eNews: February 10, 2023
In This Issue:
1. APS School Board Advised to "Err on the side of vague"
2. APS Struggling To Make Progress Towards Its Strategic Goals
3. Math "Reimagined" Needs a Closer Look
4. Standards-Based Grading Confusion
5. Declining Academic Expectations at APS?
6. From the Teacher’s Lounge: Does Paper Measure Up?
7. Happening Soon
APS School Board Advised to "Err on the side of vague"
New guidance drafted by School Board Chair Reid Goldstein reveals a keen reluctance to engage in clear, honest and frank discussion with members of the APS community, including parents, teachers and administrators.
The guidance, shared at the School Board’s January retreat:
Advises Board members to “Err on the side of vague” when talking to community members.
Directs the Board to “send comments on presentation drafts in advance,” so there are “no surprises.”
Advises the Board members not to email opinions, but to discuss over the phone.
Instructs Board members: “Don’t talk – or even listen – to staff members about working condition issues.”
Why This Matters:
School Boards best practices indicate they are “expected to be as open as possible concerning board discussions” and should focus on being transparent in decision-making and engaging effectively with their communities. We urge the Board to commit itself to a greater level of candor in its dealings with all stakeholders, and to publicly disavow the guidance and the sentiment behind it, which implies that community members are problems to be managed and not stakeholders who the Board is elected to represent.
Read why parents and teachers alike are calling for more transparency from APS, and see APS’ response here and more local coverage here.
APS Struggling To Make Progress Towards Its Strategic Goals
APS updated the School Board this week on the status of its strategic goals. On six of its stated ten performance objectives, APS data either became worse or showed no change, and some categories have no metrics yet. APS’ indicators reflect declining performance on closing the achievement gap, student health, professional learning and staff engagement. For one of the metrics measuring academic performance – which itself sets the very low bar of achieving one-year growth per year, and only for a limited number of students – APS has not developed a metric to measure performance yet, despite the fact that the goal was set well over a year ago.
Why This Matters:
APS’ strategic plan sets very modest goals for APS in comparison to our surrounding districts. The fact that APS has failed to make progress on most of those goals, despite spending the most per student in the metro area, raises serious concerns about the effectiveness of APS initiatives. The fact that APS has set only one modest academic goal—and has failed to even develop a metric to measure that single academic goal—raises serious questions about whether APS is really focused on academic excellence.
Math 7 "Reimagined" Needs a Closer Look
Given low SOL math pass rates and homogenous classes, APS is looking to “reimagine” Math 7. Making the class less homogenous could mean moving 7th grade math students around to ensure a broader range of skill sets within a class. However, a closer look reveals:
Math 7 SOL pass rates are lower because no advanced math students take this SOL.
95% or more of 7th graders in advanced math pass their SOLs, indicating they are appropriately placed in advanced math.
Why This Matters:
‘Reimagining’ Math 7 could mean ‘place more students who would previously qualify for Pre-Algebra into Math 7’ instead. This would slow down students who are ready for advanced math (Pre-Algebra or higher) and does not address the underlying issue: existing Math 7 students need more support to pass the SOL. While “Reimagining” could also mean “place more Math 7 students into Pre-Algebra,” this would be challenging given their high SOL failure rates.
Maintaining a wider range of student skills in one class, with the teacher differentiating to meet all student needs, is controversial and research on it is mixed at best. Rather than this approach, APS should follow the data on what works: providing more intensive support to remediate struggling Math 7 students.
Standards-Based Grading Confusion
APS moved to Standards-Based Grading (SBG) in some elementary schools, with four categories of grading (“Meets Standard”, “Approaching Mastery”, “Developing Mastery” and “Insufficient Data”) replacing the previous system and resulting in confusion among many parents.
Why This Matters:
The goal of grading should be to accurately categorize each student’s status–where they are and where they need to be–and communicate that clearly to parents and students. SBG, for all its good intentions, appears to be falling short on both.
