# data[].attributes.body
KQED resources for growth mindset, teaching strategies, and much more

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
"What we are talking about here is a complete restructure," said Virgil Hammonds, who just wrapped up a stint as superintendent of RSU2 in Maine and previously led competency efforts in Lindsay, California. He likened the process to a home-remodel where the whole building is knocked down to its foundation and built anew.
LAYING THE GROUNDWORK
To undertake this kind of big project a district needs to take a systems approach to teaching and learning, gathering input from all the stakeholders, listening carefully, incorporating those ideas in real ways into the plan and developing a strong shared vision and district culture.

"I have come to firmly believe that if this part isn't done well then districts may have difficulty implementing with fidelity since the culture of the traditional system remains intact," said Robert Crumley, superintendent of Chugach School District in Alaska.

It took Chugach almost three years to complete this ramping up phase. Crumley and his staff held dozens of community meetings, inviting parents, students, educators, business leaders and community members to share their input for a new vision of school that put students at the center. The district already had a lot of unflattering data telling them they needed to try something new or else fall behind.

After the initial input-gathering period, the superintendent and the school board made a public five-year commitment to making changes based on that input. "That public commitment was instrumental in staff having confidence that we were going to continue with this," Crumley said. He's well aware of "initiative fatigue" that many educators feel when new education fads come and go. But the public commitment helped gain their trust, as did the obvious incorporation of their ideas into the new plan.

Crumley also took the time to empower the staff in his district, focusing on retention, not finding new teachers that already fit the mold. To do this, Crumley worked on helping his staff have a growth mindset about their efforts and empowered them with three simple motivators:

1. Engage in complex work with a sense of mastery.

2. Engage with other people.

3. Give them some autonomy over what they do and how and when to do it.

"When you empower people you are actually giving up a little of your power and handing it to someone else," Crumley said. "That can be a little scary for some people, but it generally garners greater results for the system in the long term." Crumley even found that some of the loudest voices pushing back against the changes soon became his strongest allies. When they saw that their concerns were listened to and addressed, those vocal opponents who were often charismatic leaders in their school communities, saw their way toward the shared vision.

"Often times their concerns were valid concerns that we needed to address and they helped us address them," Crumley said. If a teacher felt so misaligned with the new system that they didn't want to work there, the district helped them find work elsewhere.

"We need to model the conditions of innovation and problem-solving as principals and district administrators," Crumley said. That means not letting bureaucracy get in the way of innovation. It means creating the conditions where staff feel they are safe to experiment and tinker with their practice.
BUILD UP INFRASTRUCTURE
Many districts trying to implement a competency education don't spend the necessary time ramping up to this kind of sweeping reform, instead jumping right into designing the infrastructure as though it is a technical problem. But without the buy-in of the community, school board, staff and students, the reform effort is likely to flop. The infrastructure must be built on a strong foundation.

"We need to model the conditions of innovation and problem-solving as principals and district administrators."

When those shared values are in place it becomes imperative that the competencies students are expected to learn are completely transparent. "We're no longer the teacher who is holding the secret of how to earn that top-level grade," Hammonds said. "Instead we say, 'here are the expectations for rigor and a clear scale for how to achieve it.'"

Teachers need to work together to clearly define the scale for how students will achieve mastery and what qualities will be included. While all students are held accountable for the same high expectations and the same competencies, they will each show their mastery in different ways. Teachers have to be ready for that variance, embrace it, and know what they are looking for to maintain rigorous standards.
TRANSITIONING INTO COMPETENCY EDUCATION
There's no "right way" to transition into such a drastically different way of thinking about school because the unique factors of each district and community will play a big role. Asking the community what they want their graduates to look like is a good way to start. Preparing students for what the new system will be like and preparing them to take on more autonomy and agency is also crucial.

Clarifying questions to help define pedagogical approach:

ž

What do we know about the different ways to motivate and engage students? ž

Where does student agency fit in learning?

What role do habits of learning play, and how can they be developed in students?

What does the research tell us about effective instructional practices?

What are the types of assessment, and what role do they play in achievement?

What types of learning experiences are needed to help students reach graduation goals?

Given your current student population, their academic needs, and their life and learning experiences, how might this inform your school design or pedagogical approach?

What challenges and educational needs can online and blended learning help you address?

How do parents and the community at large think about these questions?

