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Of Hope and TNReady

Natalie Coleman is a 7th grade language arts teacher in Sumner County and a 2015-16 Tennessee Hope Street Group Fellow.

Are we ready?

This question is front-and-center in the conversation surrounding education in Tennessee.

This is the question ringing in classrooms across the state, the question plaguing teachers working tirelessly to adjust instruction to more rigorous expectations, striving to help students reach heights monumentally higher than they’ve ever been asked to, much less prepared to, before.

This is the question of parents, nervous their children’s scores will not be as high as they’re accustomed to, worried that everything they’ve heard about the standards and Race to the Top and the over-testing is true, worried that the changes happening in our state may not be good for our children.

This is the question of students whose target has been moved each year, who have been told TCAP counts as a grade (and that it doesn’t), that it’s the last year for TCAP tests (and that it’s not), and that now it is time for us to be TNReady. As a state, we have even branded our new test with a name that echoes our question—Are we ready? Are we TNReady?

For anyone in the state closely connected to education, TNReady is a name that carries with it fear of the unknown, of unrealistic standards, and of unwarranted pressures on teachers, parents, and students. At the same time, though, it resonates with the hope of what we as a state want to achieve—readiness in our students.

We want them to be ready for the next steps in their educations and in their lives. We want them to be prepared to succeed. We do not want to continue reading that students in the first Tennessee Promise cohort aren’t making it, even when college is free, because it’s “too hard.” We do not want to continue hearing from employers that Tennessee’s young workforce is simply not ready.

I will admit that, as a teacher, I am nervous about TNReady because of the pressure it puts on my students. I fear that my classroom will progressively become more and more of a test preparation center and less of a place where students can cultivate creativity, curiosity, interest, and wonder. I am concerned that the testing may take too much of our time and focus, may not be developmentally appropriate, may not be amply vetted, may overwhelm our low-budget school technology resources. I believe that teacher and parent groups are right to raise questions and concerns, right to warn that TNReady may not itself be ready and that its incorporation into student grades and teacher evaluations is problematic and potentially unfair.

Yet, the prospect of TNReady also fills me with hope because of the aspiration it represents. As a state, we have said that it’s time for our students to be ready, time to stop selling them short with watered-down standards and bubble-sheet assessments, time to do what’s necessary for our students to be able to read and write at levels that will make them ready for the literacy demands of college and careers.

In the previous six years I’ve taught, I’ve felt a great tension between what I believe has always been the heart of our language arts standards and how those standards were ultimately assessed. At first, I idealistically believed that teaching language arts the way I learned to teach—authentically and deeply rooted in reading and writing—would automatically translate to test success as well. My achievement levels and TVAAS scores told a different story. Over time, I learned that achieving the desired results required shifting gears to TCAP-specific strategies and drills as the test approached. Test scores improved greatly, but I don’t know what my students actually gained, besides a good score, from those weeks of lessons.

Now, though, my students are preparing for TNReady Part I, a test that will require them to read rigorous texts and synthesize the information from them into a sophisticated essay. This new test has the potential to be one that matches the authenticity I strive for in my classroom.

When I tell my students that the writing we are doing in class right now is to prepare not only for TNReady Part I but for many kinds of writing they will need to do in the future, I can mean it. The skills we are honing to prepare for this test are skills that will help them write successfully in high school, on AP exams, for college admissions essays, in college classes, and even in their careers.

Right now in Tennessee, because of our raised standards and the assessments that come with them, our students are learning skills that will make them ready. I believe this and hope for more growth because of the amazing growth that I’ve already seen.

As our state has undergone massive educational shifts, our students have borne the changes and adapted. When we first began piloting text-based essay prompts a few years ago in my district, many of the students in my class stared at them blankly, merely copied the text word-for-word, or wrote a half-page “essay” that displayed a complete misunderstanding of the task. The writing was often missing the basic components of topic sentences, indention, or even separating paragraphs at all. As I worked to help my students prepare in those early days, for tests that were pilots, my students groaned when we were “writing again.” Even though I worked to make writing fun and to give students opportunities to write for genuine purposes throughout the year, writing assessment preparation was an arduous task for everyone, and students were often frustrated.

