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It is painful when all of the effort that teachers and students put into teaching and learning becomes summarized by standardized test results-especially when hard-working students that have demonstrated massive growth over the course of the year receive poor scores.

This past April, while administering the 5th grade ELA standardized test in Louisiana, I did as I was supposed to-I circulated and stuck to the script. I walked up behind Mike (name has been changed), a bright and diligent student. He was slumped in his chair, staring at the ceiling. I patted his shoulder. "Try your best," I said. He rolled his eyes at me.

Somehow Mike scored 'Approaching Basic,' which is not the lowest score, but is below the grade level standard. I'm not even sure if he finished the test, and at one point, I had to ask him to leave the room after he propelled himself out of his chair and groan-hollered. I was annoyed. He was capable of passing, but he blatantly gave up. His score reflects badly on me as a teacher-and I guess it should.

The truth is, I am much annoyed with myself than I am with Mike. He was one of my best students and his reading comprehension was on grade level according to his classwork, quiz grades and discussions. But I didn't figure out a way to help him see that or get him to invest in himself. I wondered how the test would affect him after it was over. Would it just add to his test anxiety in the future? Was I just another irrelevant adult pushing him to do something he didn't didn't see the point of? Would his score rob him of confidence in his intelligence and ability to be successful?

Now, Mike is a 6th grader at my school and he came to spend recess in my classroom recently. Apparently he hates recess; he wanted to hang out in my room instead. It bothered me that he had underperformed and seemed to blow off the test, so I asked him why he didn't show what he knew that day. "I just hate those tests," he moaned, explaining that they were boring and stressful. So, I dug a little deeper, asking him what he wants to be when he grows up. He said: "I don't know, maybe an FBI agent." I asked him if he would try hard on a test for that job. He said "If there's a test, then I would just have to find a different job." When I heard that, I knew I'd failed Mike.

As much as the test is an indicator of his reading comprehension-and I do believe that Common Core-aligned tests give a valuable measure of students' reading comprehension and critical thinking skills-this particular child left my classroom lacking confidence in his ability to achieve his future goals, maybe even more convinced that he couldn't achieve them.

Our school got a grant in 2016 to implement a personalized learning initiative. In June, before the school year started, my colleagues and I travelled to Chicago to work with LEAP Innovations, get schooled in the LEAP Learning Framework, and visit several local schools that were successfully implementing personalized learning. I was excited to try everything I saw.

When I returned, I purchased beanbags and bounce cushions to implement flexible seating. I used my 1:1 laptops to create a paperless classroom, providing instant teacher feedback on writing assignments. I made a class playlist on Google sites with hyperlinked assignments that allowed students to choose which skills to work on and which activities to complete. I even administered frequent student surveys to get their feedback. But what I neglected to do, despite the better wisdom of the teachers and administrators I met in Chicago, was to help kids set goals that mattered to them.

It's not that I didn't think about it-it's that I wasn't sure what to track. I showed kids their grades and ELA standards mastery scores, which I had tracked through bi-weekly Common Core-aligned quizzes. I meticulously graded every classwork assignment and sent them individualized feedback. I sent them rubrics for writing assignments and emailed them grades for every exit ticket. But what I didn't do was ask them what they wanted to achieve. And this was a mistake because kids are motivated by goals-not grades.

At nearly every school I visited in Chicago teachers told us that if there is one essential thing to do in a personalized learning classroom, it is to conference with students. However, much like my own middle school students, I ignored the tried and true wisdom and had to learn the hard way.

When I met with Mike last week, I essentially conferenced with him. I learned about his larger goals, and if I had been more intentional about it, or if I still had the opportunity to teach him, I could have helped him set more smaller benchmark goals and celebrate his victories along the way. If I had conferenced with Mike last year, I might have been able to point out to him how his research skills could help him become an excellent investigator. Or that his blog entries, in which he embedded extremely relevant GIFs into spoiler posts about the novel we were reading, " The Westing Game," might indicate a future in new media journalism. Or maybe I would have found out that the test makes him nervous and helped him practice calming strategies so he could still do his best.

I work at a school where nearly every student receives free and reduced lunch. Because research has shown that poverty correlates with lower standardized scores, we already know that most of my students, including Mike, are at a disadvantage from day one. That's not to say our students can't achieve high scores on these tests; I know they can and I have seen many of them do so. But how can we motivate the kids who can't see how a multiple choice test impacts their future? And is success on the test enough? Some research suggests that even a college degree is 'worth less if you are raised poor.' Other research, however, shows that goal setting can close achievement gaps.

