Standards-based report card approved for RVES

A new standards-based report card has been approved for Royal Valley Elementary School in order to help parents understand their child’s academic progress more clearly. 

“The main difference is that it’s not going to show points; it will just show a grade scale using the new standards score,” RVES Principal Noah Slay told USD 337 Board of Education members Monday evening. 

Standard score options on the new report cards include:

* M for Mastery. The student met the grade level expectation.

* OT for On Target. The student is at the right place at the right time with the subject.

* P is for Progressing. The student is showing growth with some assistance or has been introduced to the skill or concept and shows some understanding. Some errors or misunderstandings may occur and additional instruction or practice is needed.

* N is for Needs Improvement. The student is struggling to apply skills and needs significant support.

With the new grading system, Slay said that not all assignments will be reported by teachers in the grade book, only those considered summative. 

Slay explained to the board the difference between summative and formative assignments. He said that formative assignments are used after a new skill, like fractions, is taught. They are practice assignments to help gauge the students’ progress so the teacher can adjust their teaching.

Summative assignments are quizzes, tests or final projects that are assigned after concepts are thoroughly taught and students have had ample opportunities to learn the skill. 

“This is a big shift in the reporting,” Slay said. “We really want to see kids On Target throughout the school year. That’s where you want to be.”

The new grade report includes two components, a quarterly narrative and student information. 

The quarterly narrative lists each subject with a standards score next to it and then outlines what “anchor standards” were taught during those nine weeks to all students in that grade level, said Belinda Brandt, RVES reading literacy coach.

The student information part of the grade card explains the specific areas in a subject that individual students need to focus on to improve their grade.

“This will allow us to be more specific with parents,” Brandt said. “One of the things we heard about the former grade card was that some things were vague and parents didn’t really know what satisfactory really meant or what areas needed improvement that quarter.”  

Brandt said that the new card is based on exit standards, which are the standards students are expected to reach by the end of the school year.  

“Most students probably won’t reach the Mastery standard until the fourth quarter,” Brandt said. “The old report card didn’t align with the new standards, and it really didn’t fit in a lot ways. This needed to be done.”

Previously, only third and fourth-grade students received letter grades on report cards while younger students received “satisfactory” or “needs improvement” marks on their cards. With the new card, no elementary student will receive a letter grade. 

Slay said that it would be difficult to tie a certain percentage score to the standards scores, M, OT, P and N. 

 “I think this will be the biggest shift in thinking for parents,” Slay said. “It’s very possible that a student could get a 99 percent on a quiz and be On Target because of the skills that are being tested. A student could also take a test over the entire content of the standards and get a 99 percent and that could be Mastery. Same percentage but different scale score because one is assessing a part of the standard and the other is assessing all of the standard. That’s confusing but what we want to communicate to parents is whether their student is on target with where they need to be by the end of the school year or are they struggling and what do we need to do next?”

Slay said parents will have to look at the new report cards differently.

“All parents want their students to get an A,” Slay said. “There are going to be a lot of parents who have reward systems at home for earning A’s and B’ss that won’t be able to do that with this new card. It’s a change and a shift, but I think we’re going in the right direction where we need to be with the kids.”

Student report cards are given to students at the end of the first nine weeks, and parents can also track grades online through PowerSchool.

With the approval of the new grade card, however, Slay asked permission from the board to wait until parent-teacher conferences at the end of October to hand out report cards in order to allow staff to explain the new system to parents face-to-face. 

Slay, Brandt and Trisha Slimmer, first-grade teacher, also asked that parent-teacher conferences at the elementary school be extended an extra day in order to conduct 30-minutes sessions with parents instead of just 20 minutes.

“There’s just not enough time, especially if we’re explaining the new report card,” Slimmer said. “We have an 80 percent participation rate at the school. If we could have two full days in order to extend the sessions, that would really help.”

Parent-teacher conferences had previously been set for all three schools from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 28, and 8 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 29.

The board agreed to extend conferences just at the elementary school from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. that Wednesday, which means elementary students will not attend classes that day. Middle school and high school students will still attend classes that day.  

In other business, the board:

* Approved consent items.

* Was introduced to new district employees Kimberly Markham, Carol Arnold and David Boucher.

* Received an update on the FCCLA National Leadership Conference from RVHS student Jayme Burger and Monique Litherland, RVHS teacher and FCCLA sponsor. Burger received a gold medal at the competition. 

* Discussed the two fall summit meetings being held by the Kansas Association of School Boards. The meetings are being held in Olathe and Salina in October. 

* Approved a trip request to allow seven RVHS FFA members to attend the national FFA convention in Louisville at the end of October.

Kim Mitchell is the club’s sponsor, and the board agreed that the district could cover her cost of the trip, which was estimated at $380. Each FFA student will be expected to pay $75, with additional FFA funds being used to cover other expenses.  

FFA member Anna Johnson spoke to the board about the event, which includes special sessions, a career fair, leadership workshops and networking opportunities for students in agriculture.

* Received updated enrollment projections from Superintendent John Rundle. 

“We had 32 elementary students that were expected to move up in their grade level that did not return to school,” Rundle said. “Considering that’s almost 10 percent of the building, that’s hard to plan for. It seems there’s really no particular reason or rationale to it. We just had some moving within our community and those students are no longer with us.”

Rundle said that the elementary school has 294 students this year, compared to about 340 last year. 

* Approved an audit contract with Karlin and Long LLC of Lawrence at a cost of $5,000 to complete the 2015-2016 school year fiscal audit. Last year’s contract was $4,900.  

* Approved a budget resolution. A new change in the state law requires any school district that increased its budget by more than 1.5 percent to adopt another board resolution and publish that notice in the newspaper. The district’s public notice can be found on page 10 of this edition of The Holton Recorder.  

* Approved employment contracts for Joe Baumchen as the freshmen volleyball coach, Susan Cochran as a RVES paraprofessional and Clinton Burger as a bus driver.

* Adjourned the meeting at 8:30 p.m. Board members Boone Smith and Ann Kelly were absent.

The Holton Recorder

109 W. Fourth St.
Holton, KS 66436
Phone: 785-364-3141
 

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