Report Card on Quebec's Secondary Schools, 2001 Edition

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Introduction

When the Report Card on Quebec's Secondary Schools was introduced last year, the reaction was immediate. Hundreds of reports and editorials appeared in newspapers and on radio and television across the province. The newspaper Le Devoir reported that the number of applications for admission to high-ranking schools increased markedly following the Report Card's publication.¹ When a poll of 525 adult residents of Quebec--both parents and non-parents--asked respondents for opinions on the merits of a variety of methods for improving the province's schools,² more than 75% considered the Report Card an important innovation. For weeks, students, parents, educators, ministry of education officials, and taxpayers focused on school results. Such intense interest is critical to the process of improving Quebec's schools.

First, we must talk

While the reaction to it is encouraging, the Report Card will serve its purpose only when its findings are openly discussed among all those with an interest in the school. But, frank useful discussion is difficult to initiate. When confronted with the Report Card for the first time, teachers and school officials sometimes adopt a defensive attitude. They see it as an attack on their professional performance. It is not. Teachers, counselors, and school administrators should be committed to continual professional development and, as every educator knows, feedback is a necessary component of learning. Since it is an objective report on each school's past effectiveness, the Report Card provides a variety of relevant data.

Educators would perhaps prefer that school performance data not be made public. They may worry that parents do not have the time or the expertise to analyze and interpret such information correctly. Naturally, there are aspects of the Report Card that require interpretation. But, a broader understanding of school results will undoubtedly follow from inclusive discussion and debate.

Teachers and principals may fear that parents and taxpayers will understand the results perfectly well and that, if the school's performance is poor, they will demand change. Disquiet among parents can be a powerful motivator of improvement. Here, in the words of its principal is what happened at one rural school in British Columbia when it found itself at the bottom of the Report Card ranking.

[T]he fallout or publicity it brought [my school] has allowed me great license in instituting change. For that I thank you (although my thanks is somewhat like a patient thanking a dentist after a painful root canal!!!)

Surely, when teachers, parents, students, administrators, and taxpayers all have easy access to school performance data and they share the will to discuss it frankly and in detail, Quebec's schools and, therefore, the province's students will be the better for it.

Some schools do better than others

It will come as no great surprise to experienced parents and educators that the data consistently suggest that what goes on in the schools makes a difference to student success and that some schools make more difference than others.

Unfortunately, while educators are eager to trumpet the positive aspects of their school, they are unwilling to discuss its shortcomings publicly. The Report Card provides objective results--good and bad--and offers educators an opportunity to accept poor results for what they are--a starting point from which to improve.

Comparisons are at the heart of the improvement process

Comparison of results among schools provides a better understanding of the effectiveness of each school. By comparing a school's latest results with those of earlier years, we can see if the school is improving or not. By comparing a school's results with those of neighbouring schools or schools that parents and educators see as having similar school and student characteristics, we can identify more successful schools and learn from them. Reference to overall provincial results establishes an individual school's level of achievement in a broader context.

While the Report Card is not about which schools won and which schools lost, there is great benefit in identifying schools that are particularly successful. By studying the proven techniques used in high-performing schools, less effective schools may find ways to improve. This advantage is not lost on the United Kingdom's Department of Education and Employment. Its Beacon Schools program ⁴ identifies schools across the United Kingdom that have demonstrated expertise in any of a wide variety of challenging aspects of the management of schools and the teaching and counselling of their students.

Comparisons are at the heart of improvement and making comparisons between schools is made simpler and more meaningful by Report Card's indicators, ratings, and rankings.

While Quebec's secondary schools may differ in the students they serve, they must all satisfy certain basic student needs. The school's teachers should ensure that their students master the skills and acquire the knowledge presented in each course. They should provide accurate, timely feedback to students and parents regarding the student's progress. They should design and execute lesson plans that take into account those differences in individual student characteristics inevitably present in every school. Effective schools will encourage their students to complete their secondary school studies on time. The Report Card presents objective evidence of the extent to which each of the province's schools meet these basic needs.