Clearly defining the competences and the indicators is one step. Designing rubrics that clearly link back to those competencies is another equally important step that often gets overlooked. In hindsight, Hammonds wishes his team had spent more time designing the assessment rubrics. "When assessment goes beyond the level of retrieval (the goal of this kind of system), it is extra important to define things like what reflection looks like," he said.

Pittsfield School District in New Hampshire had a slightly easier journey to competency than Alaska or Maine because the state passed a law requiring high schools to implement competency education by 2008. That law has been ignored or implemented with varying degrees of effectiveness in different parts of the state, but it did help provide some support as schools began to define indicators of competencies.

For two years Pittsfield educators did research, visited other schools and began identifying teacher leaders who would pilot ideas in their classrooms. Those teacher-leaders eventually put together "Do's and Don'ts" for peers based on early experimentation. In the first year, the district devoted a lot of resources to writing the competencies, checking them against a rigor tool the state provided and training teachers, said Derek Hamilton, dean of operations for Pittsfield School District.

A panel of excited teachers who deeply understood competency education dug into the district's current grading practices and policies, revising them to fit the competency model. They wanted to be sure teachers felt they could be consistent from class-to-class and grade-to-grade. Teachers got student feedback on whether the competencies were clear.

In the second year, the district presented the competencies they'd developed to the community. While parents had been clear about the general skills and dispositions they wanted students to graduate with, they hadn't participated in the nitty-gritty competency writing and they needed to be brought up to speed.

In the third year, Pittsfield implemented the system throughout their 7-12th grade classes. It was bumpy at first, but Hamilton said when students led conferences with their parents and teachers, it all started to become clear. The parents could see how their child's work connected to the rubric. This stage helped solidify support.

"We understood that in order to make this transformation we needed to find time to do it," Hamilton said. School starts late once a week so teachers can have professional development time that's crucial to working out the kinks in the new system.

The first several years gave teachers and administrators a lot to reflect on, and in the fourth year teachers saw the need to better support students moving ahead or behind pace. They also implemented a support block on Wednesdays entirely dedicated to one-on-one support. They recognized that if time were truly flexible for students, then educator resources needed to be available in the summer too. Teachers began holding office hours, for which the district paid them, to support students who were still working on competencies.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Steps to Help Schools Transform to Competency-Based Learning

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
"What we are talking about here is a complete restructure," said Virgil Hammonds, who just wrapped up a stint as superintendent of RSU2 in Maine and previously led competency efforts in Lindsay, California. He likened the process to a home-remodel where the whole building is knocked down to its foundation and built anew.

# data[].attributes.body
Online resources for mastery grading from LAUSD experts

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Our next Mastery Learning and Grading salary point class will be offered this spring semester at Maclay MS. The class will meet from 8:00 am to 1:00 pm on the following three Saturdays: January 20 February 10 March 3 Participants can earn Mastery Learning and Grading certification as well as one salary point credit.

# data[].attributes.headline
 Mastery Based Recommended Reading List 

# data[].attributes.subject
 Mastery Based Recommended Reading List 

# data[].attributes.body
Idaho SBE

# data[].attributes.body
Competency-Based Education

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
In a previous post, I explained competency-based or "mastery" grading: a restructuring of the common grade system that compresses everything from course tests, homework, and class participation into a system that assesses students based entirely on whether or not they've mastered specific skills and concepts. (For a look at how mastery grading works in practice, check out how schools like Columbus's Metro Early College School and Cleveland's MC²STEM high school, and even suburban districts like Pickerington, make it work). In this piece, I'll discuss some additional benefits and drawbacks of mastery grading.

Mastery grading is innovative in that students only move on to more complex concepts and skills once they mastered simpler ones. As a result, the failure to master on the first attempt isn't "failure." It's a chance for students to receive additional instruction and support targeted at specific weak spots, work hard, master key concepts, and move on with a firm foundation in place.

For teachers, the possibility of meaningful achievement data that is disaggregated by child and skill and directly drives instruction should be drool-worthy. Imagine knowing at the beginning of the year-before ever giving a diagnostic assessment-what your new students have fully,...

In his proposed budget , Governor John Kasich calls for the creation of a competency-based education pilot program. Competency-based education is premised on the idea that students only move on to more complex concepts and skills after they master simpler ones. While that sounds somewhat negative at first blush, it also means that mastering current content quickly leads to advancing sooner than the standard march from grade to grade. Kasich's proposal would provide grants to ten districts or schools that were selected through an application process created by the Ohio Department of Education to pilot the program.