Each year, though, the frustration has diminished a bit. In the beginning, just making sure students learned the basics of an essay format seemed an impossible task; now, they come to me knowing how to tackle prompts and organize their thoughts into paragraphs. There is still much room for growth, but where my students start every year and where they end are both well beyond those markers for the class before. Each year is better and better, and—best of all—the groaning is gone. Put two complex texts and a writing prompt in front of my students now, and they set right to work, staying focused for over an hour at a time, writing away. They’re open to revision and work to make changes. They ask for help, and they take pride in making their writing the best they can.

This is progress I would have considered miraculous three years ago, yet it is commonplace now, and I am grateful for the growth I see in students’ abilities each year.

When February comes and brings with it text-based writing tasks for my seventh graders that look more like something I would have learned to do in pre-AP classes in high school, when April comes with a second computer-based test, this one filled with rigorous and lengthy texts to read and a large dose of an entirely new breed of multi-select, drop-down box, click-and-drag multiple choice questions, will my students be ready?

I am not sure that they will be completely ready. Yet.

No matter how my students score on TNReady this year, though, they are undoubtedly stronger for what we’ve done. No matter what problems we encounter with the test and what we need to do to fix it, I hope we never lose sight of the goal behind it. I hope we keep our standards high, I hope we keep striving to make our assessments authentic measures of the skills we want our students to attain, and I hope we see that the end result is students who are ready.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

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Still Not Ready

The MNPS Board of Education last night passed a resolution calling on the State of Tennessee to delay the use of TVAAS scores in teacher evaluations during the first year of the new TNReady test. The resolution is similar to one passed in Knox County last month.

Here’s the MNPS version:

A RESOLUTION OF THE METROPOLITAN NASHVILLE PUBLIC SCHOOLS BOARD OF EDUCATION IN OPPOSITION TO THE USE OF TNREADY DATA FOR TEACHER EVALUATIONS FOR THE SCHOOL YEAR 2015-2016

PROPOSED BY ANNA SHEPHERD

WHEREAS, Metropolitan Nashville Public Schools (MNPS) is responsible for providing a local system of public education, and
WHEREAS, The State of Tennessee through the work of the Tennessee General Assembly, the Tennessee Department of Education, the Tennessee Board of Education, and local boards of education, has established nationally recognized standards and measures for accountability in public education, and
WHEREAS, all public school systems in Tennessee have been granted a one-time pass in the 2015-2016 school year to not integrate TNReady scores into each student’s final grades due to an anticipated delay in assessment results, and
WHEREAS, teachers with at least five years of experience are eligible for tenure only if they receive an overall evaluation score above expectations or significantly above expectations for the prior two years, and
WHEREAS, this school year is the first year that the TNReady assessment will be administered, and
WHEREAS, the TNReady assessment is not a compatible assessment with the TCAP assessment, and
WHEREAS, the TNReady assessment requires the extensive use of technology and the State of Tennessee BEP funding formula, already inadequate, does not meet these technology needs or the needs of MNPS schools as a whole, and
WHEREAS, the Tennessee General Assembly and Tennessee Board of Education have already adopted the “Tennessee Teaching Evaluation Act” to lessen the evaluation score impact of TNReady in English/language arts and math, and
WHEREAS, over 70% of MNPS teachers, counselors, librarians, instructional coaches, and others do not produce individual TVAAS data, and
WHEREAS, MNPS seeks to recruit and retain excellent teachers to serve our students.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY METROPOLITAN NASHVILLE PUBLIC SCHOOLS BOARD OF EDUCATION AS FOLLOWS:
MNPS Board of Education strongly urges the Tennessee General Assembly and the Tennessee Board of Education to provide a waiver from utilizing the TNReady data for the use of teacher evaluations for the school year 2015-2016 or allow districts to only use observation data from evaluations to make decisions on hiring, placement, and compensation based strictly on the 2015-2016 TNReady data, and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Tennessee General Assembly and the Tennessee Board of Education consider the impact of the 2015-2016 TNReady data upon future years of teacher evaluations, and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Tennessee General Assembly and the Tennessee Board of Education consider allowing teachers to be eligible for tenure when they have received a composite score of four (4) or five (5) for two of any of the last five years, as opposed to the prior two years only.
ADOPTED BY THE MNPS BOARD OF EDUCATION AT ITS MEETING ON TUESDAY, JANUARY 12, 2016.

