What accountability means

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An organization consists of people, processes, and systems that come together to provide a benefit, without which the organization would have no reason to exist. A huge component of accountability is the measure of how well the organization provided that benefit. When the benefit isn't met then all the parts of the organization may need to change, which means that the accountability measure needs to be useful in that regard.

Schools are organizations that exist to produce a benefit for the students that attend them. It would be wonderful to think that accountability measures that have something to do with that benefit might one day be at the heart of accountability discussions. At the moment, the only benefit being rewarded are high or rising standardized test scores, which do not represent the rich benefit I think we all want for our students.

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