BRIGHT SPOTS

Your weekly source of learner-centered inspiration

July 25, 2024

Dear Educator,

I don’t know about you but I can feel summer coming to an end. As the back-to-school season ramps up, I am reveling in the memories made this summer but also getting excited for what is ahead in the 2024-2025 school year. Many have mentioned to me that after years of diverted attention, they are so excited to finally be focusing on instruction and getting to do what we do best in education—connect with kids, grow them, and make an impact on their lives and futures.

Last week, I got to spend a couple of days in North Dakota with my colleague Meg and the amazing Northern Cass team. I am excited to highlight their work to measure what matters to them and their community.

With Gratitude,

BRIGHT SPOT OF THE WEEK

Focusing on What Matters Most

Scorecards allow us to measure success more broadly than a single standardized test score. They incorporate community input and context, providing a more comprehensive and nuanced understanding of performance. By considering various metrics and evidence across multiple dimensions, scorecards help the community focus on what matters most.

Over two days, we worked with Dr. Cory Steiner, Superintendent of Northern Cass School District, and a team of school administrators, teachers, and parents to define what matters most to the Northern Cass learning community. Grounding the conversation in their district vision and Learner Profile, we spent time identifying their desired outcomes and metrics, and the data sources that would be used to track their progress throughout the upcoming academic year.

Like many districts, Northern Cass has no shortage of data, which can cause more confusion than clarity. How do you decide which metrics matter? By spending time in conversations with diverse stakeholders, we were able to simplify their desired outcomes in a scorecard to clearly communicate their goals for the year and create a plan to share how they are doing as a district with the broader community.

How do you measure what matters most? Share your story here.

LEARN HOW TO MEASURE WHAT MATTERS

Explore the resources below on creating a scorecard and defining student success in a learner-centered context.

📖 Beyond Conventional Metrics: Telling a New Story Through Tiers of Data.
A scorecard is a succinct, one-page representation of your school or district’s desired outcomes, success metrics, data sources, and current status. To identify the relevant success metrics, a tiered data approach can open up new ways of talking about what we could and should measure. Learn more about tiered data.

🛠️ Free Scorecard Template. Utilize this template to think through how a scorecard might take shape in your school or district context (bonus: work through it with your colleagues!). Access the tool.

📚 Design Performance-Based Assessments. Once your community establishes its scorecard, it's time to create competency-based assessments in the classroom that tie it all together. This online course will teach you how to design quality performance-based assessments that showcase student learning through portfolios, exhibitions of learning, student-led conferences, and defenses of learning. Enroll today.

LET'S SHARE OUR BRIGHT SPOTS!

What are your learner-centered Bright Spots?

Share your #LCBrightSpots on social media!

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