Ohio Department of Education and Workforce briefs House panel on using district and school report cards

The Ohio Department of Education and Workforce briefed the House Education Committee on Feb. 4 on how to access and interpret district and school report cards, which the department publishes annually under federal and state law.

Ginny Stump, identified to the committee as Chief of Policy and Legislative Affairs for the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce, said the department posts report cards by Sept. 15 each year and that the traditional report card includes six rated components and several report-only measures. “As many of you know, federal and state law require the department to publish annual report cards for each district and public school in Ohio,” Stump told the committee.

Stump (presented in the meeting as “Jenny Stump”) and department staff outlined the six components—achievement, progress (growth), gap closing, graduation, early literacy, and college, career, workforce and military readiness (CCWMR). She said CCWMR has been “report only” for the past three years while rules are drafted to incorporate it into the overall rating for the next report card.

The department demonstrated online tools and data products committee members can use: the district landing pages and component tabs on the report card site, downloadable Excel files with up to 18 years of data, advanced reports that show multiple years on a single page, and student recovery dashboards that present chart-based trend views. Stump emphasized that district and school users may also access a secure data center to review data for accuracy before finalization.

During the question-and-answer session Representative Sean Brennan asked whether adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are documented on the report card. Rachel Wakefield, the department’s administrator of accountability, replied that ACEs are not accounted for on the report card; the department reports economic-disadvantage rates and allows users to look for schools that “beat the odds” given those rates but does not incorporate ACEs as a metric.

Stump and department staff offered to provide additional technical presentations on related topics after the budget process, and committee members were directed to uploaded guidance documents and report-card guides for further review.

Ending: Committee members were shown how to download component-level data and visual dashboards; staff said they are available to provide follow-up briefings on report-card topics after the budget process.