An Educator’s Guide to MSDE’s ESSA Survey

The Every Students Succeeds Act (ESSA), the landmark federal bill that replaces No Child Left Behind, presents a once in a generation opportunity to redefine and improve public school success, with less emphasis on testing and a greater focus on closing opportunity gaps.

Maryland must submit a state plan for how it will implement ESSA. But that plan needs work — and your feedback. The Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) has set up an online survey to gather feedback which they’ll use to update their draft plan.

We’ve reproduced the online survey questions below. Look for some comments and background on many of the questions in italics, with a black bar next to them. Note that the comment refers to the question immediately preceding it.

Here’s an example:

1. What’s your favorite color?

Red

Blue

Orange

We recommend MSEA orange, of course!

Once you’ve checked out this survey guide, click here to fill out the actual survey.

Here goes!

Section 1- Long Term Goals and Measurements of Interim Progress

Questions 1–4 are demographic.

5. What is an appropriate amount of growth to expect from students each year on the PARCC Assessments?

1 percent

2 percent

3 percent

5 percent

10 percent

Other (please specify)

Educators know the challenges in expecting uniform levels of growth from students annually. Proceed with caution.

For context, the average amount of annual growth when Maryland’s state test was the MSA was around 1%.

6. Should targets be set to include all students reaching 100% proficiency by a set date? (Example: All students will reach 100% proficiency by 2030.)

Yes

No

I don’t know

If not 100%, what percent would you suggest?

A disastrous provision of No Child Left Behind set 100% proficiency targets in 2014, 12 years after the bill was signed into law in 2002. These unreachable goals set off a hysteria of over-focus on standardized testing followed by a series of carrot-and-stick waivers which states applied for that exchanged a federal waiver for not meeting the 100% target for adopting USDE-favored policies particularly on testing and teacher evaluations, regardless of whether they made sense for the state. We have been down the road of setting 100% proficiency goals before, and it is a counterproductive one.

7. Do you have any other recommendations around long terms goals and measurements of interim progress?

ESSA is a real opportunity to set long-term goals not based on test scores. This is the failed approach of No Child Left Behind. Maryland can and should set long-term goals around not just outputs like test scores, but inputs that we know make for really great schools, like small class sizes; low student ratios for special educators, school counselors, or mental health professionals; low chronic absenteeism; a healthy and supportive school culture; access to advanced coursework or career and technology programs; and so on.

Section 2: Consultation and Coordination

8. What recommendations do you have around ways for Maryland to reach more stakeholders?

9. What additional means to reach stakeholders should be included in Consultation?

Section 3: Challenging State Academic Standards and Academic Assessments

10. Which do you value more:

Limiting testing time

Depth of reporting information for instruction

Other (please specify)

As educators, we’ve seen the impact of over-testing in our schools: the narrowing of curriculum; the obsessive practice testing and pre-testing; and the draining of resources, time, and technology to support school-wide testing. Too often, little useful data comes back from those tests to help inform and improve instruction in a timely fashion. It’s time to end the culture of over-testing by limiting testing time and how much tests are weighted in how we measure schools.

11. Which better promotes meaningful assessment:

Questions that provide engaging, real-world, context

Short, direct questions of knowledge or skills

Other (please specify)

States are doing innovative work around performance-based assessments that get away from the same old disruptive and costly standardized testing in favor of projects embedded in the flow of the curriculum. Rather than purchasing and using off-the-shelf standardized tests created by huge testing companies, Maryland could be engaged in this more nuanced work that is driven by teachers. For more on how it works, check out this article in Education Week.

12. How important is it to measure a student’s ability to write clearly across academic disciplines?

Very Important

Important

Neither important nor unimportant

Unimportant

Very unimportant

13. What role, if any, should external, norm referenced exams, such as SAT, ACT, NAEP, etc. play in Maryland’s assessment and accountability system?

For college entrance only

In place of a high school exam

To determine college and career readiness

As extra credit in the accountability system

Other (please specify)

ESSA provides the opportunity for high schools to use the SAT or ACT in place of a statewide standardized test like PARCC. The SAT and ACT can be more meaningful tests for the many students who take them due to their impact on students’ post-secondary plans. This move could allow high schools to not give PARCC and save significant amounts of time and money.