My goal for my students is not that they pass the test-it's that they accomplish their own healthy and productive goals. I can't presume to generalize what that means for all of them, and since every child is different, I imagine that every learner's goals will be as well. I want my students to succeed on the test, but I don't think the scores alone are enough to really make a difference in their lives, especially if they are trying to climb into a higher socioeconomic situation or defeat a pattern of intergenerational poverty. I'm not sure what is.

I've read a lot about the qualities that correlate with success-empathy, having a best friend, reading on grade-level in the third grade. All of those things might matter as much as the scores on the Common Core-aligned tests, but I believe the goals students have for themselves are more motivating than anything else could possibly be.

This year, I plan to help my kids set personal goals and make individualized plans for success. I plan to help them see how each moment in a classroom can connect to their dreams, and to conference with all 80 of my students at least twice a month. And if I find out that there are concepts they feel they need or want to know, I plan to support them in their learning.

The conference is the most personal aspect of personalized learning. I hope that conferencing and personalizing goals for each student will help my students achieve on the test. More importantly, however, I hope that in 15 years, my students land the job they want, even if they have to sit through a test to get it-and that when they do, they feel proud, confident and successful. If only there was a way to measure that.
Annie Preziosi is a fifth grade teacher in New Orleans, Louisiana.
This story is part of an EdSurge Research series about how personalized learning is implemented in different school communities across the country. These stories are made publicly available with support from Chan Zuckerberg Initiative. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

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What Happens When Standardized Test Scores Don't Reflect Student Growth? - EdSurge News

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It is painful when all of the effort that teachers and students put into teaching and learning becomes summarized by standardized test results-especially when hard-working students that have demonstrated massive growth over the course of the year receive poor scores.

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When Cole Young became the principal of Humboldt Elementary School 12 years ago, the school was only 300ths of a point away from being labeled under-performing. Young, who had previously been a teacher at Humboldt, knew that they needed to enact change -- and they needed to do it quickly.

Young, who says he'd "been a numbers guy for a long time," began aggregating all kinds of data, pushing it out to the teachers and staff, and exploring the role it could play in helping the school turn the tables on its under-performing label. Twelve years later, the result is a school that uses data in myriad ways and is truly data driven.

Creating A Data-Friendly Culture

In moving Humboldt Elementary to a more data-driven model, one of the first challenges that former principal Cole Young faced was figuring out how to use the data, how to share it, and how to get everyone on the same page with the numbers. The school didn't have a culture of data, and creating one was difficult. "I had never been a part of a data culture, and we didn't have a system in place for it," Young says. One of Humboldt's early mistakes was what Young calls "death by data," where teachers were given a mountain of numbers and often felt a sense of "now what?"

Young began parsing through the data and looking for what would be the most useful for teachers, providing them with enough data to help them feel effective and targeted in their instruction without crossing the line into overwhelming. Once that data was shared, Humboldt staff met as a group to look at the numbers and talk about what to do with it, how it applied to research-based practices, and strategize collaboratively as a school.

Every teacher had a different comfort level with working this way, but once they looked at the data and were able to see the data points start to move for their students, the staff developed an overall sense of empowerment and buy-in.

Making It Collaborative, Not Competitive

Teachers at Humboldt don't see just their own data and scores, they see everyone else's as well. That openness wasn't something that was initially in place. Previously, teachers might have felt that they would be judged by their students' data, and it was something they kept to themselves.

Three years into his tenure, Young decided to start sharing data for all teachers, and used it as an opportunity for staff to collaborate and strategize together. Now everyone's data is shared and projected on screen after the benchmark assessments, and teachers come together to draw strengths from each other as they reflect on the data.

Tools of the Trade

Humboldt uses several different assessments to track student performance, including DIBELS, Galileo, and the AIMS test. Title I instructor Maureen Holt currently creates the student data reports in a program called VPORT, although Humboldt has used the MClass program in the past.

Creating Their Own Tools

Once they developed a comfort with data, teachers found themselves wishing for better tools to help them organize it. When they couldn't find what they were looking for, Humboldt teachers created their own data tools.

On the wall of instructional specialist Gwen Walton's room is a color-banded row of four hanging pockets that hold colored index cards. Each card represents a child, and each color represents a certain level of performance. Red is for students in Tier 3, yellow represents Tier 2, green is for students who are performing at benchmark, and blue is for students who are high achievers. The wall is only for reading scores, since that was a big push for Humboldt over the last few years.

