that propose to replace a chronically under-performing school or that propose to locate in a high poverty neighborhood.
The full report – with the lengthy title “Accountability Systems that Measure What Matters: Incentivizing Excellence in Every Washington School” – can be viewed here.
Let’s remember that Partnership for Learning is not without a strong Education Reform bias. They are stridently anti-union. Just the same, there can be little opposition to their recommendations. After all, I think we’re all in favor of mom, the flag, and apple pie.
I do find their third recommendation interesting. For them, an innovative school model isn’t one using a different way of clustering students or a different pedagogy, but one that violates collective bargaining agreements. There’s lots more room for innovation and autonomy when schools are free from District mandates than they can get from being free from union contract rules. Oddly, Education Reform proponents, such as Partnership for Learning, aren’t interested in that kind of innovation autonomy or freedom.