Board of Ed approves accountability formula
MIAMI (AP) – Florida’s Board of Education has approved more rigorous measures for evaluating high schools beyond mere test scores, adding such factors as graduation rates and participation in accelerated coursework.
The new formula for annual school grades was approved at the board’s meeting in Miami on Tuesday. The changes were required by a bill passed by the Legislature in 2008.
High schools will now receive an overall letter grade based half on student performance and learning gains on the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test, and half on five new measures: graduation rate; participation in advanced courses; post-secondary readiness; the graduation rate of at-risk students; and growth or decline in those areas.
“The Board’s approval of these changes represents a significant step forward for our state as we work to prepare our young people to compete in today’s highly competitive global marketplace,” Education Commissioner Eric Smith said.
Under the old measure, Florida’s more than 400 public high schools were given grades based entirely on their FCAT scores. State Sen. Don Gaetz, who sponsored the amending legislation, argued that wasn’t an accurate barometer of a school’s performance, because only half the students in a high school take the standardized exam.
“The FCAT, by itself, was an incomplete picture of achievement in high schools,” Gaetz said at the board’s meeting Tuesday.
Also on Tuesday, the board approved Smith’s 2010-2011 budget request, which would increase the total among invested in education by nearly 9 percent.