Students are tested at the beginning of the year to establish their index card color, which is also the color band in which their card starts out. As they are progress monitored every three weeks and fluctuate up or down in achievement, their card moves through the color bands. This wall is strictly teacher facing, so the students never see it, but it's a visual way for teachers and staff to keep track of how kids are improving and where they are currently performing.

Keeping the Conversation Going

Once the students are benchmarked and that data is shared, the conversation about those scores doesn't end. Teachers are continually getting data, ensuring an ongoing process of examining it and making changes from it throughout the year. "We didn't wait for natural breaks along the way, such as Christmas or spring break," Young says. "Once we saw something in the data, we made changes immediately."

Humboldt teachers have grade-level meetings every week to review their data together and strategize, as well as sharing tips and practices. "Teachers are talking data all the time," Young says.

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Making Student Data Part of the Conversation

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When Cole Young became the principal of Humboldt Elementary School 12 years ago, the school was only 300ths of a point away from being labeled under-performing. Young, who had previously been a teacher at Humboldt, knew that they needed to enact change -- and they needed to do it quickly.

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December 2008/January 2009 | Volume 66 | Number 4
Data: Now What? Pages 65-69

Makeba Jones and Susan Yonezawa

Few students are typically around at 7:30 a.m. on Wednesday at the Crawford High School Educational Complex in San Diego, California, home of four autonomous small schools. Wednesday is a "late start" day: School begins at 9:00 a.m., and teachers, administrators, and counselors spend the early-morning hours discussing various school matters. But on this June day, at the Invention and Design Educational Academy, one of the schools in the complex, the main office is bustling with the energy of 20 students. The school's morning professional development meeting is devoted to hearing about a qualitative research study recently conducted by a student co-research team.

At 7:40, the team walks into the classroom where the faculty meeting is occurring, and the students spread out in the front of the room and nervously wait to be introduced. One by one, the students explain their study of teachers' grading policies and classroom syllabi. One finding reveals that teachers vary in how they distribute D grades, with 4 of 17 teachers using a "no D" policy and another 4 teachers reporting that they give D s to students to enable them to pass the class. Another finding shows that 75 percent of the teachers report consistently following their syllabi, whereas 25 percent admit they do not. Teachers respond by asking questions-"Does our school need to coordinate a homework policy?" or "Is it possible to build conformity to a grading policy, at least within the same subject areas?"-or reflecting on their practice-"We should all make sure that students understand how they are being graded, and do a better job of sticking to the syllabus. ... I'm guilty of that."

For the past two years the Center for Research on Educational Equity, Assessment, and Teaching Excellence at the University of California, San Diego, has designed and run student co-research projects, with more than 150 students at eight racially diverse urban and low-income San Diego high schools. The students we have worked with have collected 449 student interviews, 122 teacher interviews, and 36 classroom observations; and they have surveyed 822 students and 13 teachers.

Student Voice and Inquiry

Our work embodies the fundamental premise that adolescents can help adults improve schools. Students have unique expertise regarding schools and can provide important information about school and classroom practices and policies.

Research into student voice highlights the power of asking students to help adults with education reform (Joselowsky, 2005; Yonezawa & Jones, 2008). Moreover, such work aligns with current discourse around data-driven school improvement at the district and school levels (Murnane, City, & Singleton, 2008) and provides opportunities for students to participate in real-world experiences to improve the larger school community (Marks, 2000; Newmann, 1992).

One Research Site

The School of International Studies is one of six autonomous small schools on the San Diego High Educational Complex. In 2006-07, the school enrolled just under 500 students, and its student population was 42 percent Latino, 34 percent white, 13 percent black, and 8 percent Asian. More than 50 percent of its students are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch.

The school's student co-research project began in 2006-07 with a study of classroom engagement in the school. That year, principal Karen Wroblewski recruited four students to participate. She used their findings to shape staff development the following year.

In the 2007-08 school year, students for the research group were recruited from a marketing class in which students learned, among other things, how to participate in a team to accomplish a shared goal or purpose. Wroblewski thought the students could enhance their collaboration skills by working on an authentic research project to help improve the school. The marketing teacher, Charos Maull, agreed that students who volunteered could use their research project toward their final grade in her class. Seven students eagerly signed up for the project.

We first met the seven students on the launch day, during which students learned about qualitative social science research through short lectures, discussions, and small-group activities. An important part of the day was talking with Wroblewski about her efforts to help teachers improve their classroom practices to better engage students. Students discussed in a focus group their personal classroom experiences and offered suggestions about how to engage students as learners. The focus group enabled students to share their thoughts and helped the group agree on a research focus.

