Charter school titans like Rocketship Education continue to bring wonderful results to disadvantaged students and communities often typecast as underperforming or “at risk.” The growing school system points to student growth as an indication that its collaborative model of education is working for a new generation of students.
All parents desire to send their children to the best schools possible. In fact, some families select communities and subdivisions based on the performance of the school earmarked for the specific geographical area. Of course, there’s plenty of data available to help parents discern where to find the best academic options for their progeny. Assessment tests from a host of providers look to see how children “stack up” when compared to peers. When a cluster of high-achievers is found at a specific school, that school is said to be “high achieving.” Typically, high-achievers are clustered in affluent areas where financial resources and student support networks are abundant. That said, academic assessments show that charter school organizations like Rocketship Education have been able to “set up shop” in economically disadvantaged areas and nourish academic growth.
Growth vs. Achievement
In Tennessee, Rocketship Education’s “Rocketship United” school deploys a specific tool, the NWEA Measures of Academic Progress (MAP), which provides detailed information about a student’s growth during a specific year. James Robinson, founding principal of Rocketship United, believes that this type of assessment is the way to go. “Proficiency scores are important, but they only tell us if a student is on grade level at a specific point in time. Growth scores, which are also called “value-added” scores, tell us how much a student is learning over a period of time, regardless of where they’re starting from. To put it another way, the difference between proficiency and growth is like the difference between asking “are we there yet?” and “how far have we gone?”[1] Rocketship Education is in good company in its effort to use MAP to gauge student growth. Worldwide, over 7000 school districts use MAP as one of their annual assessment tools.
Rocketship Education’s James Robinson contends that tools like MAP are vitally important resources for school districts and charter schools that provide for economically-disadvantaged students. “National data shows us that many students born into poverty start school behind and never catch up. In Nashville, where the majority of public school students are economically disadvantaged, there’s an achievement gap for every subject tested. A good public school will close this gap and level the playing field for all students. This is why we need to pay attention to growth. For a student performing significantly below grade level, his rate of academic growth will ultimately determine if he ever catches up.”[2] Consider, for example, a Rocketship Education student who typically tests in the “below average” range when compared to other students at the same grade level. “Success” for this student during an academic year may be measured by how much the student “closes the gap” with higher performing students at grade level. Robust growth from the fall to spring assessments would indicate that the student’s learning environment – the school – is serving him well.
At Rocketship United, where 70% of students come from economically disadvantaged contexts, MAP testing indicates that students gain some substantial improvement within the course of a school year. Robinson is certainly pleased by the data. “Last year, 146 of our Rocketeers started the year behind and ended the year at or above grade level. That is 146 achievement gaps closed in just one year. Based on our MAP data, our Rocketeers grew on average 1.35 years in math and 1.2 years in reading last year alone.”[3] Robinson also believes that effective testing says a lot about the effectiveness of teaching. “Achieving gap-closing growth requires effective teaching and effective teaching requires regularly measuring and monitoring student learning with a benchmark assessment tool, like MAP. If we only measure how students do at the end of each year, there’s no room to course correct along the way.”[4] In the Nashville area, public schools are following the lead of Rocketship Education by deploying MAP and similar assessments in the school setting.
The Power of Collaboration
Rocketship Education’s success in overcoming the achievement gap that is frequently noted when comparing impoverished and affluent schools is quite remarkable. There is, of course, a method to Rocketship’s madness. In schools like Rocketship United, students are given access to equipment, methods, and opportunities that at one time were only available in schools with rigorous financial support. Further, educators in the Rocketship model believe that dream identification and cultivation helps students claim their true potential and reach beyond stereotypes. Rocketship Education’s faculty also rely on parent collaboration, reaching into to homes to build partnerships that cultivate student success. When families are fully invested in the methods used in the school, providing ample support at home, growth in academic performance is always on the horizon.
[1] Extracted from: https://www.tennessean.com/story/opinion/2017/09/25/parents-must-understand-growth-scores-make-sense-student-progress/702172001/
[2] Ibid.
[3] Extracted from: http://www.rocketshipschools.org/possibility-reality-antioch/
[4] Ibid.
