Organizing Around Student Learning Outcomes/Objectives

Hello

Montgomery County Education Association is currently working on "politicizing" the act of teacher owned data.  We have developed an organizing plan that targets members and the community. The goal of this plan include building the narrative that MCEA teachers are the most credible experts in measuring student learning and adjusting teaching decisions.  Our long term goal is to protect the integrity of MCEA's PAR system. Our PAR system currently has no inclusion of state tests or local assessments as part of a cut score or some algorithm for assigning a score. What we have started to use are Student Learning Outcomes SLO. We do believe that this use of "teacher owned" student data is a critical component of the professional narrative section of our evaluation system ONLY.  For this we are building Student Learning Outcomes.

We have developed a 10 Minute Meeting Toolkit and planned a November 18th Town Hall Meeting. We are also using our elected faculty reps (1per building) and our Council for Teaching and Learning (like an RA - a representative body focused on instruction, curriculum and assessment) to develop the narrative via one to ones, and assess the movement of members towards our message.  Our next phases will be to move into the community. Parents and voters need to understand the importance of ensuring MCEA teachers retain control over their profession and their educational decisions.

I would love to know if there are any of you out there that are also using professional issues as the basis for large organizing plans.  I would love to have a few critical friends as we move through this work.