Teachers upgrade to electronic grade books

Published 2:00 pm Wednesday, June 28, 2006

In a teacher’s world, time is of the essence, while in a working parent’s world, quick understanding is key. Beginning next school year in North Kitsap, both groups’ grass may be getting a little greener in the interest of their students.

A computer-grade booking application called Skyward, which is being used at the secondary level and will be fully implemented across elementary schools in the North Kitsap School District next year, could quite possibly pick out the best of both worlds, said Bill Every, NKSD director of technology and information systems.

“It’s like any other traditional grade book, but the advantage to (Skyward) for teachers is: they walk into their class, they log on and their kids are already prepopulated in their grade book,” Every said. “As a parent, you can log in and you can instantaneously see your child’s grades at any point in time.”

Parents of secondary level students should be enjoying those immediate benefits next year as the district plans to activate parent access for junior high and high school students beginning in the 2006-2007 school year. Parents at the elementary level, however, will have to wait until the 2007-2008 to be included into the system because NKSD elementary level teachers will be making the wholesale switch next year.

“Everybody’s got to have that under their belt before we introduce the public,” Every said.

A dedicated pilot group of 10 teachers at Gordon Elementary tried, tasked and tweaked the Skyward system this past year. Working closely with Every and a representative from Skyward Software, the group was able to offer advice on what did or did not work for them and where they felt changes needed to be made.

“Anything that we found during this pilot that wasn’t right, we fixed it,” said Gordon teacher and pilot group leader Mel Gallup, noting that the group had more than 10 suggestions on how to better the system.

“What’s different about this system is not the idea, but the fact that the electronic grade book automatically produces a standards-based report card,” Gallup said. “When you’ve entered your last grade, your report card is basically done.”

And while the system should save teachers the time of going back over multiple portfolios of student work, the Skyward elementary report card also presents a more comprehensive glance at a student’s progress. The report card is a standards-based assessment — on a 1-4 scale, 1 meaning below standard and 4 meaning above standard — which ranks students by Grade Level Expectations, set by the NKSD, of each subject, rather than just assigning an overall grade for the entire course.

The report will also include a measure of absence and indicators of success, such as “shows concern for quality of work” or “sets goals and evaluates progress.”

“It gives the teachers a checklist while giving the parent a better idea of what’s being covered,” Gallup said, adding that previously all parents would see in a report is that their child received a B-minus in math. “Now a parent can look and see that their child is doing well in computational math but when it comes to algebraic sense it’s not so good. They can specifically see where the child is lacking.”

“That’s one thing that the teachers felt was really beneficial for them was to know that they could reference and know what they are struggling with. It’s a way to help guide the teacher,” Every said of the educational benefit of GLEs being assessed individually.

Elementary teachers will be led toward implementation of the program beginning in the fall, Every said, noting that only one day per teacher will be needed for training. “(Skyward) can create more work for teachers for a short period of time until they get adjusted to the new system, but in the long run it’s gonna save a lot of time,” Every said.