Section 4.1: Accountability System and 4.2: Identification of Schools

14. In what order would you prioritize these accountability measures?

Achievement and Gap Narrowing

Student Growth

Graduation

English Language Proficiency

High School Student Success and School Quality Indicator

Elementary and Middle School Student Success and School Quality Indicator

It is troubling that MSDE only presents the school quality indicators out as a single indicator per level, when in reality there can (and should) be a variety of multiple school quality indicators at all levels, such as small class sizes; low student ratios for special educators, school counselors, or mental health professionals; low chronic absenteeism; a healthy and supportive school culture; access to advanced coursework or career and technology programs; and so on.

By prioritizing these measures, we will see graduation rates and the largely test-based measures listed above rise; prioritizing test scores to the near-exclusion of school quality indicators means more of the same from the test-obsessed NCLB era.

15. Please rank the order of importance of the measures for the Elementary/Middle School Quality and Student Success indicator:

Chronic absenteeism/attendance

Teacher attendance

It is deeply concerning that MSDE would list teacher attendance as a possible indicator. Educators have a contractual right to use their leave days and schools should not be punished for educators exercising that right when they or a family member are sick or they need personal leave.

Suspension

It’s important to pair a suspension measure with high quality, comprehensive training in topics like restorative practices and classroom management.

School climate as measured by a survey

School facility quality

Access to a full curriculum

Access to a rigorous curriculum

Teacher qualifications

Teacher participation in professional development

16. Please rank the order of importance of the measures for the High School School Quality and Student Success indicator:

Chronic absenteeism/attendance

Teacher attendance

It is deeply concerning that MSDE would list teacher attendance as a possible indicator. Educators have a contractual right to use their leave days and schools should not be punished for educators exercising that right when they or a family member are sick or they need personal leave.

Suspension

It’s important to pair a suspension measure with high quality, comprehensive training in topics like restorative practices and classroom management.

School climate as measured by a survey

School facility quality

Access to a full curriculum

Access to a rigorous curriculum

Teacher qualifications

Teacher participation in professional development

College and career readiness

If college and career readiness is also measured by a test, then we are not getting away from test-based indicators but doubling down on them. This measure could be incorporated as an achievement rather than school quality indicator.

Dual enrollment

AP assessment score of 3 or better/IB assessment score of 4 or better

Again — by including AP/IB scores, are we getting away from test-based indicators or reinforcing them? This measure could be incorporated as an achievement rather than school quality indicator.

Career and technology education concentrators/industry certification

Once again — this is a test-based indicator that could be incorporated as an achievement rather than school quality indicator.

College enrollment

17. Should Maryland use summative ratings for schools? (Example: Assigning schools a letter grade such as A through F.)

Yes

No

If not, what other distinctions would you identify?

It’s important when using this approach to make sure that the school quality indicators are included in the weighting and ratings and they aren’t simply reflections of standardized test scores.

18. What should be the State’s strategies in supporting low performing schools?

The State Board has expressed interest in expanding vouchers and charter schools and taking over low performing schools and including them in a state-run district. Closing and privatizing neighborhood public schools won’t help students — in states that have tried such approaches, it opens the door to for-profit operators who shy away from accountability and transparency and typically do not out-perform the public schools which they attempted to replace.

Creating “competition” and subjecting schools to the free market isn’t a recipe for success — it’s a recipe for dismantling public education, as we’ve seen in Michigan under the guidance of Education Secretary-designate Betsy DeVos.

What are more meaningful strategies for supporting low performing schools? It starts with consultation with educators and stakeholders, including the formation of an advisory steering group — a majority of which must include non-administrator educators in the school, parents of students in the school, and students (in high schools) — to oversee the writing of the plan and measuring of progress made under the plan.

There should also be several guardrails to protect the process:

• If needed, hiring of outside consultation must be competitive (for-profit groups are prohibited)

• No changes should be made to the existing collective bargaining agreement without negotiations with the exclusive bargaining representative

• Community input must be sought and the school must remain public

• Charter school conversion must be approved by the local school board

• The state can only intervene after the school fails to meet measurable objectives for three consecutive years, and the state cannot use any power or action to cause a district or school to adopt any specific intervention in its improvement plans

• Schools must be allowed to exit identification categories after meeting measurable objectives for three consecutive years

• Title I funding dedicated to school improvement — as required by ESSA — should be distributed to districts through a need-based formula

Section 5.1: Systems of Educator Development, Retention, and Advancement

19. What is important in the preparation of teachers? (training, courses, etc.)

20. What constitutes evidence of a strong performance of a teacher candidate in the final year of teacher education preparation?

