AWSP Blog

As school leaders and staffulty wait for the return of SBA data, do not let the information (aka attendance and re-engagement data) we have on AND from students (daily, weekly, monthly) go unnoticed! Lean into this data to guide your leadership moves. Timely analysis of attendance data can help your system identify factors that are contributing to chronic absences. School culture, relationship building, team responses to data, simple communications that are easily accessible by busy families, and grading practices, all could be contributing! Get your teams meeting/huddling regularly and start with tier 1, universal (low lift/high-yield) efforts. If you’d like to know more about how to become more Data Literate, sign up to participate in our winter series of the Data Literate School Leader!

As we proceed, let’s take a collective deep breath and ensure we do no harm in the present. Let’s avoid getting bogged down in the grading-during-a-pandemic question in order to create the bandwidth needed for everyone to focus on the future of school. Let’s ensure our decisions move past the problematic nature of pre-COVID grading. We have an opportunity to push the system towards evidence-based, student-centered, assessment practices, and creative ideas for returning to school in the fall.

AWSP supports OSPI’s and their workgroup’s guidance for grading. The guidelines are the right thing at the right time. They give districts a clear framework while maintaining the flexibility for districts to find the right solution for their students and community. The guidance was developed with input from a huge array of stakeholders, including our own Associate Directors Kurt Hatch, Gina Yonts, and Scott Friedman. The key message from OSPI and the guiding workgroup: do no harm.

My daughter was a 4.0 high school student with an impressive resume of accomplishments during her high school career. She went on to the University of Washington where she graduated with a 3.9 and two degrees in three years. While in high school, she tore herself apart studying and preparing for the SAT. As the testing date approached and her anxiety grew exponentially, I had to continually remind her that it's just one test, one indicator, one factor that colleges use for admissions, but certainly not the only indicator. That didn't matter. To her, because of such strong social pressures among her peers, the test was either the beginning of or the end of the world. "I'm forever labeled because of that score," she once said.

Q: Dr. WAC, does the principal focus evaluation follow the same focus requirements of teachers?