SALT LAKE CITY The State Board of Education gave its approval to the specific processes and formulas to grade schools next fall.
A law requiring the state to grade schools was passed during the 2011 Legislative session, and a commission comprised of State Office of Education staff, lawmakers and other stakeholders has been pounding out the specifics ever since.
“It has not been easy work. There has been a mountain-load of data, a lot of statistics and data we’ve had to work through,” said Judy Park, associate superintendent with the State Office of Education.
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- Parents can now compare school performance after state makes new data project public Sept. 21, 2011
- Senator pitches grading Utah schools bill to Education Excellence Commission Jan. 23, 2011
- Senator pitches grading Utah schools bill to Education Excellence Commission Jan. 18, 2011
The grade a school receives whether A, B, C, D or F will depend equally on student proficiency on standardized tests and student improvement.
“What we’re communicating is we value both proficiency and growth,” said board member Laurel Brown.
School grades will be based on points, not percentages. A school can receive up to 300 points based on how many students perform proficiently on standardized tests, and up to 300 additional points based on how much students improve from one year to the next. Graduation rates will also factor into how high schools are graded.
“We want all of our schools to be able to be A schools,” said Judy Park, which is why the formula isn’t based on a bell curve.
A total of 391 points will get elementary and middles schools an overall “A,” 296 will earn a “B,” 251 a “C” and 191 a “D.”
High schools grades: 391 points earns an “A,” 295 a “B,” 250 a “C,” and 185 a “D.”
If only a small percentage of a school’s students are proficient, but they have exceptional growth in their knowledge from one year to the next, they could still be eligible to get an “A” or a “B.”
Tim Beagley, a non-voting representative from the charter school board, spoke against the fact that schools with student populations that do very poorly on proficiency would still be able to get a good grade.
“I’m very uncomfortable giving an ‘A’ grade to a school where not even half of the students are proficient,” he said. “It’s dishonest to tell the public that that’s an ‘A’ school.”
State Superintendent Larry Shumway countered that the formula is designed to give parents and educators a glimpse at the positive impact a school is having, particularly in schools with challenging demographics. If students at a school are rapidly expanding their knowledge year after year, even if they aren’t proficient, that progress should be acknowledged, he said.
Two schools could have the same number of proficiency points, but one might have steadily improved to get to that point while the other degenerated.
“The trajectories are different. The ‘A’ school has the high trajectory. The ‘F’ school has the low trajectory,” he said.
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