From 1999 to 2013, California’s Academic Performance Index boiled down everything about the state’s K-12 public schools to a single number between 200 and 1,000.
That type of accountability is going away, to be replaced by a more nuanced system that is under construction.
In the old model, the desirability of neighborhoods or even whole communities hinged in part on their school’s API score. Careers were made or lost based on how far a school or district was from the magic 800 target number. And under the federal No Child Left Behind law, failure to steadily increase an API score – even an already high one – could mean dire consequences for a school or district.
In 2014, California’s State Board of Education put the brakes on calculating API while the state switched over to new standardized tests aligned with the Common Core State Standards. Those new Smarter Balanced tests, which students took for the second time this past spring, will be just one factor in the new school grading system being created to replace the API score.
A draft version of a proposed color-coded reporting system for public schools was released in July. The proposed report card draws a lot from the NCLB-successor Every Student Succeeds Act. It looks at how a school does in English language arts and math standardized tests, but also at how well students learning English as a second language are doing, graduation rates, chronic absenteeism, suspension rate, college and career readiness, and other factors.
“It’s more complex, but it reflects life, it reflects reality,” State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson said in San Bernardino on Friday.
The proposed version of the new school report will include a column, the Equity Report, that will highlight any subgroups in trouble for any category. Categories include students who are financially challenged, English learners, those in foster care, disabled or homeless, and members of ethnic and racial groups.
“In addition, all the data will be online, allowing parents, educators and the public to access a wealth of information with the option of focusing on specific information they believe is most valuable,” Bill Ainsworth, California Department of Education spokesman, wrote in an email. “This new data will make it easier for parents to hold their schools accountable for any problem areas."
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