The students hypothesized that the structure of the school affected students' attitudes toward learning. They began to define various aspects of school structure-positive and negative-that might affect students' lives. Some of the negative aspects of the structural environment included tight policies regarding bathroom access, restrictions on food and drinks in class, and the presence of drug-sniffing dogs. Positive aspects of the school structure included increased academic support and tutoring.

The Research Questions

The student researchers eventually decided to study the educational environment at the school and its potential effect on students' attitudes. One senior captured his passion for the topic in this comment in his research notebook:

These topics epitomize everything I cannot bear regarding school. These are why my grades have dropped. I'm no longer motivated and so white with rage at times. If we could find a way to address these issues and conduct research to present to the staff which could facilitate change ... that would be the first worthwhile thing I've ever done at San Diego High "Correctional Facility."

The students' discussions led them to develop the following research questions:

To what extent do the structure at the school, the quantity of work, and individual classes affect the overall attitude of students and the quality of learning?

Does the structure of the school encourage success for students?

To investigate their questions, the students surveyed 292 students in grades 9-12 and interviewed 17 teachers and 8 students. The 17 teacher interviews included 80 percent of the teachers. The research team wanted to capture a range of students' perspectives, but they realized that a student survey and a select group of in-depth student interviews would be the best methodological approach given resource constraints. We taught students how to develop sound interview protocols and surveys and talked with them about maintaining confidentiality, responsibility, professionalism, and research ethics. Students sought opinions on school policies, security, the overall school environment, the quantity of work expected of students, and student learning supports.

Data Analysis

The team met approximately four times in 90-minute sessions to analyze the survey data by gender and grade level. They created charts and matrices to organize the data. The students divided the data into three topics: structure, attitude, and learning. To analyze the data, they worked in small groups of two or three students, with each group taking responsibility for one topic. They examined data from the surveys and interview transcripts and discussed emerging patterns. They made notations in research notebooks and debated their findings, searching for evidence to support and refute the various arguments. The students would begin with one type of data (such as survey data) and comb it for tentative findings, and then turn to a second source (such as interview data) to look for additional evidence.

The small groups shared tentative findings with the team and further discussed which findings made sense overall. Students also debated how to represent findings. For example, should they report that 28 percent of female students felt that their school was like a prison or-the reverse-that 72 percent felt that it was not?

The Findings

In the end, the researchers found that students generally believed that the school's structure worked well and that teachers were providing a good education. Students (especially seniors) did question, however, the extent of campus security and the bathroom and food policies. The researchers further learned that students (especially sophomores, at 46 percent) were overwhelmed by the workload. Female students were slightly more overwhelmed (34 percent) than male students (31 percent); and male students (42 percent) were slightly more likely than female students (39 percent) to sacrifice grades in one class to keep up in another. Support classes helped students, but they did not provide enough assistance given the amount of work assigned.

The students presented their study to the teachers and Wroblewski. The presentation prompted conversations among the impressed faculty members about how to address workload issues yet maintain the school's mission for academic excellence. Wroblewski asked her teachers, "Hypothetically, do you think our students would learn less if we gave them less work?" Pausing thoughtfully, many teachers slowly shook their heads.

The principal suggested talking about the data in upcoming professional development sessions. The teachers said that they wanted to continue thinking about how they could incorporate the students' data into their classroom plans. Although the school has not yet made concrete changes, Wroblewski has reported that she intends to revisit these issues with her faculty this school year.

Supporting Student Co-Research

How well student research is implemented and valued in any given school or classroom depends largely on the support it receives from school faculty. At the eight schools we have worked with, the research teams were fortunate to have supportive educators who believed student co-research improved their school communities and provided an important learning experience. The principals provided needed resources as well as emotional and political support to the student co-research teams.

In June 2008, a third-party researcher interviewed the principals of the schools we worked with about the project. From their comments, and those of the students, we gleaned a few key ways that school leaders can support student co-research teams at their sites.

Because student co-research projects can tackle issues that are sensitive to teachers, principals believed that asking teachers for nominations of thoughtful (if not necessarily academically successful) students to participate helped garner faculty support. This approach helped when the students' research made "some conclusions that were going to be a little bit shocking to the faculty," said Diego Gutierrez, principal of the Multimedia and Visual Arts School, whose student co-research team uncovered the facts that only 23 percent of students considered their courses interesting and only 19 percent of sophomores considered their courses challenging, compared to 75 percent of teachers who believed their courses were interesting and challenging.

