Alexandria City Public Schools



Date: May 15, 2013

For ACTION X

For INFORMATION

Board Agenda: Yes X

No

FROM: Elementary Progress Report Committee and

GwenCarol Holmes, Ed.D., Chief Academic Officer

THROUGH: Morton Sherman, Ed.D., Superintendent of Schools

TO: The Honorable Karen Graf, Chairman, and Members of the Alexandria City School Board

TOPIC: New Elementary Progress Reports for SY 2013-14

BACKGROUND: On March 1 of 2012, the Elementary Progress Report Committee began meeting to develop a new progress report for grades 1 to 5 that would be aligned with the ACPS curriculum, is standards based, provide more information to parents, and be housed in a more user friendly online application . This committee has met continuously since that time, including a full day of work in July of 2012 in order to come to consensus on the amount of detail that would be provided on the progress report, what detail should be provided, how students would be evaluated against the standards, and how to be communicate with parents how their children are progressing on learning the knowledge, skills, and competencies expected of students in grades 1 to 5.

Each elementary school was asked to select a primary teacher, an intermediate teacher, and an Encore teacher to serve on the committee. These building representatives were the committee members who participated in months of spirited discussion on how to best provide a standards-based report card that provided parents with more information on how their children were mastering the knowledge, skills, and competencies specified in the Virginia Standards of Learning (SOL) and the ACPS Curriculum. The resulting product is a modified standards-based report card in that each student is provided a rating in a cluster of similar standards that are grouped together. However, the specific standards for that grade level and quarter are specified. For example students are provided a rating in Comprehension under Reading rather than a rating in each specific facet of comprehension such as main idea, making inferences, and so on.

The committee also grappled with how to rate students in each of the content areas as well as the structure for reporting student performance on Life, Work, and Citizenship Skills. Much discussion was held in regards to using a traditional A, B, C, D grading system, to use a letter system such as A, P, D, E (Advanced, Proficient, Developing, or Emerging) or to use a number system with a rubric similar to what is currently used with the ACPS Curriculum transfer tasks. The traditional grading methods was eliminated from consideration because student ratings on standards-based progress reports represent student performance in the specified areas at the end of the quarter, not an average of grades across the quarter. While teachers will want to have multiple data points in order to triangulate the rating given a student, all of the data points will be collected near the end of the unit and/or quarter. The A, P, D, E would allow for a standards-based ranking using a rubric and would meet the ACPS Board Policy IKC-1: Grading. However, it was decided that a 4, 3, 2, 1 system would be easier for non-English speaking parents to understand and translate. Therefore, the committee is proposing a number rating system which will require a modification of Policy IKC-1.

Committee members took multiple ideas and drafts back to their colleagues in their buildings for feedback. Committee members were then asked to field test the proposed new progress reports with at least two parents at the February Parent-Teacher Conferences. Parents participating in the field test were asked to respond to a short survey that included forced answer questions and the option for an open response. The results are included in the table below.

|S: The standards based progress report provides me|77% Agree or Strongly Agree |

|with more information regarding what my child has | |

|learned or needs to learn in each subject than the| |

|current ACPS progress report. | |

|S: I find the information on the progress report |50% Agree or Strongly Agree |

|to be about right. | |

|S: I find the information on the standards based |70% Agree or Strongly Agree |

|progress report to be helpful in discussing my | |

|child’s progress with his/her teacher(s). | |

|S: I think the Life, Work, and Citizenship Skills |78% Agree or Strongly Agree |

|area of the report is relevant information in | |

|helping me understand my child’s progress. | |

|S: I understand the scoring rubric for the new |72% Agree or Strongly Agree |

|progress report | |

The committee then met to review the feedback from the field test and begin planning for how to support teachers and parents in the coming year with the use of a new progress report. The planned initial supports for teachers include:

• Distribution of the mock-ups of the new progress report with a cover letter and introductory FAQ to all elementary staff this June. (Working draft of Introducing the New ACPS Standards-Based Elementary Progress Report with FAQ attached.)

• August workshop on An Introduction to the New Progress report with the focus on helping teachers prepare for student data collection needed to use the new progress report.

• October workshop on completing the new progress report online through PowerSchool.

• Extended grading window for 1st quarter data entry.

Initial planned supports for parents and guardians include:

• Information to parents in June (after board approval) of why a new progress report and what parent supports will be available in the fall.

• Information at the start of school about the new progress reports: why and what parent supports are available.

• Workshops on understanding the progress report through the FACE centers.

• Workshop materials for individual schools to host parent workshops on the new progress reports.

• Outreach to PTAs to offer a program on the new progress reports.

• Information to be included with the first issuance of the new progress reports to provide a overview of the rating system to parents (Working draft attached: Introduction to Parents, Guardians, and Community Members)

Additional documentation provided for review includes:

1) Elementary School Progress Report 2012-13 to provide a sample of the current progress report in use.

2) A mock in PowerSchool of one grade level of the proposed new elementary progress report for SY 2013-14.

3) A spreadsheet that contains the specific content for each grade level to be included in the new elementary progress report.

4) ACPS Board Policy IKC-1

Upon approval of the new elementary progress report, the content for all grade levels will be formatted in PowerSchool for implementation in SY 2013-14.

RECOMMENDATION: It is recommended that the board approve the proposed standards-based elementary progress report for grades 1 to 5 for implementation in school year 2013-14 with the recognition that ACPS Board Policy IKC-1 will also need to be modified to accommodate the committee’s recommended rating system.

IMPACT: Parents and guardians will receive more specific information on the expected learning for their child, how their child is progress against specific expected standards, and teachers will have a more refined tool for reporting more detailed student progress and in an technology application that will be easier to use.

CONTACT: GwenCarol Holmes

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