Evolving Policy

more meaning to the final projects that require hard work, perseverance, creativity, and innovation. Through performance-based assessment, teachers can offer support and provide feedback on the academic standards or competencies necessary for success in a particular course of study and the adaptive competencies that we know are important for life beyond the classroom. CPS can ensure students leave its schools with the skills needed to advocate for themselves and others, collaborate and communicate effectively, adapt to changes or respond to constructive feedback productively, and take the initiative or lead when they are so inspired or called to take action. The goal is to ensure students have a seat at the table and that their voices are informed and heard.

In CPS, we have seen that by connecting academics to the social-emotional learning, adaptive competencies, and social justice aspects of the work, we can bring out the excellence in staff, students, and families that will help make this world a better place. After all, isn’t it our role as educators to uplift and empower young people to take charge ethically and responsibly in this fast-paced and ever-changing world? Competency-based education, focusing on the whole child, rigorous learning targets, 21st-century or foundational skills, social justice, and social and emotional learning, allows students to sit in the driver’s seat of their educational journey, take charge of their learning, and pursue their passions. (T. Howell, D. Smith, personal communication, July 14, 2021)

According to ExcelinEd and EducationCounsel (2017):

Effective implementation of competency-based education demands attention to an intricate array of education policies, practices and systems at the federal, state and local levels. Some decisions can be anticipated in advance (e.g., the need for flexibility from time-based credits and requirements) while others will only become apparent during implementation (e.g., challenges logging competency-based credits into time-based databases and IT systems). (p. 5)

The best thing that states can do (and have done) is to create opportunities for innovation—a way that schools and school districts can explore and adopt various competency-based models that work within the confines of the state laws, policies, and procedures. According to ExcelinEd and EducationCounsel (2017), “Innovation programs and pilots provide a reasonable and actionable first step for policymakers. They also provide an important opportunity to work through challenging issues and strike an appropriate balance of state and local responsibilities” (p. 5).

Many states in the United States have begun or advanced their work in competency education by way of an innovative program or project that falls into the category of one or more of the following six strategies. 1. Policy language that provides flexibility from time-based systems

2. Policy language that supports the transition to competencybased diplomas 3. Policies that recognize anytime, anywhere learning 4. Policies that allow for the acceptance of competency-based diplomas and credits by higher education institutions 5. State assessment systems that support competency-based education 6. Accountability systems that have been evolved to support competencybased learning

One of the earliest and most notable innovative projects to advance competencybased learning on a national scale first happened in New Hampshire and is known as Performance Assessment of Competency Education (PACE). The PACE pilot received a waiver from the U.S. Department of Education starting in the 2014–2015 school year, with four school districts part of the initial work. PACE is considered to be an innovative program because it is based on a performance assessment accountability system where performance tasks are created collaboratively by PACE school classroom teachers, administered to students as part of their regular classroom assessments, and then scored at both the local and state levels. These tasks are used to help determine student proficiency in some federally required grades and subjects instead of a more traditional achievement test. Evans (2019) studied PACE scores in the four pilot districts relative to peer districts that used traditional testing measures and concluded, “Findings suggest that students in PACE schools tend to exhibit small positive effects on the grades 8 and 11 state achievement tests in both subjects in comparison to students attending non-PACE comparison schools.” This research supports with empirical evidence efforts being made by other states to implement similar innovative programs and strategies.

Innovative policy changes have taken different paths. By 2018, states like New Hampshire, Michigan, Oregon, and Utah had instituted policies that allow for flexibility from time-based systems. During that same time period, states like Vermont, Michigan, and Maine had enacted state policies to support competency-based diplomas. Louisiana and Florida started anytime, anywhere pilot schools. Florida, New Hampshire, and Virginia instituted state assessment systems that support the work of competency-based learning. Idaho and Ohio each had started innovation pilots focused on competency-based learning. Also in that same time period, Colorado and Georgia had started general innovation programs. These states continue to advance their work, and many more states have enacted similar programs since this time.

In neighboring Canada, competency statements have become a foundational structure of many provincial curriculum documents. In British Columbia, for example, the Ministry of Education (2016) defines its three core competencies of

communication, thinking, and personal/social as “sets of intellectual, personal, and social and emotional proficiencies that all students need in order to engage in deep, lifelong learning.” The Ministry goes on to state that they are “central to British Columbia’s K–12 curriculum and assessment system and directly support students in their growth as educated citizens.” The British Columbia core competencies are supported by smaller subcompetencies. Each subcompetency is made up of a handful of facets (unique and interrelated components), six profiles (descriptors of students’ subcompetency development), and illustrations (examples of how students demonstrate their learning). What makes the British Columbia model stand out is the emphasis it places on student reflection on their growth and development of their learning throughout the learning process, by way of the profiles and their connections to the facets.

In the United States, policy work in the state of Virginia has opened doors for the work to flourish in its schools. Beth Blankenship, English teacher, and Elizabeth Dean, instructional coach, have been a part of their school’s transformation and share how Madison High School in Fairfax, Virginia, got started.

Practitioner Perspective Beth Blankenship and Elizabeth Dean, Madison High School, Fairfax County, Virginia

Our high school’s journey to build a more equitable system for our students started in 2016. The discussion of fair grades was a trending issue in 2016 among our district office leadership, and after a two-year countywide committee process resulted in minor policy changes, there was little inspiration to make any grading changes at all. It wasn’t until our school’s leadership council decided to look closely at our current grading system from the perspective of students when inspiration to change arrived. Examining the system from the student perspective revealed many of the inaccuracies and inequities of our traditional approach to grading. The leadership council established a three-year goal to improve our system by transitioning from the 100 point scale to the 4.0 scale. Learning more about fair, accurate, and equitable grading practices was a part of these early years in our journey. In order to learn more about grading for equity, standards-based grading, and the 4.0 scale, we hosted teacher-led book groups, attended online courses, and reached out to other schools to learn from their experiences. Throughout our journey we had many “Aha!” moments. One of our most important “Aha!” moments occurred at the iNACOL (now Aurora Institute) Conference in the fall of 2019 where we learned more about implementing competencybased grading at a preconference session our building leadership team all attended together. At that session, we realized two important ideas: grading for equity could be best enacted through competency-based learning, and that our school staff, while they had been developing a 4.0 scale, did not have a shared, basic understanding of the philosophical underpinnings of competency-based learning and assessment. We realized that if we