Adding “Student Voice” to the Mix: Perception Surveys and State Accountability Systems

Abstract

For the past two decades, student perception surveys have become standard tools in data collection efforts. At the state level, however, “student voice” is still used sparingly. In this study, we examine the ways in which including student survey results might alter state accountability determinations. Reconstructing the accountability system in Massachusetts, we draw on a unique set of student survey data, which we add to the state’s formula at a maximally feasible dosage in order to determine new school ratings. As we find, student survey data shift school accountability ratings in small but meaningful ways and appear to enhance functional validity. Student survey results introduce information about school quality that is not captured by typical accountability metrics, correlate moderately with test score growth, and are not predicted by student demographic variables.

Accountable to whom? Reimagining Hispanic serving institutions’ financial models

“…HSIs can further assess the empowerment Latinx students may encounter through their experiences directly and indirectly associated with grant activities (Cuellar et al, 2017). Integrating these liberatory and empowering experiences and outcomes align with recent calls in K-12 accountability systems to include student voice and institutional climate measures (Gagnon & Schneider, 2019;Schneider et al, 2021) and adopting them into higher education.…”

“…A commitment to serving Latinx communities is part of servingness (Garcia, 2016; Garcia et al., 2019). Emerging K‐12 scholarship calls for the expansion of accountability measures to more adequately assess school quality and include student voices (Gagnon & Schneider, 2019; Schneider et al., 2021). Building on these K‐12 efforts, reimagining accountability within HSIs to include Latinx students and communities provide a venue through which these constituents can hold institutions accountable to serving them.…”

Beyond ‘good’ and ‘bad’: Disrupting narratives about school quality

“…These correlations were weaker for measures like "student growth percentile," which are designed to account for different student starting points. But given the weight of achievement scores in the state accountability formula, the relationship between demography and performance ratings remained durable and troubling (Schneider et al, 2021).…”