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New student-achievement director: district proficiency "not good enough," data disaggregation planned
Summary
Student achievement director presented statewide assessment results and outlined steps for principals and teachers to disaggregate data and set SMART goals; board members raised concerns about proficiency, growth and classroom consistency.
Miss Olsen, the district's new student achievement director, presented recent proficiency data from the Arizona Academic Standards Assessment (AASA), ACT, Arizona Science Test and ACT Aspire and told the board the results are "in line with the state's average proficiency, but that is not good enough for us." She outlined immediate next steps to analyze and act on the data.
Olsen said the district will disaggregate data at district, school, teacher and student levels and examine subgroup results (for example, English language learners). "We're going to then examine the data by both domain and cluster," Olsen said, adding principals will be asked to create measurable SMART goals tied to the state standards and dates for checkpoints.
Olsen described how the state uses proficiency and growth differently in school letter grades: proficiency counts toward preparedness while growth carries more weight in the grade formula. "Proficiency is 30% of the letter grade where growth is 50% of the letter grade," a staff member explained during discussion.
Board members pressed on whether instructional coaches should be placed at each campus and discussed the trade-off between a single district vision of instruction and site-based coaching. Olsen said her immediate priority is creating a common vision of what high-quality instruction looks like across the district before expanding coaching roles.
Public commenters and board members also discussed factors that affect proficiency rates, including student test-taking motivation, family engagement and school leadership consistency. One audience member said school leadership and staff morale affect instructional quality and student outcomes.
Olsen said school letter grades are typically released in November and the district will hold additional data meetings with principals after that release to refine goals and interventions.
Provenance: Miss Olsen presented AASA and ACT findings and next steps (transcript start 00:44:11).
