{"id":2575,"date":"2012-08-28T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2012-08-28T04:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aurora-institute.org\/blog\/cw_post\/1643\/"},"modified":"2020-02-05T12:48:58","modified_gmt":"2020-02-05T17:48:58","slug":"1643","status":"publish","type":"cw_post","link":"https:\/\/aurora-institute.org\/cw_post\/1643\/","title":{"rendered":"Muscatine Jumps into Competency Education"},"content":{"rendered":"

I don\u2019t think the\"\"<\/a>re is a word for it\u2026probably time to make one up. I just love the feeling of \u201ca-ha!\u201d \u2013 when I get an itsy-bitsy glimpse of understanding about our world and our work. I had two \u201ca-ha!s\u201d when I caught a glimpse into the Muscatine Community School District<\/a>\u2019s (Iowa) efforts in competency education.<\/p>\n

The Muscatine Journal<\/a> covered a school board meeting where a competency education pilot was described.<\/p>\n

It starts in the classroom<\/strong>:\u00a0 Muscatine has 26 volunteer teachers that are going to pilot competency education in their classrooms.\u00a0 They are from elementary, middle and high school as well as their alternative school. They are doing their own research and figuring out how to integrate standards-based grading into their classrooms.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve seen states lead the charge to have all high schools award competency-based diplomas, we\u2019ve seen new schools develop that are competency-based, we\u2019ve seen districts begin with elementary schools and work up or secondary schools and then back into earlier grades. Yet here is a district working across grades with teachers willing to take the lead.<\/p>\n

A Variation on Grading<\/strong>:\u00a0 There is always a lot of interest in how competency education schools manage grading and the translation back to the traditional grading systems. The teachers in the Muscatine pilot are doing away with the D\u2019s and F\u2019s. Instead students get a number, 1 or 2, for approaching or nearing proficiency. A, B and C\u2019s are given to indicate the level of proficiency.\u00a0 Interesting!<\/p>\n

There are some great messages that come through in the article in the Muscatine Journal that others might want to use as well:<\/p>\n