Moneyball
I know that everyone on the East Coast is hyperfocusing on the Superbowl, which I'll watch, but, really, I'm just counting the days to spring training.
In fact, baseball and education are amazingly similar.
❝He [Joe Maddon, Tampa Bay] knows human factors affect the numbers radically. Context is partially external (in baseball, factors like ball park effects, weather, a humidor or not) but it's vastly internal (human players as individuals and as part of the team and their individual quirks and personal strengths and weaknesse
He knows the numbers only take you so far and that you have to go farther than that to achieve excellence. Maddon doesn't lose sight of the vast pool of non-numeric data out there...that goes into his pool from which to draw❞ (Management by Baseball)
Tony LaRussa, while not exactly a Moneyball proponent, gives a great quote.
❝The 'Moneyball' kind of stuff has its place, but so does the human," La Russa said by telephone from Pittsburgh. "Really, the combination is the answer.❞
As teachers, principals, administrators, researchers and policy wonks, we all need to remember that data can help us improve education without being so data-driven as to lose sight of good teaching.
Can data improve my teaching?
I did my first formal CAT yesterday. I've added a new assignment this semester (group wiki), so I asked them to write down strengths and areas to improve on the assignment. We then discussed it, and I told them my ideas for improvement also. I use this in conjunction with their final products to help me improve my teaching for next semester or possibly future assignments if applicable.
That is my background on assessment.
I've enjoyed reading Eduwonkette's week on data-driven posts and appreciated the link to Scott McLeod's data resource page where I found an article that made the parent side of me salivate.
❝Stage-three schools shift the focus from groups to individual students — every single, individual student.❞
McIntire discusses how schools can say that they focus on all students but most don't have the systems in place to do so. I've had friends whose districts say they differentiate, but they don't feel the district follows that mission statement at all.
Differentiating is the buzzword right now, but it is hard to implement without support.
❝In stage-three schools, school leaders establish structures of accountability that ensure teachers regularly analyze student performance data, talk about it in functional units, and enact specific action plans at the classroom, team, grade, and school level.❞
Of course to do that requires time for teachers to meet together in teams, which they should be doing anyway.
❝How can teachers hope to provide customized instruction to dozens or even hundreds of students?❞
But they can, and do. I've seen it.
Using data to improve instruction shouldn't be overrelied on but if used with commonsense can help more kids learn. Off to read Datawise now.
Data Mining
The Quality Counts 2008 Report is
out, and Missouri didn't finish in the top tier.
No surprise there.
One interesting question deep down in the report
was whether a teacher had an identifying tracking
number assigned (yes). Another was whether Missouri
links teacher and student records by course/subject
and assessment results (no). These questions were
in between ones on teacher pay parity, mentor
teachers and other traditional teacher quality
questions. Mmm....
❝The day is not far off, teacher-quality advocates say, when a host of professional and policy decisions could be informed by analysis of data from thousands of teachers and students observed over time. Such longitudinal data allow researchers to measure changes in student achievement—and to link them with teacher characteristics.❞
Ah, a researcher's dream and a privacy advocate's nightmare.
❝For instance, teacher-preparation programs could be slated for overhauls—or not—depending on how well their graduates perform. Or state policies could reflect new knowledge about which qualifications indicate teacher effectiveness.❞
I already think teacher ed programs need overhauling, but research showing what works is always helpful.
❝While such systems have the potential to yield rich information on differences that affect student learning, they also raise a thorny question: Might teachers be ranked, assigned, or fired on the basis of such data?❞
The idea is to focus on student achievement instead of teachers, but in this day of accountability I don't believe that would really happen. As a researcher wanna-be, though, I see so much potential...
Can I have my kid's score, please?
Last semester I had a
student tell me about the sneaky way she had to use
to find out her child's reading level. I was
appalled. I never asked which district and don't
want to know. My kids' teachers have told me the
reading scores at conferences, which I had assumed
every teacher in the country did. I was
disappointed to find out I was wrong.
Jay Mathews lists parent
participation as a way to improve schools.
Participation can mean fundraising for the PTO,
showing up for teacher conferences, helping in
the classroom or even having a voice in school
policies. If parents aren't even given their own
child's assessments and standardized test
results, then any talk about increasing
participation is just so much fluff, happy talk,
can-we-get-some-money-out-of-you talk.
If I had more time, I would survey the local
districts for participation rates (using multiple
methods of participating) and see which factors had
the highest correlation rate. My guess would be
education level, more so than median income.
Secondary factors might include size of district
and transportation method.
A theory of mine is that schools that don't provide
bus service would have higher parent participation.
They already have to walk or drive the kids to
school. Double points for the schools that don't
have efficient carpool lanes. The parents might
actually have to go inside to pick up the kids and
see the teachers. Find me one of those schools that
doesn't have high parental partnership.
Parents that want to know how to become more
involved or help their school become more open can
be inspired by St. Louis's own Project Appleseed, a national
resource for improving parental involvement.
Actually, it has a lot of good information for
educators also.
Schools usually include in their mission statements
about the importance of parent participation. I
want to see them walk it, which includes the first
steps of thinking of parents as partners and
providing them with all testing and
assessment results, not just when the parents ask
for it.
Do we read or not?
Now we're ranked the sixth most literate city, especially because of our great library resources.
❝St. Louis measured high in library resources — second only to Columbus, Ohio — which remained "outstanding," McLaughlin said.❞
A few days ago I posted that St. Louis was ranked the 9th best place to educate our kids by Forbes. Ironically, our lowest score was for our library system. C+ Sigh, I think I have a headache.
One difference between the two is that the Central Connecticut State University library study just looked at St. Louis city; whereas, the Forbes report looked at the entire metropolitan area.
The CCSU study looked at:
1. Number of school media personnel per 1,000 public school student
2. Number of branch libraries per 10,000 library service population
3. Volumes held in the library per capita of library service population
4. Number of circulations per capita of library service population
5. Number of library professional staff per 10,000 library service population
I couldn't find the specific methodology for the places ranked (Forbes) study, but it discussed number of volumes and turnover. It looks like the CCSU study looks at a wider variety of factors by adding in accessibility and number of librarians. Whether it is the accessibility or narrowing the scope to the city that made the library system higher ranked would be interesting to know.
This is another example of seemingly conflicting assessments that could confuse the public. However, I guess most people who actually read the articles just remember the rankings and leave it at that. Maybe I'm the only one who gets confused.
But hey, we're No. 6!
It's Report Card time!
I am sure I will be mining these report cards for data for some time, but for today's sneak preview I thought I would provide a chart listing the St. Louis county districts by median income and then whether or not they met the criteria for this "award." It's quite telling I think.