The competency-based model goes by different names in different places. In Ohio, there are schools that already utilize it but call it something different: mastery grading. (Be sure to check out how schools like Metro Early College School and MC²STEM high school, as well as districts like Pickerington, make it work.) Mastery grading assesses students based on whether or not they've mastered specific skills and concepts. Instead of an overall grade that takes homework completion, daily assignments, class participation, and test grades that cover multiple standards into account to formulate an average, mastery grading breaks down a student's...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In a previous post, I explained competency-based or "mastery" grading: a restructuring of the common grade system that compresses everything from course tests, homework, and class participation into a system that assesses students based entirely on whether or not they've mastered specific skills and concepts.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Commentary

I am the principal in a grades 7-8 school, perhaps the last venue where we try to give kids second, and sometimes third, chances. This happens mostly with discipline, but also with academics, because this is the last time when a kid's grades do not really matter. What I mean by this is that I am unaware of any college or employer that has ever requested a transcript from a student's junior high school.

My teachers and I are currently having discussions about grading practices, standards-based grading, and everything in between. I do not know that we will ever adopt a truly standards-based grading system, but I believe we are on our way to making our grading system more meaningful.

The first thing we attempted to clarify was what exactly is a grade? If I were to look in my grade book and see that Johnny has a B, what picture does that actually paint? That B should tell me that Johnny is pretty proficient. He obviously has some flaws, but I would venture to say he is fairly well-versed in the subject at hand.

The question is, however, what actually went into that B? Unfortunately, a teacher's grade book is one of life's greatest mysteries. Did Johnny do well on tests, but fail to turn in some homework assignments, thus dropping him to a B? Possibly worse, did he do poorly on his tests, but those deficiencies were masked by Johnny's reliable turning-in of homework or participation in class? Perhaps worse yet, did Johnny's grade increase because he brought in a box of tissues or earned some other type of extra credit? I firmly believe the problems of the American education system are not the result of years of poor teaching practices. They are the result of years of poor grading practices.

Now I am not looking to debate the relevance of homework. There are experts out there who can cite research and data to both support and refute the importance of homework, and I have no desire to wade into that discussion. It is also not my intention to debate the merits of high-stakes testing. What I hope to bring to light is what a grade really is.

Ideally, Johnny's B should tell me that Johnny has a good handle on things and will likely do well on any standardized test in that subject. Realistically, I have no idea what Johnny's B means. To fix that problem, I suggest we make sure Johnny's grade reflects what he knows and is not influenced by factors such as discipline or responsibility. Those should be separated.

I believe it is our responsibility to make sure all students are learning the content and skills that are required of them. I am a big believer in reteaching and reassessing. It is more important that the child learns the material than when the child learns the material. If a child takes an assessment (I dislike the word "test") and fails because he or she does not know the topic, that child receives a low grade. So far, that is fair. However, simply putting that grade in the grade book and moving on is the exact reason why public schools are in the position they are in today. This process begins early in a child's education when a child never learns the necessary skills, and then continues to fall further and further behind. It would be my hope that a struggling student receives additional instruction and is reassessed and that his or her grade is updated to reflect the new knowledge gained.

At my school, many teachers will have a brief discussion with students before or after class to identify a problem, and teachers will give suggestions on looking at the content from a different angle. Sometimes a student will come to school 10 minutes early for the reteaching portion of his or her day, and then the student and teacher will work out a convenient time to reassess what's been learned (or not learned). We have built two daily intervention periods into the school day (around lunch time) for all students to assist in this endeavor. But it still brings us back to the original debate of grading based on what's been learned versus when it was learned.

When I share this view with other educators, the No. 1 response I get is that it is not fair to the kids who got it the first time to allow kids to be reassessed.

Really? I missed the part in education school where they taught us that a grade's primary purpose was to compare and rank students. It was my understanding that a grade is a tool that tells us about an individual's level of mastery. If that is the case, then it is unfair if we do not reassess that individual.

The second-most-common response, and one gaining some momentum lately, is that by giving students extra supports, we are not preparing them for college because there will be no opportunities for a redo there. That is probably correct, but what is more important for us to teach our students: deadlines or the actual skills they will need to be successful? I argue that it is the latter. I understand that deadlines and a sense of responsibility are important skills to learn, but not at the expense of learning the primary skill that was at the heart of the assignment, project, or assessment in the first place.

