Dive Brief:
- In an opinion piece for EdSurge, Riverside Unified School District (CA) Assistant Superintendent Renee Hill writes that this year’s low scores on the Common Core-aligned Smarter Balanced tests are an opportunity to improve.
- Hill said teachers and adults should take the opportunity to shift their thinking about student performance and take responsibility for students’ learning.
- But she also noted that administrators and teachers should be cautious about how they talk about the scores, including an avoidance of referring to scores as “good” or “bad.”
Dive Insight:
Hill’s insights walk a careful line between laying the responsibility for student performance at the feet of teachers and criticizing single-minded consumption of test scores. As a result, they may provide a helpful handbook for administrators facing disappointing scores.
“The score just is,” Hill wrote. “A score represents one moment in time, and it is based on limited information about the student on one particular day. It says nothing about learning environment, home support, a myriad of other influences on outcomes, or—most importantly—student interest or potential.”
Teachers and administrators should be looking at scores in the context of a student’s background and learning, and alongside a host of other factors, Hill said. But she also urges them to use “I” statements when talking about student test scores, like so: “I was not able to reach a certain percentage of my students.” That phrasing, she writes, “serves as a reminder that the scores are the result of adult action or inaction, and adult ability or lack of ability to help students learn at high levels.”