Our choice of school performance indicators was largely dependent on the availability of relevant data. We selected only annually generated data maintained by the Ministry of Education so that they would be comparable from school to school and from year to year.

From these data, for each school, for the seven school years 1993/1994 through 1999/2000, we calculated six indicators of school performance.

1. the average uniform examination ⁵ mark received by the school's students on four important Secondary IV and Secondary V courses;
2. the percentage of these examinations that the students failed;
3. the extent to which their average, raw school-based mark exceeds their average raw provincial examination mark in these four courses (an indication of school-level grade inflation);
4. the difference in the average examination marks of male and female students in Secondary V first language courses;
5. the difference in the average examination marks of male and female students in Secondary IV physical science; and,
6. new this year, a measure of the extent to which each school encourages and assists its students to stay in school and finish their chosen secondary program on time.

Each school's annual Overall rating out of 10 is calculated using these six indicators. The overall ratings are intended to answer the important question: "Generally, how is the school doing academically?"

While the indicators chosen for the Report Card provide a useful measure of the academic program at each school, it is likely that the inclusion of additional measures of school effectiveness would make the Report Card even more useful. We plan to add more indicators as relevant data become available and we encourage all interested parties to suggest new measures of school effectiveness that they believe will improve the Report Card.

Where parents can choose among several schools for their children, the Report Card is a valuable tool for use in the decision-making process. Because it makes comparisons easy, the Report Card alerts parents to those nearby schools that appear to have more effective academic programs. Parents can also determine whether schools of interest are improving over time. By first studying the Report Card, parents will be better prepared to ask relevant questions when they interview the principal and teachers at the schools under consideration. Of course, the choice of a school should not be made solely on the basis of any one source of information but the Report Card provides a detailed picture of each school that is not easily available elsewhere.

Finally, the vast majority of Quebec's students attend schools that are wholly or partly financed by taxpayers. For the school year 1999/2000, Quebec's taxpayers spent more than seven and one-half billion dollars on the operation and maintenance of the province's elementary and secondary schools. A public expenditure of such magnitude necessitates continued, independent measurement of the schools' results. The measurements should be easily available to any interested taxpayer.

As noted above, with this edition we introduce a new indicator noted in the tables as Taux de promotion. It measures the likelihood that the school's Secondary IV students will stay in school and complete the general program of studies ⁶ on time. This new indicator complements the other five. While they are evidence of the quality of the school's teaching in the general program, the Promotion rate indicates, first, the extent to which the school is successful in keeping its students in school and, second, the extent to which the school is successful in encouraging students to obtain their general program diploma without delay.

In last year's Report Card we provided the average parents' income for each school as an indication of the family background of its student body. This indicator was designed to allow more meaningful comparison among schools by identifying schools where the family backgrounds of its students are roughly similar. It could also be used to estimate the extent to which the actions of the school affected student success--that is, the value added by the school.

This year, we have added two new indicators of the composition of the student body. Both relate to the individual characteristics of the school's students. First, for each school we include the percentage of its Secondary IV and Secondary V students (noted in the tables as EHDAA (%)) who, as a result of their special needs, attract extra ministry of education funding for their local school authority. Such students' disabilities are referred to collectively as EHDAA.⁷ A high proportion of EHDAA students is generally associated with lower school performance.

The addition of new measures of the composition of each school's student body has enabled us to refine our estimate of the value added by each school. The Adjustment for value added (noted in the tables as Ajustement valeur ajoutée), when added to the Overall rating out of 10, reports the contribution (in rating points) made by the school to its overall rating. The continued improvement of the value-added estimator is an important step in determining the relative effectiveness of schools in contributing to their students' success.

Last year's launch of the Report Card on Quebec's Secondary Schools was, by any measure, a success. The improvements made to this year's edition will make the Report Card even more useful.

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