So how do we fix the grading system? If we are going to continue to use the traditional 100-point grading model, then we need to make grades more meaningful and more reflective of what students have mastered, not how compliant they have been. We need to get to the point of looking at a student's grade and knowing exactly what it means. We can do that by basing students' grades on their levels of mastery. If we can identify the students who need help simply by looking at our grade book, we will be able help those students rather than just passing them along. I am not a proponent of just passing them along. I am a proponent of fixing the problem.

I have two daughters, and they both enjoy playing golf. It would be nice if they made it to the LPGA Tour (I'm really not that dad, just trying to prove a point). But it is more important for them to learn the basic skills than it would be to learn those skills on the lightning-quick greens of Augusta. So I choose to take them out to the local public course. My detractors might say: "Well the greens on the LGPA Tour are not that slow. You are not preparing them to be successful." I think most people would look at that viewpoint and find the logic flawed. I wish more people saw it that way in education.

Published in Print: June 5, 2013, as What's in a Grade? Why Mastery, Not Speed, Is Key
Back to Top

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Why Grades Should Reflect Mastery, Not Speed

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Commentary I am the principal in a grades 7-8 school, perhaps the last venue where we try to give kids second, and sometimes third, chances. This happens mostly with discipline, but also with academics, because this is the last time when a kid's grades do not really matter.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Imagine if Education Worked This Way in Most Schools ...

Back in 2011, I had been blogging about education for a couple of years and found myself thinking that while lots of tech tools showed promise as engaging constructs, and offered something new and exciting, I wasn't sure that they could really change learning. Then I came across the concept of "reverse instruction", which had recently been labelled the "flipped classroom" by some pioneering teachers writing about it online. Here was something that could truly impact the we teach and how students learn.

The flipped classroom technique leverages technology to truly position teachers to change how they teach, and how students learn. The concept of individualized learning had been around for decades, and all teachers inherently do it to some extent, but in the traditional classroom, there had never been much time for it. With the flipped classroom, by pushing some learning content out of the classroom, it freed up time during class to work more directly with our students. This just made so much sense.

I've been writing about and using flipped techniques ever since, and it has been my pleasure to teach educators all across the world about how to get start with it in their classrooms over these last 5 or so years.

A Gateway to Deeper Learning

Over that time, while gaining experience teaching, and constantly reading and learning about it, I've noticed that many passionate educators have used the flipped classroom as a gateway to deeper learning experiences. Aaron Sams does a great job of laying this out in this video:

Sams notes how teachers typically take a second step beyond the flipped classroom model to build on what they've started. This can include more inquiry, project based learning, and mastery learning, and "handing over a lot of control of the learning process to the students" ( ohh ... scary).

Mastery Learning

Sams references Mastery Learning in his video, and it ties into the concept of Mastery-Based Grading, so let's review it quickly. Mastery Learning is an instructional strategy and educational philosophy, first proposed in 1968 by Benjamin Bloom (yes, also the mind behind the famous Bloom's Taxonomy). Mastery Learning "maintains that students must achieve a level of mastery (i.e. 90% on a knowledge test) in prerequisite knowledge before moving forward to learn subsequent information. If a student does not achieve mastery on the test, they are given additional support in learning and reviewing the information, then tested again. This cycle will continue until the learner accomplishes mastery, and may move on to the next stage."

Mastery-Based Grading

Mastery Learning ties logically to an alternative approach to assessment and grading. There is a call in some education circles to do away with traditional grading and tests. Tests don't really explore what a student can do with what they've learned. Of course, some subjects (think basic arithmetic) can be very effectively tested with a test, but so many really can't. Just because a student can memorize and recall a bunch of facts doesn't mean he can apply them in a useful way (or that he or she isn't bored to tears in that class).

The recent article, " Is This for a Grade?": how Mastery-Based Grading is Changing our School ", provides a good view into how mastery grading can work.