21. What requirements are necessary for mentors of new teachers?

Maryland currently has fairly vague requirements for mentors, which could be strengthened to improve the relationship. But simply improving requirements for mentors isn’t enough. New teachers should be getting — as is outlined in Maryland regulations — time to meet with their mentor during school hours, a reduced workload, time to observe veteran teachers, and access to a professional learning community.

For more on what new teachers should be getting — but often aren’t — check out this article.

22. How can certification regulations and/or the process of the certification of educators be streamlined or changed?

Get out your red flag! Gov. Hogan, some members of the State Board, and privatization-aligned education reformers have sought to dramatically lower entry requirements for teaching. We need to focus more on recruiting and retaining highly trained and qualified educators rather than make it as easy as possible for people to step into classrooms whether or not they are prepared. Such an outcome would accelerate teacher turnover and churn and not serve students well. We should maintain high professional certification standards and rely on the state’s Professional Standards and Teacher Education Board, which is made up of educators, for guidance.

23. Are the required educator certification tests a meaningful measure of a teacher’s ability?

Yes

No

I don’t know

Comment:

Section 5.2: Support for Educators

24. How can the State support professional learning for educators to meet student needs?

25. What incentives would encourage the retention of effective teachers?

Provide higher salaries

Provide bonuses

Offer more planning time

Offer more professional development options

Other (please specify)

Note of caution: the items listed in this question are subject to collective bargaining rather than mandates from the State Board. Also, “providing bonuses” is very vague. Would these be provided for taking on additional extracurricular or leadership duties, or achieving national board certification? Or is this just focused on test scores and trying to funnel more incentives and attention to testing?

26. What recommendations do you have for the development of teacher leaders and teacher leadership pathways?

Section 5.3: Educator Equity

27. What are effective strategies to ensure all children have access to an excellent educator?

This shouldn’t be about how to get a finite amount of excellent educators in front of more children, but about supporting more educators in their development as professionals. A stronger mentor system; increased teacher voice in school and district decision-making; providing effective, targeted, and relevant professional development; and improving working conditions and salaries are just a handful of ways to help educators develop as professionals.

28. How would you prioritize the importance of teacher characteristics?

Effective (as deemed by a State Teacher Evaluation Model)

Experienced (more than 1 year of teaching)

Teaching in the area of certification

Other (please specify)

This is a highly loaded question. Maryland law ensures that local school systems and the local union must mutually agree upon their evaluation system. The state has developed a default teacher evaluation model that may be used when mutual agreement is not reached. That model has been based much more on standardized tests and factors outside of an educator’s control than the local evaluation models which have been developed with local input and a sense of what works for a specific school district.

It is illegal for the state to mandate that all teachers are subject to a single, uniform evaluation system developed without their input and agreement. It is reckless to try and build support for such an approach through a benignly and misleadingly worded question.

Section 6: Supporting All Students

29. What strategies should Maryland consider to help all students be successful?

30. As part of Title IV, Maryland may use funds to develop and implement programs and activities that support access to a well-rounded education. Please indicate which of the activities/programs below you feel are important to a well-rounded education. (You may choose more than one.)

College and career guidance and counseling

Programs and activities that use music and the arts as a tool to support student success

Programs and activities to improve instruction and student engagement in STEM

Efforts to raise student academic achievement through accelerated learning programs

Activities to promote the development, implementation, and strengthening of programs to teach traditional American civics, economics, geography, or government education

World Language Instruction

Environmental Education

Programs and activities that promote service, volunteerism, and community engagement

Programs and activities that support educational programs that integrate multiple disciplines

Other (please specify)

This is a good opportunity to use ESSA to increase support for community schools, restorative practices, PBIS, and other evidence-based initiatives.

31. How would you rate your agreement with the Maryland DRAFT Consolidated State Plan?

Not in favor

Generally ok, needs revisions

Mostly Agree

Completely agree

32. General Comments

A couple overarching points worth considering:

ESSA represents a once in a generation opportunity for Maryland to redefine and improve public school success, with less emphasis on testing and a greater focus on closing opportunity gaps. We can only get there by giving more weight and focus to school quality indicators rather than simply looking at test scores.

The State Board of Education has discussed using ESSA as an opportunity to close public schools, send more taxpayer money to private school voucher programs, and vastly expand charter schools. If we don’t want that to happen and we want ESSA to truly help us with the challenges we face in schools every day, we need to speak up and voice opposition to those approaches.

Up to speed? Great. Now click here to fill out the survey and make sure your voice is heard!