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Issue #2 • Winter 2009
Accountability requires the use of multiple forms of qualitative and quantitative evidence from both academic and nonacademic areas to arrive at judgmentsas to where a student or a school is doing well and where not, and to provide a basis for making improvements.
No important academic decision about astudent, a teacher, an administrator, a school, or a district should be made solely on one type of evidence, such as standardized test scores.
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Meier, D., Kohn, A. Darling-Hammond, L. Sizer ., & Wood, G., “Many Children Left Behind” (Boston, MA, Beacon Press Te Forum for Education and Democracy 2004) page 107.
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dolescence is a uniquely critical time inthe development of young people. For example, a wide range of educational researchhas found declining levels of motivation,engagement, and achievement in adoles-cence. Developmental and clinical psycholo-gists have discovered that psychological disor-ders like depression and anxiety often emergein adolescence. As a major component of theadolescent life experience, secondary schoolscan provide a strong platform for future suc-cess or can solidify negative attitudes andself-concepts for life. The Hope Study is a means to assess schoolenvironments using the developmental per-spective. Schools can now be assessed as cul-tures that create a set of relationships, normsof behaviors, values and commitments that lead to the development of healthy and pro-ductive students. According to developmentalpsychology, school environments can achievethis objective by providing for students’ basicpsychological needs: autonomy (choice,self-management), belongingness (strong teacher and peer relationships) and a positivegoal orientation (uniformly high expectations,recognition of effort). Each of these variablesleads to higher engagement. Developmentaltheory states that students in these sorts of supportive environments should respond by engaging more directly in their learning and,
over time, gaining condence in themselves as
achievers.In addition, The Hope Study measures student behavioral and emotional engagement inlearning and their psychological adjustment,
or “hope”. Hope is a construct that reects a
student’s perception of him or herself as a suc-cess, a problem-solver, and an achiever. In apsychologically healthy environment, student perceptions of the learning environment (as measured by autonomy, belongingness,and goal orientation) should be higher, andstudents should respond with higher levels of engagement, and, over time, more hope.By increasing student engagement and
hope, schools can realize benets in terms of
student behavior, attendance, and academicachievement, and students gain an increased
condence in themselves as achievers whichbenets them throughout their life.
Research now shows that higher-hope stu-dents not only set more challenging school-related goals for themselves when comparedto lower-hope students, but also tend toperceive that they will be more successfulat attaining these goals even if they do not experience immediate success.
The Hope Study
Edvisions (http://www.e.cm)
Flexible eSIS
T
he Milwaukee Public SchoolsDistrict (MPS) uses a studentinormation system, eSIS, which isproduced by AAL. eSIS can causemyriad headaches or small-schoolsta members, whether program-mers or teachers, especially or thoseschools, like mine, that use project-based learning or integrated cur-riculum as the primary instructionaldelivery models. Some o the chal-lenges we ace are:
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How can eSIS accommodate ourschool’s dierent schedule(s)?
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How can eSIS measure and reportstudent profciency in a project-based model?
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How can our school meet thedistrict requirements o using eSIS without sacrifcing what makes ourschool unique?Many schools in MPS are acingthese questions, and while there areno easy answers, it is possible to makeeSIS work or us. Representativesrom DuBois and MLLI, along withsta rom MPS ech Services, havedesigned an
ESIS Flexible Options Manual.
Tis manual, based on realquestions and problems, providessmall school programmers and teach-ers with dierent tips and tricks thatcan be used to make eSIS easier to use— think o it as the eSIS cheat sheet! wo inormational training ses-sions will be held or GLCC schoolmembers (teachers and programmers);to obtain copies o the manual, ask questions, and learn new techniquesor working with eSIS. Sessions willbe held at 4:30pm on uesday, Febru-ary 24th, and Tursday, March 12th,in Room 133B o Milwaukee Learn-ing Laboratory and Institute (MLLI),6506 W. Warnimount Ave. Please callAbby Wilson at MLLI (604-7850) with any questions.
by Abbby Wilson
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