At Tri-County Early College, they use a mastery-based grading approach, and here is an explanation of two of the key elements in their grading system:
"1. All assignments must be completed at a level of competency and are in-play as long as that takes (i.e. grades are never used as a punitive measure and zeros are never given).
By insisting that all assignments be completed, we address the learned behavior many students who come to us have developed in the traditional model: one that says it's okay to simply opt-out of an assignment and take a zero. Our students learn early on that (1) we don't give just "busywork" assignments and that (2) all assignments must be completed in order to obtain credit for a given course. We also realize that all students do not learn key concepts at the same pace and thus allow them to redo assignments as often as is necessary to prove a minimum level of proficiency.
2. Grades are indicated in terms of relative mastery opposite learning goals rather than arbitrary letter grades.
The second key attribute of our grading system takes square aim at the mindset of focusing only on the grade and not the learning process. This is done by eliminating the A - F scale in favor of one that is simply an indicator of student growth: in-progress, mastery or high mastery. As mentioned above, the student is expected to continue working to attain "mastery" per clear learning goals established at the beginning of each project/unit of study."

For those wondering, this article also explains how this can be mapped back to the essential A - F grades required by most of our grading systems, and expected by parents, colleges, and other stakeholders.

Wrapping it Up

How exciting it is to see how a good idea (the flipped classroom) has served as a cornerstone for building a deeper and more active learning experience that can also be assessed in a better way than the outmoded, uninformative grading system still so widely in use in our schools. Let's use that valuable class time to help students solve problems and create, to construct and master their own learning, to change how they look at learning, and to take ownership of it.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
Mastery Learning and Grading: Changing our Approach to Outcomes and Grades

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Back in 2011, I had been blogging about education for a couple of years and found myself thinking that while lots of tech tools showed promise as engaging constructs, and offered something new and exciting, I wasn't sure that they could really change learning.

# data[].attributes.body
MBG

# data[].attributes.body
Mastery-based grading and assessment

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
How you can help students take responsibility and meet high expectations by providing the right tools and support along the way.

Photo credit: Zachary Fink

Project-based learning help students at MC<sup>2</sup> STEM High School meet the school's rigorous requirements for reaching mastery in order to receive credit.

MC ² (Metropolitan Cleveland Consortium) STEM High School is a year-round public school in Cleveland, Ohio, where instruction is through interdisciplinary project-based learning, and the focus is on providing students with an integrated curriculum that is informed by real-world experiences.

The school uses a mastery system for assessment (PDF) in grades nine and ten in lieu of the traditional A-F system. This means that students must demonstrate competency at 90 percent or better in order to receive an "M" for mastery on any given benchmark task, and they must achieve mastery in order to receive credit. In setting such a high bar, the system clearly defines expectations and demands top academic performance. However, in requiring that all students meet this bar, it also communicates that the administration believes every student is capable of reaching this standard, and it obligates the school to provide the tools and support for students to succeed.

The school has multiple structures in place to ensure that students can meet the requirements, including trained volunteer tutors from NASA, General Electric Lighting, and local teaching colleges, as well as differentiated instruction (PDF) from the teachers. In math teacher Catherine Staveteig's class, this means that she uses a combination of group projects, individualized learning -- which can include online exercises -- small group sessions, and one-on-one instruction. At the end of each quarter, she has "recovery time," when she may provide alternative assignments to give students different ways to learn and demonstrate their mastery and thereby obtain credits they didn't earn before.

One of the core operating principles at MC² STEM (PDF) is "Master your own path." The mastery assessment system helps to inculcate this principle because students are expected to take responsibility for meeting the school's expectations. Rubrics are transparent to the students so that they know exactly what is required of them. Teachers provide the instructional support students need and make themselves available for additional help, but students are expected to know their own status and be proactive about seeking what they need, whether from teachers, tutors, or fellow students. As senior Timothy Hatfield explains, "With the mastery system, I am held accountable to do that work and get it turned in."
Resources from MC² STEM
These kinds of high expectations, along with adequate support structures in place, have been shown to be some of the most impactful strategies for improving academic achievement. You can read more about the research supporting this approach, as well as other strategies in practice at MC ² STEM, in our research summary.

Grades 9-12 | Cleveland , OH

Enrollment

270 | Public, Urban

Per Pupil Expenditures

Free / Reduced Lunch

100%

DEMOGRAPHICS:

1% Asian/Pacific Islander

Data is from the 2010-2011 academic year.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
How you can help students take responsibility and meet high expectations by providing the right tools and support along the way. Photo credit: Zachary Fink Project-based learning help students at MC 2 STEM High School meet the school's rigorous requirements for reaching mastery in order to receive credit.