The Texas Education Agency’s rating of Dallas ISD with an overall grade of B reflects a score of 86 out of 100 — a five-point improvement over the district’s 2018 rating of B.
The TEA’s new A-F rating system measures such factors as student achievement, school progress/growth and how well schools perform at closing academic gaps between various populations of students. It’s important to know that Dallas ISD’s homegrown rating system – the Local Accountability System for Campus Success – applies a more robust standard for assessing schools than that applied by the state. In short, Dallas ISD is holding our schools to a higher standard than other districts that do not apply these additional criteria.
Dallas ISD’s Local Accountability System includes criteria designed to measure how well district schools are meeting the needs of the whole child. The LAS assessment domains look at how a specific school is doing based on multiple measures – whether all students are making academic progress, and the health of the school’s culture and climate. The specific domains are:
Academics:
- A School Effectiveness Index—Whether a school is growing its students, regardless of where the students start.
Culture and Climate:
- Staff Climate Survey- What teachers and staff think about their school’s priorities and the culture of feedback and support.
- Parent/Guardian Survey – Feedback from parents and guardians about the school’s academic program, environment and communication with families.
Student Experience:
- Student Survey—What students think about their school’s instruction, engagement, culture and environment.
- Student participation in extra & co-curricular activities
Based on these criteria, the district gives schools an A-F rating: Accomplished, Breakthrough, Competing, Developing and Focus. As an element of the district’s Theory of Action, the ratings serve as the basis for decisions that impact student achievement and help determine the level of decision-making autonomy granted to school administrators.