 

The resolution includes a few interesting notes:

  • 70% of MNPS teachers don’t have individual TVAAS data
  • There’s mention of the inadequacy of the BEP formula
  • There’s a call for further review of TVAAS after this year

According to prepared remarks by MNPS teacher Amanda Kail prior to the vote, four other counties have passed similar resolutions.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

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New Kid on the Block

Charles Corra, an employee of RePublic Charter here in Nashville, has started a new blog on education policy and what he calls a “forum for ideas,” including ideas on charter schools.

In a post on charters, he says:

I look forward to a broad-based discussion of how charter schools impact Tennessee – whether it be negative, positive, or a little bit of both.

We’ll see how the discussion goes.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

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CAPE Flies into 2016

At the first MNPS Board meeting of 2016, advocacy group CAPE will again be encouraging teachers to raise their voices and speak out. CAPE member Amanda Kail previews the remarks she plans to make this evening:

Ladies and gentlemen of the school board — My name is Amanda Kail. I am an EL teacher at Margaret Allen Middle School.
First and foremost, I would like to wish all of you a happy new year. And in that vein, I would like all of us as a district to take a moment to reflect on what we have gotten right, and how we can improve in 2016.
First of all, you are to be commended in recognizing that over-testing has become a serious problem for our schools. Countless studies from leading experts in education, as well as the groundswell of parents around the country who are opting their children out of the tests, and even demands from students, such as the White Station High School students organizing in Shelby County point to the same conclusion — high-stakes testing has been a colossal mistake, regardless of the intentions. Many of you have made statements recognizing the need to reign in the testing as a priority. Thank you. Now let’s make 2016 the year that happens.
How can we do that? First, let’s end testing where we can. DISTRICT benchmarks take up SIGNIFICANT instructional time, and are often given so close to other tests as to be redundant. Getting rid of them would mean 3 less weeks of testing (and 3 weeks more of instruction).
Second, make instructional time THE FOCUS of school days again so teachers can teach and students can learn. Cap building-level testing to no more than once per semester. Remember that assessments are now given on-line, and that most schools at MNPS do not have enough computers to give these assessments in one day, meaning that a single whole-school assessment can drag on for one or two weeks in order to accommodate all students and grade levels.
Third, join Knox County, Blount County, Washington County and Anderson County schools by supporting Board Member Shepherd’s proposal to postpone using TN Ready scores on teacher evaluations this year. Tell Nashville teachers you respect our profession enough to not evaluate us on something that is so much beyond our control. Then tell the Tennessee legislature that it is time to reexamine the trust we have placed in high-stakes testing to tell us anything besides which schools are rich and which are poor.
Finally, lets find a director of schools who truly has ALL of our schools at heart. MNPS needs someone who will ask our legislature to end high-stakes testing and who will demand full funding for our district. Someone who will spend their time getting struggling schools more resources, like the wrap-around services from the Community Achieves program, and who will implement a fair and fully-supported discipline policy grounded in restorative justice. Someone who recognizes that threatening and punishing schools that are serving students with the highest needs is not nearly as useful as finding those schools the resources they need.
We have much work to do, but if we work together, this can be the year our system truly shines. Thank you.
For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport
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TSBA Agenda

The Tennessee General Assembly begins its 2016 session today.

