|
To make sure you receive future emails,
please add our contact information to your address book or safe list.
|
The Index of Education Quality™
In response to a need for institutions to have a deeper understanding of their institutional effectiveness, AdvancED® introduced in the 2013-14 school year an innovative and state-of-the-art framework to measure institutional performance. The Index of Education Quality™ (IEQ™) provides institutions a holistic measure of their overall performance based on a comprehensive set of indicators and evaluative criteria. As a formative tool for improvement, it graphically pinpoints areas of success as well as areas in need of support and/or focus.
In the past, accreditation reviews resulted in a recommended accreditation status. Labels such as accredited, advised, warned or on probation were used to describe the status of an institution relative to a set of static standards. These labels, with the exception of accredited, were oftentimes perceived as punitive in nature and not as a formative measure by which a school or system could improve. Each institution's initial IEQ score is the starting point for improvement and provides a benchmark to assess and guide the institution. Using the IEQ, institutions have the opportunity to focus their attention, activities and actions resulting in positive impacts and measurable improvements designed to optimize learning for every student. As institutions document these changes and submit them for review, their IEQ scores are updated to reflect this progress and guide the next steps on their improvement journey.
 |
Setting an IEQ score became part of AdvancED’s accreditation process in the fall of 2013. Moving forward, if you have completed an External Review during the 2013-2014, or if your institution belongs to a school system engaged in AdvancED School System Accreditation, you will be able to access your IEQ™ score from the Adaptive System of School Improvement Support Tools (ASSIST™) via a dashboard. From the dashboard you can update your institution’s demographics, see the latest documents/reports for your institution and see your IEQ™ score. As a reminder, institutions will continue to receive a comprehensive report of the team’s findings with recognition of Powerful Practices, Opportunities for Improvement and Improvement Priorities through the External Review process. The addition of the AdvancED Index of Education Quality further enhances the accreditation process as a lever for continuous improvement and enhances an institution’s understanding of where it is situated on a continuum of performance and improvement. If you have questions about IEQ, please feel free to contact us.
|
|
|
|
Six Million Surveys Completed in ASSIST™
|
|
More than six million students, parents and teachers have completed AdvancED surveys about the quality of their educational institutions. This represents a total of over 169 million ratings and open-ended responses that AdvancED has collected to questions about the experience stakeholders have had with their school or school system. The surveys are available to AdvancED accredited institutions for free through ASSIST™ (Adaptive System of School Improvement Support Tools)—AdvancED’s web-based school improvement system.
Surveys have been administered across the United States and around the world by public and private schools and school systems. The surveys are offered both online and in paper version and in multiple languages. Additionally, the survey content is customized for students, parents and staff at all grade levels. Analysis of their data by each institution yields a rich source of information and insights into the opportunities institutions have to improve and deliver high quality education that meets the needs and expectations of their constituents. If you haven’t done so, please log in to ASSIST today to learn more and begin using the surveys.
|
|
All You Need to Know about eleot™
|
“Sometimes understanding the big picture involves looking beyond the obvious. Sometimes getting to the root of strengths and weaknesses in the classroom requires asking strategic, in-depth questions and hearing honest answers. Are students immersed in positive learning experiences? Are they connecting content to real-life situations? How do they react to classroom rules and expectations? Are they willing to take risks with learning?
The AdvancED Effective Learning Environments Observation Tool™ (eleot™), a learner-centric, formative tool, answers these questions and more by providing quantifiable data that focuses on students and informs improvement efforts to create the most optimal environments for student learning.”
You can find this information and all you need to know about the Effective Learning Environments Observation Tool™ (eleot™) on the AdvancED website. Something else you may not know is that as a part of the AdvancED External Review, our teams have been certified to use eleot in the data collection process. It has proven to provide valuable information for our teams and for our schools’ improvement efforts. This research-based tool is now available for schools to purchase for use beyond the AdvancED Accreditation Protocol.
