We are very excited to start working on three new projects in the coming weeks. Read details about them below!
Materials to Measure NorthStar Skills
Client: Generation Schools Network
Generation Schools Network (GSN) is working with school districts in Colorado to co-create a student-centered reporting solution to help guide instruction and ensure student success. Part of that reporting solution will address career competencies, or “NorthStar Skills,” that students need to develop to be successful after high school. Battelle for Kids describes these skills in Portrait of a Graduate (https://portraitofagraduate.org/).
We will be working with GSN to define and measure their NorthStar Skills. It is not our first time working with GSN, and we’re excited to continue our partnership. Through previous contracts, we assisted GSN in developing measurements for NorthStar Skills chosen by the Santa Fe Trail BOCES (SFT BOCES) and I-76 corridor schools. In our latest project, we will develop definitions for three NorthStar Skills: Collaboration, Empathy, and Social Capital. We will then identify the competencies related to each and develop progressions, rubrics, and sample assessment items for each competency.
Evaluation of The Essential 0-5 Survey: Infant-Toddler Teacher/Staff Survey
Client: Start Early
We will provide data analysis services to Start Early, a nonprofit public-private partnership focused on improving equitable access to quality early childhood education and care. Start Early’s The Essential 0-5 Survey: Infant-Toddler Teacher/Staff Survey uses teacher perceptions to measure the quality of early childhood education programs.
Marzano Research will conduct a psychometric validation of the survey that will help ensure the tool accurately measures what it is intended to measure. To help Start Early use the results of our analyses, we will host and facilitate an online data sense-making event to collaboratively review and interpret preliminary findings. Finally, we will develop a validation report demonstrating the extent to which The Essential 0-5 Survey: Infant-Toddler Teacher/Staff Survey is appropriate for infant and toddler settings. This project is an opportunity to continue our previous work with Start Early.
Oregon’s Accelerating Learning Strategic Plan
Client: Oregon State University
We are partnering with Oregon State University (OSU) to provide facilitation and strategic planning support as it develops an Accelerating Learning Strategic Plan. This work has been made possible because OSU received a federal ESSER III grant from the US Department of Education to support Oregon students and educators in addressing unfinished learning that resulted from the impact of the COVID pandemic.
OSU has centered the following priorities and themes in implementing its approach. The work builds on its Equity Stance.
- Oregon Identified Priorities
- Address unfinished learning as part of a responsive system grounded in equity, meeting students where they are and accelerating their learning by building on strengths and addressing needs.
- Prioritize health, safety, wellness, and connection for all communities.
- Strengthen high-quality, culturally sustaining, and revitalizing instruction, leadership, and programming.
- Oregon Themes
- Family Engagement: Realize family and community engagement strategies in each area and hold districts accountable for their plans.
- Centering Equity: Don’t let equity get lost in the shuffle within each priority area.
- Disparate Impact: Students in special education, in foster care, from highly mobile populations, who are Black/African American, American Indian/Alaska Native, and Latino/a/x, Pacific Islander communities, from areas with low vaccination rates, and others were affected differently and may need different solutions in each area.
- Grade Level Transition: Assessments can be a part of ensuring students are acknowledged for their achieved mastery, acknowledging students may not need to only be learning in one grade level across subjects.
- Sustainability: The one-time nature of these funds is of concern when it comes to sustaining efforts in each area, as well as Agency’s ability to support the continuity.
- OSU’s Equity Stance:
- Education equity is the equitable implementation of policy, practices, procedures, and legislation that translates into resource allocation, education rigor, and opportunities for historically and currently marginalized youth, students, and families, including civil rights-protected classes. This means the restructuring and dismantling of systems and institutions that create the dichotomy of beneficiaries and the oppressed and marginalized.
We are looking forward to providing updates as these projects get underway!
