Student Achievement: What Do We Really Want to Measure?

Since 2002 and No Child Left Behind, education reform has held schools accountable for student achievement based on test scores.   Twelve years later, there is still a large focus on high stakes tests.  Schools are measured by how well students perform on one test.  More and more schools will soon be labeled SINA- Schools in Need of Assistance.  Are we focusing on the right things? Is a test score alone what we want to use to hold our students, our teachers, and ours schools accountable for student achievement?

We should want more for our students at Southdale.  As a building leader, I am more confident in evaluating student achievement based on their student leadership notebooks than their score on the Iowa Assessments.  The Iowa Assessments is one way of measuring student achievement and can be useful to chart growth over a year’s time.  However, watching a student at Southdale share their leader notebook with their parents or a community member is informative, reflective, inspiring, and powerful.

As a Leader in Me (LIM) school, each of our students prepare and utilize a leadership notebook.  The data notebook is a compilation of evidence of what students are learning.  Students at Southdale are responsible for their learning.  They know what is expected of them in each of the subjects.  They also spend time tracking their goals, and reflecting on their behavior. Students clearly understand their goals, can articulate their strengths and weaknesses.  The students have weekly reflection time to write about what they did well during the week and how they want to improve.  There is ample data testifying to what they are learning and what they have achieved over the days, weeks, and months of school.  These notebooks are also a great communication tool.  Parents view the notebooks weekly and can also write positive comments to their child celebrating their growth.

As a profession, we are encouraged to focus on evidence based practices. Evidence suggests at Southdale, that utilizing leadership notebooks is the right work.