The Tennessee School Boards Association has released an agenda that includes opposition to vouchers and funding of items mentioned in prior BEP Review Committee reports.

Here it is:

TSBA firmly believes in the success of Tennessee’s public schools and the opportunities they have provided and continue to provide to children.  The association acknowledges the challenges that public schools face as well as the need for continued improvement, and its member boards of education are dedicated to reaching the goal of every child achieving his or her highest potential.  We believe we can help accomplish this goal by focusing our legislative efforts on the following areas:
Local Control of Schools   TSBA believes that local boards of education are the best equipped and informed to make decisions to address the needs and challenges of their local schools.  TSBA opposes any efforts to diminish or impede upon this local control.

Maintenance of Effort Penalties   TSBA believes that the responsibility and accountability for funding schools should be connected.  Rather than the state withholding BEP funds if a local budget is not timely adopted, TSBA supports legislative changes to shift the penalty to the funding body whereby the state would withhold local sales tax dollars.

Maintenance of Effort Requirements   TSBA supports legislative efforts to change the local responsibilities of funding bodies to ensure that they provide at least a 3% increase every three years.

Publicly Funded Vouchers   TSBA opposes any expansion of the special education voucher program as well as any new legislation that would divert money intended for public education to private schools.

Minimum Instructional Time   TSBA supports legislation to provide an option to school districts to meet instructional requirements through a minimum number of instructional days or a minimum number of instructional hours.

Fees for Inspection of Records   TSBA believes that the public’s ability to inspect records must be weighed with the burden on staff to comply with open records requests and supports legislation to allow for reasonable fees when LEAs must create numerous documents and/or expend several man hours in order to comply with a request for inspection.
BEP Recommendations and Priorities   TSBA urges Governor Haslam, the General Assembly, and the Department of Education to continue efforts to fund all of the recommendations and priorities of prior reports of the BEP Review Committee.
The Tennessee School Boards Association will actively support legislation relative to these and other issues as determined by its Resolutions and Position Statements.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

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Quest for Answers

After the Achievement School District announced the results of its matching process in Memphis, we published an analysis of the process by Ezra Howard. That analysis called into question the matching process, noting that un-weighted scores resulted in few actual matches.

Using that quantitative analysis, a video provided by Memphis Quest (on twitter @Memphis_Quest), reviews the NAC matching process and highlights discrepancies between the ASD’s stated matching process and the actual events that occurred in matching Memphis schools with charter operators. In several cases, a majority of evaluators did not recommend a match, yet scores were averaged in such a way as to create a match. Additionally, the NAC committees did not include the recommended number of members according to the ASD’s outline of the process.

The video is 22 minutes long, and it raises serious questions about how the matching process was conducted this year.

 

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

 

 

 

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McIntyre to Step Down

Knox County Schools Superintendent Jim McIntyre announced today he will step down from his current role in July of this year.

His tenure in Knox County has been controversial, with teachers speaking out about his leadership and emphasis on TVAAS scores to evaluate and pay teachers.

The decision comes as recent votes by the School Board and County Commission indicate a lack of strong support for McIntyre.

The Knoxville News-Sentinel reported:

McIntyre’s contract recently was extended on a 5-4 vote of the school board, but McIntyre acknowledged that the 2016 election will shift the balance in favor of opponents of the superintendent.

He said that he decided to step down over the weekend, after conversations with Knox County Schools Board of Education Chairman Doug Harris.

McIntyre mentioned efforts by Knox County Law Director Richard “Bud” Armstrong to discredit his recent contract, and a vote by Knox County Commission to not support that contract. The 9-2 vote had no impact on his contract, which was between McIntyre and the Board of Education, but symbolic in showing a groundswell of dissent for the schools administrator.

More on McIntyre:

Knox County Turmoil

Dear Jim

A Matter of Fairness

Big Monday for McIntyre

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

 

 

 

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Pinkston v. Miller

The race for School Board in MNPS is starting early, as current Board Member Will Pinkston announced his re-election plans this morning and saw Jackson Miller confirm within hours that he would challenge Pinkston.