Please visit the eleot Web page to view the Frequently Asked Questions about eleot. Also, Analyzing Results from AdvancED’s Classroom Observation Tool is an AdvancED Source article based on over 45,000 eleot observations; the results are powerful in informing our educational practice. Please be sure to read this article from the Spring 2014 issue from our online publication, The Source.
|
|
How are You Measuring Student Engagement?
|
The level to which students are engaged in day-to-day learning is a key indicator in their success and performance.
Use eleot to observe classrooms from the perspective of the student. It’s easy to use and provides powerful, reliable and quantifiable data about the learning conditions your students experience every day. Educators across the nation have embraced eleot as an encouraging way to gather meaningful and actionable classroom observation data.
Each license incorporates unlimited use of eleot for one year, including the mobile app and three registrations for online certification training.
Consider leveraging Title I, Title II or School Improvement grant funds to implement this powerful research-based tool for professional development, peer learning and continuous improvement.
Feel free to contact us or customer service at 888.413.3669, ext. 5720 or contactus@advanc-ed.org if you have questions.
|
|
Benchmark Data For External Reviews
|
Beginning in the 2013-14 school year, AdvancED introduced a new framework to describe the results of an accreditation review. Did you know that External Review Reports now provide benchmark data too?
Last year AdvancED introduced the Index of Education Quality™ (IEQ™), a formative measure for placement on a continuum of performance, pinpointing areas of success as well as areas in need of improvement. The IEQ™ is comprised of three domains of performance: 1) the impact of teaching and learning on student performance; 2) the capacity of leadership to guide the institution toward the achievement of its vision and strategic priorities; and 3) the use of resources to support and optimize learning. The Index of Education Quality provides a holistic measure of overall performance. By basing the score on data aggregated from each AdvancED Standard and diagnostic results from student, parent and staff/teacher surveys, the IEQ provides a benchmark to assess and guide future decisions. Institutions hosting an External Review now receive an IEQ score when they are accredited.
Additionally, in the fall of 2014, AdvancED began providing benchmark data for each Indicator and for each component of the Evaluative Criteria in the External Review Report. These benchmark data represent the overall averages across the entire AdvancED Network. The AdvancED Network average provides an extraordinary opportunity for institutions to understand their context on a global scale rather than simply compared to a state, region or country. It is important to understand that the AdvancED Network averages are provided primarily to serve as a tool for continuous improvement and not as a measure of quality in and of itself. Benchmark data, when wisely employed, have a unique capacity to help institutions identify and leverage their strengths and areas of improvement to significantly impact student learning.
Together, the IEQ™ and the AdvancED Network benchmark data provide a powerful framework that recognizes and supports the journey of continuous improvement. Institutions can use both as the starting point for continuous improvement.
|
|
External Review Next Year? Prepare Now!
|
|
It is not too early to plan for the 2015–2016 school year. To this end, if your school or school system is going to be up for your five-year External Review next year or the following year, we have professional development training opportunities for you this spring and summer. It generally takes a year to carefully prepare for an internal review process and to be ready for the External Review. We strongly encourage you to send key members of your leadership team to this “Spring/Summer Training” so they can learn and support each other through this process of continuous improvement and accreditation. To ensure your success and awareness of all of AdvancED’s new Protocols and online tools, we will be inviting you to training sessions very soon. Look for an email with your invitation to come shortly. In the meantime, review these dates and determine which works best for you and your leadership team:
May 12, 2015, 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., COSA Office in Salem
May 14, 2015, 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., Southern Oregon (place to be determined)
May 19, 2015, 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., COSA Office in Salem
August 4, 2015, 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., COSA Office in Salem
August 19, 2015, 9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m., Portland (place to be determined)
|
|
|
|
|
|
AdvancED, the home of NCA CASI, NWAC and SACS CASI, is dedicated to
advancing excellence in education worldwide.
|
|