TEXAS AFT LEGISLATIVE HOTLINE--FRIDAY, JUNE 26, 2009
(copyright 2009 Texas AFT)

* More Than Just Test Scores: A Better, Broader, Bolder Approach to Accountability
* Using Teacher Evaluation to Improve Teacher Quality--Again, More Than Just Test Scores
 
Using Accountability to Fix Schools, Not to Fix Blame: A new report released yesterday by the Broader, Bolder Approach campaign says school accountability should be used as a tool for improving schools, not as a blunt instrument to punish schools and teachers. AFT President Randi Weingarten said, "We are particularly pleased that the Broader, Bolder campaign believes school accountability involves more than just test scores. A well-designed accountability system--what we call 360-degree accountability--can help schools give students the comprehensive education and support they need to succeed in the 21st century."
 
The scholars behind the Broader, Bolder Approach make specific recommendations for both state and federal policy changes in their new accountability report. At the federal level, they recommend that the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA, "known temporarily during the Bush Administration as the "No Child Left Behind Act,'" in their words) expand the range of subjects covered by the National Assessment of Educational Progress. This test is given to a representative sample of students and allows state-to-state comparisons of achievement levels, but currently it focuses on math and reading. Broadening the NAEP, often termed "the nation's report card," to include a broader range of subjects would counteract the narrowing of the curriculum spurred in recent years by NCLB.
 
The Broader, Bolder Approach report further recommends that ESEA give states flexibility in designing their accountability systems, provided that they include qualitative evaluation of school quality and do not rely primarily on standardized test scores to judge the success of schools. The report calls on states to make such qualitative judgments through a system of inspections of their schools, "to ensure their contributions to satisfactory student performance in academic subject areas, as well as in the arts, citizenship, physical fitness and mental and physical health, work and other behavioral skills that will enable them to achieve success in a pluralistic society and complex global economy."
 
For a look at the full report, see
http://www.boldapproach.org/20090625-bba-accountability.pdf.
 
Using Teacher Evaluation to Improve Teacher Quality: Another new report, from the Center for American Progress, appropriately acknowledges the crucial role of strong teacher evaluation systems in improving instruction and raising student achievement, says AFT President Randi Weingarten. "AFT concurs with the report's recommendation that we craft evaluation systems that use a wide variety of data, rather than relying solely on test scores or implementing other 'silver bullet' approaches without teacher input," Weingarten says. To read the June 25 report, "So Long, Lake Wobegon? Using Teacher Evaluation to Raise Teacher Quality," see http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/06/teacher_evaluation.html.