The all-important Texas Education Agency accountability rankings are due out next week and there’s more than the usual confusion as the format has changed yet again.
But the Rockdale ISD is looking forward to the scores. “We are confident the 2018 ratings will be favorable to the district,” Assistant Superintendent Pam Kaufmann said.
Preliminary ratings are due at midweek while the final ones—the school “report cards” which generate much anxiety each August—are due Tuesday.
FORECAST—Of course, administrators can forecast rankings by using information already provided by the TEA from test scores and other areas of assessment.
That’s where the optimism comes in.
There’s another factor, too. In past years the ratings have focused on the negative, areas in which schools are perceived to have problems.
The new system measures progress. “It focuses on growth, measuring how much progress is being made,” she said.
“We think that’s right in line with what we are doing,” Kaufmann said. “We think its going to show up in these ratings.”
This year’s TEA accountability ratings will only address districts, not individual campuses within those districts.
A-F—But the biggest change is in the format itself. This year is the first in which school districts will be graded on the same A-F scale with which generations of students and parents are familiar.
The format for a trial run last year as the TEA issued “here’s how you would have fared if we were actually grading you” scores.
Those triggered a firestorm of criticisms from superintendents stateside. Many, including Dr. Monzingo, said no one knew what each letter grade meant, no one could explain the grade and no one knew what districts could do to raise the grade.
That prompted some major changes in the system before this year’s scores were compiled.
Even so, the “not really preliminary” scores issued last year, using data from the 2015-16 school year had the Rockdale ISD at the top of the pack in Milam County.
DOMAINS—The 2017 A-F scores measured four “domains” that included student achievement, student progress, closing performance gaps and post-secondary readiness.
While the “trial run” scores were floated last year, the actual scores were based on the old system and Rockdale ISD met all standards and its campuses received six distinctions in subject areas.
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