Staying informed and involved in ongoing projects is also important for principals. In every team, some student attrition occurred, and principals were instrumental in encouraging students with wavering commitment by impressing upon them the value of their insights. This helped retain borderline participants, thereby making the projects and teams more representative of student populations.

Principals also told us that returning to the students' findings when planning future professional development or shaping the guiding principles of their schools signaled to faculty that the students' work was significant. As Joe Austin, principal at the School of Business, explained,

We debriefed as a faculty on [the students' findings] and have added them to the list of guiding principles at our school ... and the recommendations are the students' so I really feel like it was legitimate and purposeful ... it's driving decisions.

Angela Kinlaw, dean of students at the School of Community Health and Medical Practices (CHAMPs), reiterated this point for her school:

Our teachers actually used a lot of the research to make decisions about what things they're going to focus on in terms of their own professional development. ... The students did their research talking about the motivation of students here at CHAMPs and what kinds of things it would take to motivate students. So that particular information is going to be used during the summer work that the teachers are doing to make decisions about things that they're going to incorporate into that professional learning.

In addition, principals used the student co-research groups during their schools' accreditation process. Principals incorporated the teams and their findings into the Western Association of Schools and Colleges accreditation reports to prove that the schools were serious about gathering data in innovative ways. Indeed, Don Mitchell, principal of the Invention and Design Educational Academy, had visitors from an accreditation team observe one of the student co-researcher data-analysis meetings and ask questions. The team left impressed and commented on the uniqueness of the project in elevating students' involvement.

What Schools Can Learn

The eight schools, their student co-research teams, their teachers, and their principals have taught us about the range of ways that student-based research can be incorporated into schools and classrooms. Students can effectively research substantial problems in education such as student and teacher engagement, safety, racial segregation on campus, relationships between the school environment and student apathy, and even teachers' grading and assessment policies and practices.

Students designing, conducting, and presenting research about their schools is a powerful way to initiate and support educational reform, but it will not happen without adequate adult support. Student-driven research is an authentic and meaningful educational experience for students, but it is also helpful to the administrators and teachers who choose to take student co-research seriously. It is our responsibly as adults who work with schools to make these types of opportunities available to students and to celebrate the voices of young people willing to take on the challenge of improving the schools they attend every day.

References

Joselowsky, F. (2005). Students as co-constructors of the learning experience and environment: Youth engagement and high school reform. Voices in Urban Education: High School Redesign, 8, 12-22.

Marks, H. (2000). Student engagement in instructional activity: Patterns in the elementary, middle, and high school years. American Educational Research Journal, 37(1), 153-184.

Murnane, R., City, E. A., & Singleton, K. (2008). Using data to inform decision making in urban school districts: Progress and new challenges. Voices in Urban Education: Using Data for Decisions, 18, 5-13.

Newmann, F., M. (1992). Student engagement and achievement in American secondary schools. New York: Teachers College Press.

Yonezawa, S., & Jones, M. (2008). Reforming schools from the inside out: Student voice and the potential influence on school policies and practices. Manuscript submitted for publication.

Makeba Jones ( m3jones@ucsd.edu) and Susan Yonezawa ( syonezawa@ucsd.edu) are Associate Project Scientists at the Center for Research on Educational Equity, Assessment and Teaching Excellence (CREATE), University of California, San Diego, 9500 Gilman Drive, Dept. 0036, La Jolla, CA 92093-0036.

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December 2008/January 2009 | Volume 66 | Number 4 Data: Now What? Pages 65-69 Makeba Jones and Susan Yonezawa Few students are typically around at 7:30 a.m. on Wednesday at the Crawford High School Educational Complex in San Diego, California, home of four autonomous small schools.

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February 2003 | Volume 60 | Number 5

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Feature Articles

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ADDITIONAL ONLINE CONTENT

Jay Feldman, Gail Lucey, Sarah Goodrich and Dana Frazee

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Using Data to Improve Student Achievement

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February 2003 | Volume 60 | Number 5 Unlocked articles can be read for free by all visitors. Members and subscribers log in to read all articles. Jay Feldman, Gail Lucey, Sarah Goodrich and Dana Frazee

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High-quality education data are essential for improving students' achievement in school and preparing them for success in life. When effectively used, these data can empower educators and families with the information they need to make decisions to help all learners succeed.