In a bold move, Florida’s governor announced that the state will end annual state assessments and replace them with shorter progress monitoring assessments three times a year. Given Florida’s standing as a pioneer and leader in the state assessment and accountability space, it is likely that many other states are sitting up to watch what happens here. (If they’re not, they should be.)
As a person who has spent years helping schools and districts in Florida use their existing progress monitoring data (e.g., iReady, Star, MAP) more impactfully, I find myself receiving the governor’s news with both cautious optimism and trepidation.
I’m hopeful because I’ve witnessed firsthand how skillful and routine interrogation of well-organized progress monitoring data can change academic expectations and create excitement in a school and district.
I’m worried because these kinds of data, and the actual barriers to their effective use, are so pervasively misunderstood.
Contrary to what many believe, progress monitoring data aren’t going to tell us what instructional changes need to be made.
Progress monitoring data tell us if adjustments are warranted and for whom (i.e., which individuals or groups of students). However, the what and the how in terms of next steps will be dependent on the the humans in play, the resources at hand, and the insights discovered from more granular, standards-level evidence (e.g., item-based interim assessments, unit tests, and student work). We need both—progress monitoring data to determine whether students are growing quickly enough, and standards-level evidence to guide our planning for instruction.
But, if there isn’t a support system for helping teachers resolve the “now what” questions and translate them into reasonable commitments to act, then reviewing data isn’t going to change a darn thing, whether it’s done once a year, three times a year, or every single week.
Another popular misconception held by people outside public education is that these types of progress monitoring data are new. In fact, most ELA and math teachers in Florida have had access to quarterly progress monitoring data, in addition to annual state assessment data, for years. And yet…quoting Commissioner Corcoran after the 2019 results for the National Assessment of Educational Progress were released, “Florida’s NAEP results have relatively flat lined.”
Why might this be? What are the real barriers in the way of using progress monitoring data to determine if and for whom instructional planning and delivery should be adjusted?
Here are five significant challenges we help our schools and districts address:
1) Progress monitoring data are rarely organized by assessment providers in ways that allow teachers and principals to answer the most important questions:
- Is my Tier 1 instruction effective? For whom (in terms of student groups)?
- Are my interventions working? For whom?
- Are the students most impacted by COVID catching up?
- Which teachers are generating outstanding results with students that look like mine?
2) Scale scores, rather than percentiles, are used to track student progress, often leading to a false sense of accomplishment.
3) Individual student growth is typically calculated within a given academic year rather than across academic years, often yielding inflated average student growth rates that fail to be corroborated by the end of year state assessment.
4) Dashboards—don’t even get me started.
5) “Data meetings” often lack essential leadership, purpose, structure, and specific, instruction-related next steps. Consequently, they can leave teachers feeling isolated, frustrated, or blamed rather than informed, empowered, and encouraged.
Here’s the cause for optimism: if these barriers can be named, they can also be overcome.
Imagine with me for a minute. What if state education agencies commit to helping teachers and principals learn from, and act on, their student outcomes data? What if renewed emphasis is placed on using these powerful data to identify extraordinary practice and create opportunities for others to learn from those settings?
If that seems far-fetched, then district leaders, what if you committed to helping your schools create such conditions, regardless of how your state implements its program?
School leaders, how you can you be proactive to set up your teachers for success?
The change is coming. Annual assessments will go away in Florida (and in other states eager to follow its example), and teachers will be required to test students three times a year. And so we have an opportunity to fundamentally alter the way we use the information—not for blame of teachers (or students) as has so often been the impact—but to understand our current reality in terms of rates of student learning, continually strive to get better, find joy that comes from a job well done, and ultimately change the trajectory of students’ lives.
To learn more about out how K12 Lift helps schools use progress monitoring data as a catalyst for improvement, click here.
