Parents who don't understand!

Parents who need to be educated about the mission of an exemplary middle school!

So parent education will commence!

.... If I were the new principal of a middle school in which numerous well-educated parents seem to be operating under the impression that middle school is or ought to be junior high, I would take that as a sign that my "audience" is people who are actively concerned about knowledge and academic achievement.

It's just not exemplary.

So there's room for growth.

There is room for growth because the middle school is not at this moment "exemplary" as defined by the National Middle School Association. It's good, but not exemplary.

Growth is change over time.

e.g. growth in height, weight, and reading ability


Question: when your child's test scores in reading and math decline from one year to the next, is that growth?

Apparently there is room for "growth" at the middle school, growth meaning that the middle school is not at this moment "exemplary" as defined by the National Middle School Association.

So there is room for growth.

Unfortunately, parents don't seem to be on the same page with the NMSA:

...there is much confusion about what middle level education is and which characteristics make middle schools exemplary. In casual conversations with parents, I have found that there are many misunderstandings about what we do and why we do it....

It is important to know that middle school is not junior high.

source:
Irvington Middle School News


If I were the new principal of a middle school in which numerous well-educated parents seem to be operating under the impression that middle school is junior high, I would take that as a sign that my "audience" is people who are actively concerned about knowledge and academic achievement.

Not team-teaching and exploratory programs.

What is Expected Growth? (204 KB, PDF) by Gary L. Williamson, Ph.D., July 2006 We are all familiar with children, either through knowing our own or through acquaintance with those of other people. Perhaps no other thing in life is as obvious as the dramatic way that human beings develop and grow. Our key social and political institutions devote a significant part of their resources to ensuring that children grow and learn to function as productive citizens. Growth and learning are central to the mission of our country’s public schools...

Because there are a number of alternative ways to conceptualize student growth and to measure it, states face a challenge to design and implement accountability systems that address a variety of information needs and still comply with state and federal laws. In this context, there are naturally many viewpoints about how best to conceptualize and measure student growth and to set appropriate goals for growth. This makes it especially important for students, parents and educators to better understand student growth, how it is measured, and how growth expectations may be set in different contexts for different purposes...

source:
White Papers
The Lexile Framework for Reading

I hadn't quite grokked the use of the word "growth" in edu-speak.

-- CatherineJohnson - 04 Dec 2006

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