APS can improve its Standards-Based Assessments to increase transparency and its focus on achievement, specifically by:
Making the levels clearer. APS’ category labels are difficult to understand, and there are especially troubling implications for parents who don’t speak English as a first language. Is “approaching mastery” better or worse than “developing mastery”? Similarly, “approaching mastery” sounds better than “meets standard”, yet it’s considered a lower level of achievement. One recommendation is to change the categories to: “Advanced; Meets Standards; Limited Mastery; Little Mastery.”
Reinstating the “Exceed Expectations” category that APS used prior to the pandemic. Most other approaches to SBA include a category above “Meets Standards,” such as “advanced” or “advanced understanding”.
Read more about Standards-Based Grading here and ArlNow’s coverage here.
Declining Academic Expectations at APS?
New data indicate that:
Fewer APS students are taking Algebra by 8th grade than in years past.
Enrollment in AP and IB courses lags our local peers.
Many of our graduates reported feeling unprepared to write at a college level and are practically begging for more HS ‘writing assignments.’
In many areas related to academic expectations, APS appears to be moving in the wrong direction, from policies reducing the amount of homework and grade inflation to setting APS-wide goals for student academic achievement that are uninspiring.
Why This Matters:
The rigor of high school curricula is one of the most important factors in determining whether students will succeed in post-secondary education. APS needs to create more aggressive metrics for academic achievement. Moreover, messaging from school and district leaders, and a no-excuses mentality, will help create a culture where educational achievement and excellence is valued.
From the Teacher’s Lounge: Does Paper Measure Up?
(Editor's Note: From time to time, we will offer a perspective written by an APS parent or teacher on a topic of concern or interest for APS. What follows has been only lightly edited for clarity.)
During the pre-service week, every secondary teacher attended a lengthy virtual training on Paper, the “free to students” online tutoring service that APS announced earlier this year. The primary reaction of my teacher friends was to speculate how much this program cost. (Probably not the reaction the county was hoping we’d have.) While I sincerely hope that Paper works as advertised and is worth the investment, I have my doubts.
Paper bills itself as an equity tool and I understand its appeal. The basic concern – that richer kids are more likely to have access to academic tutoring than poorer kids – is a reasonable concern. Moreover, Paper seems to have anticipated many accessibility concerns. It offers some non-English language tutoring and professes to rapidly connect students, 24-7, with a tutor, without a time limit. According to Paper, its tutors are highly-vetted subject matter experts. All of this is promising.
However, who needs this and who will use this are potentially two different things. My students thus far have not shown much interest or report that the tutors are hit-and-miss in terms of quality. If it catches on, I strongly suspect that Paper will be primarily used by already capable students, given that those are the students who already visit and email me. My seniors at risk of not graduating don’t come to school regularly and/or have shockingly poor literacy and numeracy. It’s hard to see how Paper serves students like them. This uptake issue is a real concern given the October 2022 studies of Paper’s use by the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University, which found that usage at Aspire Public Schools was persistently low even with significant efforts by the schools. To my knowledge, APS has yet to publish its mid-year usage numbers or announce how it will measure efficacy.
Finally, I question to what degree Paper can fill the aforementioned access gap with a comparable tutoring experience. A good teacher or tutor develops a relationship with a student and engages in a dialogue that allows the instructor to discern whether the student actually comprehends, rather than relying on the student to know exactly what to ask, to be able to articulate it in writing, or to be able to accurately self-report their comprehension. Paper, however, offers only a live chat function with whatever tutor is available. I guess it's better than nothing and, again, I hope the tutors are strong. But even if they are, does a Paper tutor have an ongoing investment in my students? I think most teachers would rather have significantly reduced class sizes – FYI, 32 in a high school core content class is just too many – and to be better able to assist students ourselves.
HAPPENING SOON
Thursday, February 16, 7 PM: Next School Board Meeting. Sign up to speak.
February, 22nd, 7:30 PM--APE Meet and Greet, Arlington Rooftop (3rd Floor Indoor Mezzanine). RSVP or just show up!
February 23rd, 6:30 PM - 8:30 PM: "Making Healthy Choices" with the Kenmore Community Families in Action, Juntos en Justicia and ASHPA. More information here.
Did you know you can add the APS calendar to your iphone calendar or google calendar? Check it out!
