Shaping the Future of Public Education Through True Accountability
Before handing out the STAAR test, Georgetown High School teacher Sarah Kuczek puts it into perspective for her students. “I don’t teach to this test. I teach you skills,” she tells them. “This one test is not going to define you. It’s not going to define my teaching. It’s not going to define who you are.”
Created in 2012, State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness (STAAR) testing is used as an indicator of student learning to ensure they’re ready to enter the next grade level. But Sarah believes it falls short of that goal. She says STAAR testing is not a true indicator of kids’ abilities, with its arbitrary grading, focus on a certain population that leaves minorities at a disadvantage, and a one-size-fits-all approach. “They’re asking us to reach students where they are, and help them grow, but they’re asking kids to all conform to the same test,” she explains.
EDUCATION GAME CHANGER
Through his advocacy for True Accountability, John Tanner hopes to change that paradigm and forge a bright future for public education. When an impoverished student falls behind because of limited access to education, it doesn’t mean they’re a failure. But a test can make them feel like one. It’s why John, founder of bravEd, is working to change accountability in public schools from a metric-based system to one that focuses on student progress and meaningful change. BravEd is an organization that pushes for schools to move beyond test-based educational accountability. “What we do with our current system is look at children who are years behind through no fault of their own and declare them failures,” he says. “If they’re labeled failures just because they’re behind, you’re at risk of creating failure where none exists.”
The same is true for schools and the annual letter rankings they receive from the state based on STAAR test results. In 2019, Georgetown ISD was given a B, while several of its schools got Ds and Fs. “Saying you’re a C or D or B doesn’t tell me anything about the effectiveness of that school,” John says. “What does reveal a school’s effectiveness is True Accountability,” he adds. True Accountability is a movement spearheaded in Texas by the Texas Public Accountability Consortium (TPAC) that fosters connections between school districts and communities to learn schools’ strengths and weaknesses, and to find ways to improve.
For the last five years, John has worked with 60+ school districts in Texas, including GISD, to establish True Accountability systems alongside the required standardized testing. Ultimately, John hopes to work with policy makers to eliminate STAAR testing altogether. “I would love to see meaningful accountability in schools, and for test-based accountability to go the way of the dodo bird,” he says.
To learn more about bravEd and the True Accountability movement, visit brav-ed.com.