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Dear Teachers, Support Staff, Students, Parents, and Community,

February 5this report card day in North Carolina. The General Assembly has

required public schools to release A-F letter grades across our state. The grade is

primarily determined by how students perform on standardized tests. As educators,

we welcome accountability and transparency, which helps us achieve higher levelsof student success. The model embraced by North Carolina falls short of these goals.

The North Carolina model is an inaccurate, poorly thought out metric that measures

student performance more by poverty and neighborhood, rather than the actual

work taking place in our schools. The Corruption of School Accountability When

one studies the report card grades, it will be abundantly clear that higher

performing A and B schools are located in suburbs with poverty levels below 40%.

Mid-performing schools receiving C and D grades will be mostly rural and inner city

neighborhoods with poverty levels as high as 70%. The dreaded F grade will be

reserved for those schools that have poverty levels in excess of 90%.

All educators are keenly aware of the correlation between poverty and a studentsability to perform, particularly on standardized tests. There are numerous national

studies that document the onset of the achievement gap well before children enter

kindergarten. Communities that are serious about closing the achievement gap

realize that the work takes time and additional resources. The best hope for

children born into poverty is early childhood education and summer enrichment

programs. Even then, the gap continues to be perpetuated as parents of higher

performing students accelerate their childrens learning with private tutors, cultural

experiences, travel, and environments that enhance learning.

Unfortunately, the path chosen by North Carolinas leaders does little more than

blame schools for the achievement gap and inaccurately labels schools. This coursemust be corrected. It is destructive and must be stopped before irreparable damage

is done to public schools. In reality, public schools are not failing; they are getting

the best results in the history of public education.What do International Tests

Really Tell us About US Student Performance ? Within the last decade an entire

movement has been born, promoted by think tanks and perpetuated by the media,

that paints a dismal picture of public schools.The Illusion of "Failing Public Schools"

In reality, schools are doing a much better job of preparing students for life in the

21stcentury. According to the National Center for Education Statistics, schools with

less than 25% poverty have children performing at a higher rate in reading than any

other group of children in the world. Public Schools Aren't Failing

North Carolinas over emphasis on standardized testing has narrowed our definition

of what school success really means. Parents expect schools to focus on the whole

child. They want their children to be nurtured, loved, and challenged every day.

When parents find schools that accomplish this, they grade them high. In our recent

annual climate survey, 81.1% of our parents graded our schools as A or B and 92.2%

of parents said they would recommend their school to a friend. I would encourage

you to take a look at our climate survey and judge for yourself.

http://www.epi.org/publication/webfeat_viewpoints_corruption_of_school_accountability/http://www.epi.org/publication/webfeat_viewpoints_corruption_of_school_accountability/http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/http://dianeravitch.net/2015/01/31/thomas-ultican-the-illusion-of-failing-public-schools/http://dianeravitch.net/2015/01/31/thomas-ultican-the-illusion-of-failing-public-schools/http://dianeravitch.net/2015/01/31/thomas-ultican-the-illusion-of-failing-public-schools/http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2015/01/30/5483360/public-schools-arent-failing.html#.VNLM_ELgG0Ghttp://www.charlotteobserver.com/2015/01/30/5483360/public-schools-arent-failing.html#.VNLM_ELgG0Ghttp://www.charlotteobserver.com/2015/01/30/5483360/public-schools-arent-failing.html#.VNLM_ELgG0Ghttp://dianeravitch.net/2015/01/31/thomas-ultican-the-illusion-of-failing-public-schools/http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/http://www.epi.org/publication/us-student-performance-testing/http://www.epi.org/publication/webfeat_viewpoints_corruption_of_school_accountability/

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We are fortunate that our business community understands the fallacies of the A-F

grading system. John Green, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Statesville

Chamber of Commerce, penned the attached letter in support of our teachers and

students. Likewise, Rich Neimand and Dave Clayton of the Neimand Collaborative

say that politicians are the ones that deserve an F for perpetuating such a poormeasure of student success. Their attached letter offers encouragement to teachers.

In closing, I offer sincere thanks to our teachers and support staff that work

incredibly hard each day. I would encourage you to hold your head up, be proud of

your work and your profession. It is through your efforts that America remains an

economic powerhouse, our democracy gives us the freest society in the history of

mankind, and makes us the envy of the world. Today I choose to give you the A that

you have earned.

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When the scores come in for Iredell Statesville Schools, the sad truth is that many Statesville based schools

will receive challenging grades and some will fail. As noted above, the correlation between grades and median family

income in the urban areas is absolute and will be evident. Some of our best teachers are in these schools and they

can tell you that because children come into those classrooms at dramatically different levels of academic ability,

significant growth can occur but may not show up on a one day test. The individual growth for many of these

students is outstanding and those teachers should be applauded. The system as currently mandated by the state

provides little value to that growth.

Additionally, this new grading scale has the potential of inhibiting economic expansion. Industrial,

commercial and residential expansion occur more rapidly in communities with excellent schools. The grading scalewill give the impression that some of our schools are less than stellar and will provide incentive for that expansion to

occur somewhere other than Statesville.

Our plea to Raleigh is to modify this grading scale to more accurately reflect the growth of a childs progressas opposed to heavily weighting one test on one day. Our plea to the citizens of Statesville and Iredell County is if

you are in doubt as to the performance of the school, check out the scores on the ISS website or make a plan to visit

one of the local schools and see for yourself. Our schools are essential for the future of Iredell County. We must all

work to be truly informed on the daily performance of our schools throughout the whole school year, not just the one

test day. Finally, support the staff of these schools while we work through this challenge. A teacher (and the rest of

the school staff) will really appreciate us all reaching out and saying thanks!

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m e m o

To: Public school educators

From: Rich Neimand, Dave Clayton

Date: January 28, 2015

Re: Messaging guidance on school grade results

_______________________________________________________________________________________

Context: The pending public release of school grades has all the pitfalls of an overly simplistic and monolithic

measure of school success, focusing criticism on the public school system by heavily emphasizing absolute

levels of student achievement on standardized testing. Rather than a technical deconstruction of the school

grade rubric, you should leverage growing public sentiment against legislative attacks on public education to

attack the credibility of the grades and link them to the very thing that parents hate: an ever-shifting landscape

of assessments that are poor measures of success.

The school grades dont make the grade.A new year brings yet another assessment of our children that

measures the wrong thing, hurts their education and runs down the good work of our teachers and schools. A

good school grading system would be comprehensive, fair to all students and shed light on what happens

inside the classroomsnot just on year-end grades.

Scores that measure grades and not growth are bad measures of children and schools.Our schools

are built to meet each child where they are and take them higher. This school grading system doesnt take

into account where children start and the progress they make in our schools.

Some of the best schools are punished for trying to help the poorest students. Schools that work with

any child regardless of his or her level of achievement shouldnt be punished for doing what public education

should dotaking each child higher. Unlike others, we dont court the best students with fancy mailerswe

put our efforts into meeting children where they are and helping them grow.

Politicians get an F for inventing a poor measure of our children and their schools. These flawed

school grades fail children instead of giving them a fighting chance. Schools should be evaluated on

comprehensive measures that take into account the challenges each child and school facesand they should

have the tools and funding to succeed. After years of funding cuts, its time for politicians to make the grade

with more investments in things that work for our children, such as smaller class sizes and more teaching

assistants.