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Group produces controversial A-F school grading reports as state delays implementation


Great Lakes Education Project released 'report cards' on school districts in Michigan. (Mikenzie Frost)
Great Lakes Education Project released 'report cards' on school districts in Michigan. (Mikenzie Frost)
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An education group produced report cards for thousands of schools in Michigan after it said the state Department of Education is not following the letter of the law that was passed during the 2018 lame-duck Legislature.

The Great Lakes Education Project, a right-leaning group based in Lansing, published report cards for 2,800 schools in the state, assigning letter grades for the same categories the state would. The law set a Sept. 1 deadline for the education department to produce the report cards. Beth DeShone, executive director of the project, said the state has been dragging its feet on the implementation.

“It is now 72 days that they have been breaking the law by not submitting those report cards to schools,” DeShone said.

The A-F grading system was met with controversy when it was first introduced, and several emails provided by the education department reveal its opposition from the beginning.

In a letter from then-interim State Superintendent Shelia Alles in December — before the bill was passed by the Republican-controlled legislature — she said the A-F system would be an additional accountability assessment for parents to have.

Martin Ackley, spokesperson for the education department, said it told the Legislature several times that the September deadline would not be feasible. Ackley said the department is in the process of creating the grading system, but it takes time.

“We told them before they passed the law in December. We told them again in the spring and we continue to tell them that we weren’t going to be able to do this because we are creating the system now. We aren’t withholding any information, we’re not withholding the grades, we are still developing the system,” he said Tuesday. “It’s very complex to set up a system of accountability. It takes almost two years and what’ we’ve had to do is accelerate that system.”

Ackley said when the Legislature wrote the education department budget, it acknowledged the challenges of producing the A-F grades in the timeline and in the budget, wrote that the department had until March 2020 to produce the report cards.

“They put that March 2020 deadline in our budget so they recognize that is the date when the A-F grades will be ready,” Ackley said. “They know very well, the Legislature and GLEP knows very well that this is going to take time. It’s not something that can be created quickly.”

Currently, the federal government requires states to use another system to assess accountability for schools. The A-F grading system goes against what those requirements are and uses other ways to indicate success or areas of improvement.

DeShone said the federal systems are not clear and make it difficult for parents to get a clear understanding of how well schools are doing in their area.

“Letter grades are intuitive. Our children receive report cards every quarter and we celebrate their successes and provide support to them when they need help,” DeShone said. “Why we shouldn’t expect the same from our school buildings and our state is beyond me.”

During a Board of Education meeting Tuesday, state Superintendent Michael Rice and the other board members combed through the different methods to issue the A-F grading system. Rice reiterated several times to the members — who some seemed to have issues with the letter grade system as a whole — that it was not a federal mandate.

“The board should be aware though that we are not here having this discussion because of the feds. We are here having this discussion because the state Legislature passed this law,” Rice said. “I would encourage you to which you have a problem with this exercise, slash state law, I would encourage you to locate it at the locust of the problem, namely the entity that approved this in December of 2018.”

Rice said the information that will be used to assign a letter grade is the same information parents have access online now.

“This is not about transparency at all. This is about putting a label on top of that transparency because transparency already exists,” Rice said.

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