At CRPE, we study how assessment, accountability, and oversight can strengthen public education while fostering equity, innovation, and continuous improvement. Our research examines how traditional accountability frameworks can narrow teaching and constrain schools’ ability to adapt, and we explore approaches that measure what truly matters for student success—academic growth, deeper learning, and readiness for life beyond school. We also investigate how oversight can balance school autonomy with strong protections for access and quality, ensuring that all students are well served. Across this work, our goal is to inform accountability systems that uphold public trust while enabling schools to innovate and respond to the diverse needs of their communities.
One theme that emerged in our discussions on the next generation of school accountability is that tensions inherently arise when developing accountability systems that need to serve multiple interests and stakeholders.
Today, we wrap up our blog series on accountability prompted by a paper and statement of principles released last week. Thanks to guest bloggers and co-signers James Merriman, Joanne Weiss, Sandy Kress, and Jane Hannaway for weighing in with their thoughts about where accountability systems need to go next.
Schools have long been held accountable for how they carry out their activities. State and local authorities require students to take certain courses, minutes of classroom instruction are specified, limits on the ratio of students to teachers are set, textbooks are approved, and teachers leading instructional activities are certified by the state.
School accountability matters. In a country founded on the dream that any child can grow up to be whatever she wants to be, accountability provides a measuring stick to judge how well schools are doing at giving each child—and every type of child—a fair shot at a good future.
Preparing for a hiking trip brings you face-to-face with the world of trade-offs. You weigh, literally and figuratively, every ounce of what you put in your pack, trying to decide if the comfort something might bring in camp is worth the discomfort of hauling it up there in the first place.
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