State Board of Education and Superintendent of Public Instruction say letter grades are OK for students, but not for educators
The State Board of Education objects to using letter grades to make the State Board’s Public School Achievement Index understandable. The State Board ranks school performance, placing schools in one of six categories: Exemplary, Very Good, Good, Fair, Underperforming and Lowest 5 Percent. The State Board complains that school performance is too complex to be summarized with a letter grade, although the Board manages a profession that routinely uses letter grades to summarize the performance of students.
Letter grades make the complex Index understandable to parents and the public: Exemplary (A), Very Good (B), Good (C), Fair (D), Underperforming (F), Lowest 5 Percent (F-).
Brenda Hirschi, President of the Shelton Public School Board, expressed appreciation for clarifying the Index this way:
“Thank you so much for this email article. I really appreciate your taking the time to provide this information. As a school board director I have been confused about what all of this means. How a parent could figure out the state achievement index chart is beyond me.”
Governor Inslee supports giving schools letter grades: “I am proposing for every school to have a letter grade disseminated to parents so that we can hold ourselves accountable.” (See the 10:16 mark of this video.)
Senator Litzow (R-Mercer Island), a leader in promoting public education, sponsored SB 5328, to report the state School Achievement Index as letter grades:
“This bill is about creating an easily understood and transparent accountability system that is clear to every parent.... At the end of the day, this is about clarity and transparency for parents. Everyone understands it. What we have now is a murky description which does not define the difference between Good and Very Good, between Fair or Struggling.”
In support of SB 5328 Senator Smith (R-Colville) said: “Labeling schools as a D or an F will provide a great impetus for them to improve.” The state’s powerful education establishment blocked the bill from passing.
Now the State Board criticizes Washington Policy Center for reporting state data and trying to help parents understand the rating system for schools. Keeping the Index confusing may soothe the feelings of school officials, but it doesn’t help parents understand how well or how poorly their schools are meeting the state’s paramount constitutional duty to educate their children. In a system where one in four students drop out, parents clearly need more, not less, information about public schools.
I have received calls from parents asking, “What does it mean that my school has been ranked as only Fair on the Index?” They also ask, reasonably, “What can I do about this?”
Members of the State Board of Education and Randy Dorn, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, say they want school administrators to be accountable and that they want parents and the public to be well informed about how well schools are educating children. Providing letter grades for public schools, an idea that enjoys broad bi-partisan and popular support, is one way to do that.