2021 Convening Resources
Discussion Videos
The October A-GAME Convening was a huge success! Networking, sharing, and creating together brings a huge amount of strength to the authorizing and educational community.
To celebrate this community, we are making all of the Convening videos and resources available to everyone. Please feel free to use these tools to strength schools for our kids and our country.
Learn more about the A-GAME.
Free Goals Directory
Meet the school leaders of alternative education campuses who have been through the A-GAME process of creating Responsive Goals. In this video you will learn about their schools, their students, and their missions.
Accountability Disconnect
In the Accountability Disconnect and Defining Quality video, school leaders discuss the disconnect when assessing school quality using the current state and authorizer accountability systems. They discuss the common measures used for capturing student growth and achievement such as proficiency rates on state assessments, four-year cohort graduation rates, truancy or attendance, and high school exit exams. The school leaders explain how these measures miss what matters most to their families, students, and teachers. When if they were every labeled a failing school by their authorizer or the state’s report card, the school leaders discuss the impact of being considered a “failing school” on their staff and families and how a new approach to accountability is necessary.
Innovative Measures
In the Innovative Measures video, hear from school leaders about the types of measures and methods of differentiation they, with their authorizer, developed using the A-GAME process to capture student academic growth and social-emotional learning. These measures go Website Description:
beyond what is currently used by states and authorizers to determine school quality. They are derived by asking what matters most for the school, their families, and their staff. They are intended to measure the extent to which the school is successfully meeting its mission.
Authorizer Mindset
In the Authorizer Mindset video, school leaders discuss what they need in their authorizer in order to create a positive relationship that supports student learning. They discuss the issues that they have had when authorizers are not willing to look beyond a one-size-fits-all approach to authorizing. They reflect on how they felt being able to truly negotiate their goals with their authorizer due to having an external facilitator as part of the Responsive Goals process.
Higher Standards
In the Higher Standards video, school leaders react to the question about whether Responsive Goals, which do not rely on state assessment proficiency rates and other federally recognized accountability measures, as lowering standards. The leaders respond how they feel that responsive goals, that measure ALL students, actually raise the standards.
Social Emotional Learning
Hear from charter authorizers about how they incorporate social emotional development in their oversight frameworks and school goals. They respond to school involvement in choosing the assessment, the rollout process, and how the data can inform schools in turn around or recovering from a low academic year. They speak to the importance of capturing quantitatively school climate, student engagement, and social emotional development as well as the validity of the data.
Why A-GAME and its Impact
Here from school leaders about the impact A-GAME has had on their relationship with their authorizer, their ability to align their accountability goals with staff goals and to finally have charter goals that measure what matters.
How A-GAME can work with all schools
In How A-GAME can Work with All Schools, school leaders of alternative education campuses respond to the question on how all schools should be measured. They discuss that each school has a different mission, course offering, and approach and that this should be considered when evaluating the school’s impact.
AEC Dashboard Walkthrough
The AEC dashboard aims to provide authorizers with some “typical” results for students attending AECs. The data is collected from state department of educational websites, as well as the National Center for Education Statistics website.
Digital & Print Resources
AEC Dashboard
One area of shared difficulty among authorizers and AECs is establishing rigorous but attainable performance targets. The AEC dashboard aims to provide authorizers with some “typical” results for students attending AECs. The data is collected from state department of educational websites, as well as the National Center for Education Statistics website.
Free Goals Directory
Are you searching for responsive goals for student populations, national situations, or changes in data availability?
Download the latest A-GAME resource, “Responsive Goals Directory,” and see the different ways leaders have measured success among their AECs, as well as the unique ways AEC support their students.
College and Career Readiness Flow Chart
The Los Angeles County Office of Education (LACOE), in collaboration with two of the county’s authorized alternative charter schools, DaVinci RISE and the North Valley Military Institute, used the A-GAME process to add more college and career-ready opportunities. They have made their flow-chart available for others to determine which pathways prepare students for a successful future.
Workforce Readiness Evaluation Rubric
As a workforce readiness evaluation tool, the rubric can evaluate how students feel about their preparedness for the workforce, as well as how teachers/advisors of workforce preparation courses determine whether students are prepared to enter a work experience opportunity.
Better Goals. More Learning. Using Student (re)Engagement Levels to Create Meaningful Goals and Measures
A-GAME originally set out focusing exclusively on measuring the quality of alternative education campuses (or AECs). Members joined as they were frustrated by accountability systems that rely on traditional measures, because they don’t tell the whole story. Schools serving large numbers of disengaged and barely-engaged students typically receive low marks on state and authorizer performance frameworks -- even if they produce positive results for students documented through other measures.
This document is designed to show how to avoid this problem and measure what really matters for all schools!
Minding the Gap: How State Policies Can Create Conditions for Innovation in Alternative Education Accountability
Minding the Gap is a resource to help state education agencies, charter school authorizers, leaders of alternative education campuses, policy-makers, and researchers understand how states are balancing the demand for rigorous public accountability with the diversity of alternative education campuses (AECs) and the real-life experiences of students they serve.
Measuring Quality: A Resource Guide for Authorizers and Alternative Schools
For charter school authorizers, alternative education campuses can be a challenge, as students tend to be highly mobile, are chronically absent, and are often years behind in academic learning. Therefore, data is scarce and not reflective of all students enrolled by the AEC throughout the year. This document provides concrete recommendations and specific examples of ways to measure outcomes for AEC charter schools.
Evaluating a New AEC Applicant
This rubric provides examples of how authorizers can rate applications to open an alternative charter school and is consistent with the guidance and recommendations put forth in the A-GAME’s Measuring Quality: A Resource Guide for Authorizers and Alternative Schools.
Assessing an AEC for Renewal
This rubric provides an example of how authorizers can assess an application to renew an alternative charter, and is consistent with the guidance and recommendations put forth in the A-GAME’s Measuring Quality: A Resource Guide for Authorizers and Alternative Schools.
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