Jason Gonzales and Joey Garrison have the story for the Tennessean.

Pinkston outlined goals for a second term in his morning news release:

“Working with a new mayor and a new Metro Council, we have a profound opportunity to get the entire community rowing in the same direction for the first time in nearly a decade,” Pinkston said. “I’m optimistic about the upcoming director search and I’m excited to continue working for our students, parents, teachers and taxpayers.”

Miller plans to make a formal announcement tomorrow.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

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Telling the NAC Story

Yesterday, TN Ed Report presented an analysis by Ezra Howard of the Neighborhood Advisory Council’s (NAC) rubrics and the Achievement School District’s (ASD) scoring mechanism. Ultimately, the analysis found the process biased toward matching a neighborhood school with a charter management organization. Separately, several members of the NAC held a press conference calling the process “deceptive” and a “scam.”

In response to the NAC press conference, the ASD sent this press release to several media outlets:

“The ASD invited people with varying backgrounds and points of view to join the NAC and, in so doing, we knew there was the possibility that giving every member a voice in decision-making would mean that some members would not be happy when final decisions were made. This year’s community input process was redesigned with the input of a diverse group of stakeholders, including some recent critics. We agreed with the importance of strengthening parent voices in decisions about schools and that NACs should have an opportunity to evaluate the plans of school operators in areas that reflect the highest priorities for parents and community members. There is no question that the Priority schools that we engaged in this process are deserving of a meaningful intervention to significantly improve students’ opportunities for success. We are grateful to the parents, students, teachers, counselors and community members who spent the better part of two months learning about and evaluating the potential fit of operators that applied to serve these Priority schools.

We did our best to run a fair, transparent process and we believe we achieved that. Based on the scored rubrics and methodology we used to ensure parent voice accounted for 50 percent of the feedback we received from the NACs, we had four matches and one school that did not match. We will honor both the match and non-match outcomes of this community input process.

We ran our redesigned process with fidelity, and we addressed every concern we were made aware of during the process. We have always attempted to be an organization that listens and learns. Our biggest concern as we move forward is the fact that we have some members of the NAC who feel the need to go to the media rather than come to us discuss their concerns. If it’s political posturing to overturn a fair and open process, then there is little we can do to address that. If there are good faith ways we can improve, we are open to that feedback. And we welcome those NAC members who continue to have concerns to meet with our team members in the new year.”

TN Ed Report would like to hear from both members of the NAC and the Achievement Advisory Councils (AAC) from past years. Did you find the process transparent, consistent, and acted on with fidelity? Did you share your concerns honestly with the ASD from the beginning? Did you find he process to be fair and open? Please write to nacstories@gmail.com

TN Ed Report would like to share your opinion in fairly and openly. Whether they are positive or negative, your view of the process will be presented without influence. In addition to your story, please provide your name and a detailed description on the NAC or AAC team on which you served.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport

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The ASD’s NAC for Problems

Ezra Howard offers some insight into the ASD matching process in Memphis

Personal Experience

When the Achievement School District (ASD) announced that it would restructure its Achievement Advisory Council (AAC) and rebrand it as Neighborhood Advisory Council (NAC), I was cautiously optimistic. Last fall, I sat on the Northeast Region of the Achievement Advisory Council (NE AAC) and was thoroughly disappointed with my experience. Due to an automatic match between Green Dot and Raleigh-Egypt High School, the NE AAC dealt solely with engaging the community. This ordeal was well covered by the media, specifically the decision for an automatic match, the heated community meeting, and Green Dot’s decision to pull out of the matching process. My frustration didn’t stem from fellow AAC members; they were wonderful and I have nothing but respect for them. It also didn’t come from speaking with community members, teachers, and families at schools considered for takeover; they were frustrated but needed to be heard. Rather, my frustration stemmed from receiving limited support when working with the Achievement School District and the matching charter management organizations (CMOs) as well as the lack of transparency throughout the entire matching process.

