Today officially closes a monthlong process to encourage the public to submit input on the new School Letter Grades system.
September 15 is the last day the Tennessee Department of Education (TDOE) will accept submissions on the new advocacy tool that will provide an A through F letter grade for how well each public school is serving its students.
“We want to hear YOUR thoughtful feedback on what school letter grades (A, B, C, D, F) should represent for each school across the state,” wrote the department on its social media page.
The department has been accepting feedback from the public for exactly what should be prioritized in the grading system and held 10 public forums across the state over the last few weeks to gather additional input.
TDOE received a wide variety of comments and concerns at those meetings and a few themes have emerged for the School Letter Grades
Student Growth Versus Student Achievement
Perhaps no topic gained more attention during the town hall meetings than the discussion of whether student achievement should be valued more on the School Letter Grades or student growth.
Multiple communities across the state, including Nashville, expressed a preference for prioritizing growth over achievement because it better encompasses challenges their schools face with student circumstances, resources and funding, and even teacher shortages.
“It’s not a level playing field, our students come to us at very different places in terms of past experiences, prior achievement, the resources available, the funding available to schools vary,” said Metro Nashville Public Schools Executive Director Dr. Paul Changas at a forum in Nashville.
Prioritizing growth over achievement is also something favored by some English language learners (ELL) staff who feel that measurement better reflects the success their students are seeing.
“I just want to really emphasize the importance of our ELL students. We have so many students who have grown in ELL and we have had students who have accomplished a lot even here at this high school and have graduated because teachers have taken time to teach them and spend a lot of time understanding where they come from. They’re not only affected by a language, but they’re affected economically, they have many things going on in their home,” said Bedford County ESL assistant principal Graciela Arroyo. “I really want when this (Letter Grades) is passed to really consider that.”
Transparency and Easy to Understand
Another common theme of the public hearings is that the School Letter Grades should be transparent and easy for parents to understand.
As part of that, some parents encouraged the department to cut the jargon and make a simple, transparent, and easy-to-understand letter grade system.
“At the end of the day, to me, this is like a Yelp score. You know, when I choose a hairdresser, or a restaurant, I choose it because of the stars. Or in this case, the grades. Honestly, if the people who work at the restaurant or the hairdressing school made a great effort and you you know, they came in early to do a great work, I appreciate that. And on a human level, I can understand that. But for my children, what I want is just the best,” said Nashville parent Francisco Moreno.
The Department of Education plans to take all comments into consideration when finalizing School Letter Grades. The system is expected to launch in November.
