DC Public Charter School Board Approves Early Childhood Performance Management Framework

Washington, D.C. — The DC Public Charter School Board (PCSB) approved establishing an Early Childhood Performance Management Framework (PMF) at its board meeting Monday night, creating for the first time a common way of measuring how charter schools are preparing the city’s youngest students to be ready to learn in kindergarten and beyond.

The board’s 5-0 vote means that PCSB can evaluate the 62 charter school early childhood programs based on a common set of metrics, which is a shift from the individual targets that each school used to set for itself, known as Accountability Plans. Instead, the framework includes five indicators that will be applied to all charter school early childhood programs from pre-kindergarten to second grade:  student progress in literacy, mathematical thinking, social emotional learning, student achievement (grades K-2 only), teacher interaction (pre-kindergarten only), attendance/re-enrollment, and a measure specific to the mission of the school. The framework goes into effect in the current 2013-14 school year, with results published for the first time in November 2014.

The new framework comes after two years of consultation and research with charter school leaders who were part of an Early Childhood PMF Task Force. It was also shaped by extensive public comments and parent feedback. PCSB reviewed and revised its initial proposal based on more than 60 public comments from parents, community members and charter school leaders. That feedback raised concerns about whether there was an over-emphasis on literacy and mathematical thinking, whether social-emotional learning was sufficiently weighted in the framework, and the implications of putting schools in performance tiers based on their results. As a result, social-emotional learning is an optional measure for PK-2nd grade.

Therefore, PCSB made changes to the proposal that included adding a goal that was specific to the mission of the school, increasing the weight of the social-emotional component for those schools that choose to use it and establishing no tiers for any schools on the 2014 results.

“Moving away from immediate tiering shows that this is not about a desire to put a label of good or bad on the school but to ensure we have a process for measuring whether children are progressing adequately toward social and emotional competency and math and reading competency,” said PCSB Vice Chair Darren Woodruff.

The new framework joins the Performance Management Framework that PCSB established three years ago for elementary, middle and high school students. The Board also approved on Monday a framework for Adult Education programs.

About PCSB: The DC Public Charter School Board (PCSB) is setting a national model for creating quality public school options through its rigorous review of new charter applications and effective oversight of charter school performance that is leading the transformation of public education in Washington, DC. PCSB currently oversees 60 public charter schools on 108 campuses serving nearly 35,000 students living in every ward of the city.

Learn more at  www.dcpcsb.org .

# # #