My biggest fear for the AAC process was that, as applied to REHS, it was all lip service for the veneer of community engagement. So when I heard that the AAC would make some changes and become the NAC, I was cautiously optimistic. I recognized there were new strengths in the process, like the use of scored rubrics and ensuring parents were on the council. However, there were weaknesses, like limiting the number of members in each NAC despite the size of the school or the number of grades taught. Furthermore, the ASD pledged to honor the NAC’s recommendations. Malika Anderson, the incoming Superintendent of the ASD, echoed these sentiments with a promise to emphasize community engagement. I thought this year would be different.

Continued Concern

I didn’t sign up for the NAC, however, I moved to Lisbon, Portugal with my wife in order for us to both pursue PhDs. Despite the distance, I closely followed the events from afar. I was immediately concerned when I read about the comments made by Latoya Robinson, an NAC member, in the Commercial Appeal.

Latoya Robinson said she served on one of the neighborhood advisory councils that the ASD employed to rate charter operators who applied to take over the struggling schools. Robinson said the way their input was calculated allowed for Kirby Middle to be taken over against the council’s wishes.

“We did not put down information saying that we wanted Kirby to be taken over by Green Dot,” she said.

So I filled out an Open Records Request with the ASD for the individual rubrics and the scoring sheets used by the ASD. The results were not particularly encouraging.

The Matching Process

A little background on this year’s matching process: Green Dot was matched with Hillcrest High School and Kirby Middle school. Green Dot has been active in ASD schools for less than two years. They operated Fairley High School last year (Composite TVAAS of 2) and Wooddale Middle School this year (no TVAAS). Scholar Academies began with Florida-Kansas Elementary this year (no TVAAS). All of the operators considered this year were CMOs. Achievement Schools, the ASD’s direct-run schools, were not considered for matching.

[Note: I was paying attention specifically to the quantitative data. However, I suggest everyone read the individual rubrics and pay close attention to the notes. There are some very interesting facts. Names of the NAC members were redacted, and probably for good reason.]

A Problematic Process: A Low Bar, Grade Inflation, and Erasures

ASD 1

When reviewing the NAC rubrics and scoring sheets, I was immediately surprised to find that the cut score on the rubric was 50%. A passing mark of 50% seems extraordinarily low and, honestly, reminds me of the long abandoned grade scale used by the ASD where 46 was considered passing. Second, I noticed that a couple CMOs were barely passing with scores in the low to mid 50s. Third, I noticed quite a few scores were erased from consideration due to “insufficient evidence bordering on opinion.”

Let’s take each point in turn. It seems very plain that the bar set for CMOs is really low in the matching process. To make matters worse, passing the 50% mark is almost guaranteed using the scoring rubric set by the ASD. The ASD used a four point Likert scale to measure if the CMO was meeting expectations. Each level of measurement was given a score from 1 to 4 (except Demonstration of Community Outreach, which receives a score of 3, 6, 9, 12); the scored are then added up and divided by the total to provide an average percentage. First and foremost, the 1 to 4 scale is problematic because even if a CMO fails to meet the standard of any measure by a NAC member, they still score 25%. These free points set the floor high enough that it tells a CMO that they only have to strive for 25 percentage points in order to pass. In theory, if every NAC member thought the CMO “partially met the standard” then the CMO would be matched with a school. With most scores hovering in the 50s, that’s exactly what happened.

The floor is so high and the ceiling is so low, it makes it very difficult for a CMO to not match with a school. The scoring mechanism for the NAC rubrics is blatantly biased in favor of matches and takeovers. Furthermore, the glaringly low expectations for CMOs in this process stands completely against the rhetoric of high expectations espoused by the ASD, most recently by Chris Barbic himself. It’s hypocritical to the standards held to the schools slated for takeover, which requires a TVAAS 4 or 5 from schools on the priority list. Take Raleigh-Egypt Middle School, which scored a TVAAS of 3 this year with a TVAAS of 5 last year, which is now in the hands of Scholar Academies, which partially met expectations with a score of 54.17%. That’s absurd, but it doesn’t end there.

