Accountability in Colorado Education
Accountability: Holding ourselves (students, parents, educators, and community members) responsible for meeting identified student achievement targets through a continuous cycle of planning, evaluation, and reporting.
Colorado has in place a management strategy for school improvement called public education accountability. It involves a statewide method to establish clear goals for all public schools K-12 and to put responsibility for improvement plans in the hands of local school communities.
The strength of this strategy lies in two key features:
- significant involvement of the community in school improvement planning, and
- disclosure of actual progress to the public
Accountability is the effective use of information to focus energy toward the attainment of student results.
How It Works
- The State Board of Education has set high statewide goals for improvement of education.
- Each local district develops its own goals and accountability program tailored to its community and consistent with the state's goals.
- Each school in a district develops its own goals and accountability program consistent with the state and district's goals.
Colorado's accountability program is designed to strengthen and improve each local school through team management appropriate to its community.
- Each accountability program-- district, and building level--is guided by a representative advisory committee which reviews improvement plans, makes recommendations, and reports its progress frequently and clearly to the appropriate audience whether it be the general public, the State Board of Education, the local school board, or the school community.
- Annual reports are disseminated by each school to its public, and by each district to the community on progress toward local and state goals as well as improvement plans for the next school year.
An effective accountability program focuses on asking the right questions, choosing the right indicators of student performance, and reporting the results to the right audiences.
Background
The Accountability Act of 1997 and Part 2 of the Public School Finance Act of 1988 provide the legal basis for accountability in public education. This process is administered through State Board of Education rules.
History
From 1897 through 1952 the University of Colorado approved high school graduates for college. In 1952 accreditation and accountability became a function of the Colorado Department of Education. In 1971 School District Advisory Accountability Committees started the process of significant involvement of the community and disclosure of progress to the public. In 1988 School Building Advisory Accountability Committees were set up. In 2001 the annual School Accountability Reports (SAR) were issued. For more information regarding the SAR Reports click here: http://reportcard.cde.state.co.us/reportcard/CommandHandler.jsp
School Level Process
In Colorado, the focus of accountability is at the school level. The local accountability committees function as follows:
- Set prioritization of expenditures of school money
- Meet at least quarterly
- Work on means for determining whether decisions affecting the educational process are advancing or impeding student achievement
- Report educational performance to the public
- Review safety issues
- By September 1 of each year adopt high, but achievable goals and objectives for improvement of education in its building and adopt a plan to improve educational achievement in the school, to implement methods of maximizing graduation rates in secondary schools of the district and to increase the rating for the school's accreditation category.