Accountability in Scholarship Programs
Accreditation
In the coming legislative session we will again be advocating for
accreditation as a requirement for all schools participating in
scholarship programs. The Opportunity Scholarship already contains
requirements for accreditation and requiring it in the other scholarship
programs will reassure parents and facilitate needed protections for
children. It will also minimize the need for unnecessary and intrusive
regulation by the State.
We believe such a requirement should be phased in and our recommendation
includes a reasonable time line of three years from the date of obtaining
candidate status to the initial accreditation visit. The school would then
receive a two-year grace period following the initial accreditation visit,
if needed, to correct any standard violations. In all, this amounts to a
five-year period before accreditation being required by the participating
school.
In weighing whether students in scholarship programs will be well served
by the requirement, consider that accreditation is an essential
accountability element within virtually every facet of education from
early childhood programs through graduate school. At the pre-K level the
State’s Advisory Council recommended that programs participating in VUPK
must be nationally accredited and Gold Seal approved. Other precedents for
accreditation include the Florida Resident Access Grant, the Private
Student Assistant Grant, Access to Better Learning and Education Grant
program, and Title IV Pell Grants. Moreover, law school graduates cannot
participate in the Florida Bar exam unless they graduate from an
accredited school.
Norm Referenced Testing
Longitudinal data based on learning gains in core subject areas will allow
the State to determine whether its public dollars allowing parents to
enroll their children in choice programs are serving these students well.
For this reason, we recommend that private schools be required to
administer the SAT 9, SAT 10, ITBS or some other nationally norm
referenced test to scholarship students and report results to parents. We
propose that aggregated test scores should be publicly disclosed to the
Florida Department of Education when there are 10 or more voucher students
per grade with a participating private school.
Requiring schools with 10 or more voucher students to report scores would
help to provide an adequate sample size in which analyses could be drawn
upon and at the same time comply with the Federal Educational Rights of
Privacy Act. Providing such data would need to occur in such a manner that
participating private schools would not be placed in an unfair position
and the confidentiality of students’ records would have to be protected.
Because almost all participating private schools administer standardized
testing in the fall or winter, public disclosure of aggregated test scores
would not be required until after the students had been in attendance at
the schools for one full year. This is a reasonable transition time for
the children and the schools.
Another advantage offered by making public aggregated test scores of
voucher students (within specific circumstances) is that a longitudinal
database would be established to record academic performance from
elementary through high school. The database would be a resource to
address with empirical evidence misconceptions as to whether scholarship
children are learning a year’s worth of knowledge each school year. The
data could also serve as a consumer index for parents.
The longitudinal data would also create a baseline to begin drawing
comparative analyses of aggregated norm referenced test scores of
scholarship students with that of aggregated Florida Comprehensive
Assessment Test results. Obviously, in order for fair
comparisons to be drawn, students of similar academic levels, based on
grade level, socio-economic status, geographical location of the student’s
residence and school, and whether they are developmentally delayed and/or
have been diagnosed with a disability, would have to be qualitatively
measured.
Additional Accountability Recommendations
Additional accountability recommendations include: 1) parents annually
signing off as to whether they believe their child is achieving
academically; 2) requiring core-subject teachers who instruct scholarship
students to possess a bachelor’s degree, teach in-field and attend one to
two professional workshops annually; 3) documenting that scholarship
dollars are expended on scholarship students; and 4) requiring new schools
to provide evidence of fiscal soundness.