The sheer amount of redactions is shocking. The most appalling is Green Dot’s rubric for Kirby Middle, where several individual scores were erased and at least two whole rubrics were taken out of consideration. However, if you look at the rubrics yourself, you see that this NAC was very thorough, their reasoning is sound, and they substantiated their arguments with evidence. Take for example this apparently redacted assessment for Green Dot partially meeting the standard for community engagement:

The application demonstrated plans for parent engagement but the operator presentation of how parents are involved in the school was not convincing. When asked about engaging parents at the level required to made (sic) significant cultural changes, the operator was not able to give a strong plan of action.

The NAC member then provides a long list of concerns about community engagement with references to documentation and examples of personal experience. And would it be a surprise that the redacted scores appear to be 1s and 2s rather than 3s and 4s? Consider this assessment of “meeting, with reservations” with a rationale of “Operator understands necessary interventions for the student population. Green Dot has shown academic success at Fairley” with the strengths being “As stated they are the leaders in the school turnaround. They have demonstrated success rates in schools not only in Memphis but other cities.” With Fairley’s composite TVAAS of 2 last year, I disagree.

A Second Look

So there are two major issues with the NAC rubric scores. First, there is the low bar set for CMOs. Second, the redactions on the NAC scores appear inconsistent and biased toward high scores, ensuring that a CMO matches. So I decided to recalculate the rubric scores. I first make “not meeting expectations quantifiably unacceptable by recalculating the scores without the free points while keeping the passing score at the ASD’s 50% mark. Second, I analyzed the final NAC averages using the redacted scores. Finally, combine the former to methods to see where the NAC scores stand. All data came directly from the individual rubrics and scoring sheets provided by the ASD.

ASD 2

In order to the account for the roughly free 25 percentage embedded in the measurement tool of the NAC rubrics, I simply changed the scale from 1 to 4 to 0 to 3. In essence, CMOs are awarded no points for “not meeting expectations.” If CMOs surpass the 50% mark, simply put, this would put the aggregate score must be somewhere between “meeting expectations with reservations” and “partially meets the standard.” Even with the ASD’s redacted score, the results are not promising. Caldwell-Gutherie is the only school matched with 80.79 percent. Kirby has 48.98%, Hillcrest has 34.52%, Raleigh-Egypt Middle has 38.33 percent, 29.39%. It’s apparent that a buffer of about 25 percentage point drastically changes the outcome.

ASD 3

 

When the redacted scores are accounted for, there is a dramatic change in the average rubric score. Only Caldwell-Guthrie with 83.90% and Raleigh-Egypt Middle School with 53.75% would be considered for the matching process. Kirby with 47.22%, Hillcrest with 49.17%, and Sheffield with 45.25% would not be considered matches. Without a doubt, the redactions changed the results.

ASD 4

When you take away the 25 percentage point buffer and use all data available, there are some very interesting findings. First and foremost, only one school passes the low 50% mark: Caldwell-Guthrie at 78.53%. Every other school is below 50%. Kirby is 29.63%, Hillcrest is 32.22%, Raleigh-Egypt is 38.33%, and Sheffield is 27.00%.

It seems apparent that the assessment tool for the NAC rubrics are not only biased, but highly massaged. I believe these three additional forms of analysis illustrates how the NAC truly perceived the CMO and potential matches, and that view is quantifiably poor. It also points to the importance and impact of how a test is scored.

There is another interesting observation that I want to put on the table. In the case of each of the five schools scoring below 50% in my assessment, there are two individuals in each group that score the CMO significantly higher than their peers. Sometimes the scores are two or three times higher than the others and there are two very impressive perfect scores for Caldwell-Guthrie. I may be wrong, but if I were a betting man, I would bet the farm that the two highest scores in each NAC are the two “community members.” The difference these community members make ranges anywhere from 7 to 23 percentage points. If I am correct, then the community members’ assessment of the CMOs may not be representative of the parent members on the NAC.

