By Illinois Radio Network/Cole Lauterbach
SPRINGFIELD – Illinois’ education officials are set to unveil new metrics that will decide how much local school districts could receive in federal school improvement funds.
Using the new support and accountability model that’s planned to be released at the end of the month, schools that are struggling could receive $150,000 in Title I federal funds for school improvement, plus additional funds based on enrollment and state and local funding levels in the current school year. Some of those funds would have already been distributed earlier this year, officials said.
Rae Clementz, ISBE’s Director of Assessment and Accountability, said the new accountability and support metrics will provide insight for school officials and the public.
“It helps us depict a better, richer picture of the many ways in which schools are doing wonderful things,” she said.
Much of the new accountability and support model will be based on student data gleaned from PARCC, the acronym for Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers. Officials said that, while the test was not going to be conducted, the content would still be delivered and used to measure growth via an Illinois assessment of readiness.
PARCC received criticism from parents and administrators alike for long periods of testing.
One statistic that’s going to be factored in is chronic absenteeism, which measures students missing class for any reason, not just truancy.
“Chronic absenteeism highlights students that may otherwise go unnoticed in average attendance,” Clementz said.
Absenteeism figures will be higher than chronic truancy, which only measures unexcused absences. In the 2015 school year, the most recent year for which data was available, 335,094 Illinois students missed at least 10 percent of their school days. This is what advocacy group Attendance Works classifies as “chronically absent.”
Patrick Payne, director of Data Strategies and Analytics with ISBE said there will also be new information on teacher quality released, measuring certain credentials and “the number of inexperienced teachers.”
The new measurements will not affect the state’s school funding formula that went into effect this year.
