Module 9 – Grading and Reporting Practices

      A rating of DEFICIENT is appropriate if any of the following exist:

§  The school does not have a formal process, based on school-wide rubrics, to assess whole-school and individual student progress in achieving the school’s 21^st century learning expectations

§  Teachers, generally, fail to provide specific, timely, and corrective feedback to ensure students revise and improve their work

§  Teachers, generally, fail to regularly use formative assessments, including school-wide rubrics  

A rating of LIMITED is appropriate if the school does have a formal process, based on school-wide rubrics, to assess whole-school and individual student progress in achieving the school’s 21^st century learning expectations; teachers generally provide specific, timely, and corrective feedback to ensure students revise and improve their work; and teachers generally use formative assessments, including school-wide rubrics, but:  

§  Teachers, generally, fail, prior to each unit of study, to communicate to students the school’s applicable 21^st century learning expectations and related unit-specific learning goals to be assessed

§  Teachers, generally, fail, prior to summative assessments, to provide students with the corresponding rubrics

§  Teachers, generally, fail to use formative assessments to inform and adapt their instruction for the purpose of improving student learning

§  Grading and reporting practices are not regularly reviewed and revised to ensure alignment with the school’s core values and beliefs about learning

A rating of ACCEPTABLE is appropriate if the school does have a formal process, based on school-wide rubrics, to assess whole-school and individual student progress in achieving the school’s 21^st century learning expectations; teachers generally provide specific, timely, and corrective feedback to ensure students revise and improve their work, and teachers generally use formative assessments, including school-wide rubrics; and teachers generally also use formative assessments to inform and adapt their instruction for the purpose of improving student learning; teachers generally, prior to each unit of study, communicate to students the school’s applicable 21^st century learning expectations and related unit-specific learning goals to be assessed;  teachers generally, prior to summative assessments, provide students with the corresponding rubrics; grading and reporting practices are regularly reviewed and revised to ensure alignment with the school’s core values and beliefs about learning; and:

§  Professional staff collects, disaggregates, and analyzes data to identify and respond to inequities in student achievement

§  Teachers and administrators, individually and collaboratively, examine a range of evidence of student learning for the purpose of revising curriculum and improving instructional practice, including most of the following:

-                    student work          

-                    common course and common grade-level assessments

-                    individual and school-wide progress in achieving the school’s 21^st century learning expectations

-                    standardized assessments

-                    data from sending schools, receiving schools, and post-secondary institutions

-                    survey data from current students and alumni

§  The school’s professional staff communicates:

-                    individual student progress in achieving the school’s 21^st century learning expectations to students and their families

-                    the school’s progress in achieving the school’s 21^st century learning expectations to the school community

A rating of EXEMPLARY is appropriate if all the descriptors in the ACCEPTABLE rating are met and:

§  Teachers collaborate regularly in formal ways on the creation, analysis, and revision of formative and summative assessments, including common assessments

In each unit of study, teachers employ a range of assessment strategies, including formative and summative assessments