I went through some of the names of the NAC members and some of the community members also sat on the previous AAC (some of whom I worked with and are those for whom I still have great respect). Several individuals on the NAC appear to be members of the contentious Memphis Lift. Memphis Lift, which is funded by Democrats for Education Reform, headed by Chris Barbic’s wife. Apparently, as one NAC member noted, Lift assisted some CMOs in community organizing activities as well. Despite the community member’s background, the data suggests these outliers, which appear unrepresentative of majority of the NAC members, were highly influential in the outcome of the NAC rubrics.

Conclusion

Whichever way you view it, the NAC results are very problematic. The entire process seems to favor CMO matching from the outset. With low cut scores, a buffer of 25 percentage points, numerous redactions, and influential members that may not represent the consensus, CMO matching seems to be a foregone conclusion from the beginning. Simply looking at the data, the NAC and the matching process calls into question authentic and meaningful community engagement. The rubric data undermines everything the NAC proclaimed to be and refutes the constant message of high standards, accountability, data-centric approaches, student-centered mindsets, transparency, and community engagement espoused both by the current superintendent, Chris Barbic, and the incoming leader, Malika Anderson. At best, it’s disingenuous; at worse, its strategic community disenfranchisement.

Quite frankly, the NAC appears to be the same thing as the AAC, lip service. Now we have the data to prove it.

The Need for Action, The Need for Change

When I sat on the AAC, Margo Roen, then Deputy Chief Portfolio Officer, said she was surprised that I didn’t write a blog post about my AAC experience. I said, half-jokingly, that I didn’t want to be mean, but now I’m angry. Honestly, anyone looking at this data and reading these rubrics should be angry too. The ASD seems to be speaking out of both sides of its mouth. It sets the bar pretty high for priority schools trying to avoid a takeover, but sets the bar laughably low for matching operators. It claims to care about community engagement, but then puts extreme limits on the community voice and agency. It claims urgency for action, but asks for patience when it comes to turnaround.

I wanted to believe in the education reform espoused by the Achievement School District. I want kids to shoot from the bottom 5% to the top 25%. I do not take joy in the fact that academic institutions view the ASD’s effect as “statistically insignificant.” I am not happy that NAC rubrics illustrate low opinions of charters and a scoring mechanism that undermine the matching process. But something quickly needs to change, because Tennessee families continue to be sold a bill of goods by the ASD and out-of-town charters.

I have a simple suggestion for our legislature, because it seems very apparent that it will take a bill to entice honest operation by the ASD. Raumesh Akbari, as most educators know, passed a widely praised bill that took schools with a TVAAS composite of a 4 or 5 off the table for turnaround. There should be a bill that reflects the same for the expansion of the ASD. For any operator wishing to expand in the ASD, an aggregate TVAAS 4 or 5 must be necessary for all schools. Allowances could be made for new operators. However, for those already operating in the ASD, growth must be required. Second, an NAC-type structure is necessary, but must be heavily restructured and regulated outside of the ASD. There’s nothing wrong with the shape of the NAC, but the measurement tool makes very little sense and shows clear bias.

The worst part about it is that the ASD could have taken this exact approach to takeovers this year. A great example is the direct-run Achievement Schools. After some inconsistent results and a few rocky starts, all five of the Achievement Schools scored a composite 4 or a 5 last year. However, no schools were considered for the Achievement Schools in the matching process. Barbic is right to celebrate that fact in his opinion piece on Saturday; but his use of Whitney to prop up the cadre of charters considered for this year’s matching process is inaccurate and misleading. Green Dot’s Fairley High School has a TVAAS of 2 and Scholar Academies has no real track record in Tennessee. By all accounts, that should be unacceptable. Ultimately, it makes me think the expansion of the ASD is less about children and learning and more about adults and business plans.

NAC Rubric – no redacts, unweighted

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