Accountability-based Reforms Should Lead To Better Teaching and Learning — Period

Author: Reeves, D.B.
Publisher: Harvard Graduate School of Education
Publication Date: 2002, March/April
Journal: Harvard Education Letter
Full text available online at: http://www.edletter.org/past/issues/2002-ma/reeves.shtml

Abstract (written by WestEd)

At a forum hosted by the Principal's Center at Harvard Graduate School of Education, Reeves, chairman and founder of the Center for Performance Assessment, describes the six principles he believes create effective school-based accountability systems.

1. Congruence: Through the accountability system, districts can ensure that the strategies, rewards, recognitions, and personnel evaluations are unified.
   
2. Specificity: We need to know what specifically works and set as many standards for adults as for kids.
   
3. Relevance: The strategies schools use should be related to the improvements they are trying to achieve.
   
4. Respect for diversity: Because not all students learn the same way, we need to use different teaching strategies, and these strategies need to be reported on.
   
5. Continuous improvement: Children need timely, immediate, relevant feedback, as do teachers.
   
6. Focus on achievement, not norms: Children need to achieve clear, objective expectations, not be compared to other children as done with the bell curve.
   

He states that these principles follow from the "moral principle that we dare not hold kids any more accountable than we expect to hold ourselves."