Texas Projection Measure

How much can you learn in a day?

Many odd questions get debated late at night, over beers, in college dorms. Given the demands placed on students with lectures, labs, research and homework, it shouldn't be surprising that one such question that arose was, "How much can you learn in day?" Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott now faces a similar question, "How much progress over a school year is good enough?"

William McKenzie, in The Dallas Morning News Education blog, reports that Scott is trying to answer that question as part of the accountability ratings for schools. This year, for the first time, Texas is looking at not only how many students pass the TAKS test, but how much students have progressed during the year. Have enough students show enough progress, even if they don't pass the test, and a school could still be given a an acceptable or better rating. Despite some mockery (lowering standards, rewarding for failure, fuzzy math), this makes a lot of sense.

Take for example, two sixth grade teachers. The first has a class of bright students who all start the year performing at grade level. During the year, they learn what's required of sixth graders and pass the TAKS. Good job.

The second teacher finds herself with a class of students who have been left behind. None are performing at grade level. Some are performing two or more grades behind. But, through hard work, diligence and skill, she brings all of the students along, all progressing at least one grade level and some two grade levels during the school year with her. How do we just this teacher's, this school's performance? The old way would judge them unacceptable because so few students passed the TAKS. But most reasonable people would recognize this teacher is doing superior work because her students are making so much progress. Another year or two of such teaching and these students might catch up. The old ratings had no way to recognize that.

The old way of rating schools was blind to such progress. The new Texas Projection Method is designed to identify such progress so that teachers responsible for superior progress can be identified, rewarded and learned from. It's a good goal. Parents, legislators, the public ought to give it a chance to work.