Educational Ice Cream

The challenge in talking about educational accountability is twofold. First is that no one in their right mind would suggest that they are unwilling to be accountable for the work they do, especially when that work is as important as the education of a child.

But second, the way accountability has been done in education is so embarrassingly dumb that it isn’t an accountability worth being accountable to or for. That leaves educators in the untenable position of saying that they are happy to be accountable, just not in the way that states and Federal government want them to be accountable. Which leaves educators vulnerable to accusations of wanting to cherry pick among systems for the one that puts them in the best possible light. Or of not wanting to be accountable at all.

Let’s be clear about how dumb the current system is. It is something done punitively and authoritatively. It is done to schools by those outside schools, most of whom lack any expertise regarding educational processes. Its negative judgments are concentrated on the poorest communities. It is based largely on standardized test scores, which few understand, especially the policy makers making the rules. It creates judgments that differ a great deal from what the educators in a building know to be true. It comes with sufficiently negative judgments that it interferes with and often corrupts what educators know to be best practice. It is stressful and forever the 600 lb. gorilla in every school. It uses complex compliance-based formulas to assign labels. Almost no one would classify what passes for educational accountability as a system that promotes anything resembling excellence.

In short, what passes for educational accountability follows a formula that has been roundly rejected by virtually every other profession for the simple fact that if understanding an organization and its efforts is the goal, this won’t get you there.

The challenge in talking about fixing educational accountability is also twofold. First, the paradigm of test—judge—punish is so powerful that improving accountability almost always occurs under the assumption that standardized testing is a fete accompli, something as commensurate with accountability as the terms bunny and hare are to each other. 99% of the effort that goes into trying to fix state and federal accountability programs and policies is about trying to lessen the negative impact of a demonstrably bad (dumb) system. Or find a better way to test. Or tweak the formulas to hurt a little less, which of course will be met with accusations of (ironically) dumbing down the system.

And second, it has proven almost impossible to imagine something other than our compliance-driven test-based accountabilities. Whatever the reason, there has never been a concerted and sustained effort to ask and research what accountability could have and should have looked like, and then ask how we might move towards it. I interact with people all the time about a future state of educational accountability, and it never ceases to amaze me how challenging it is to see beyond narrow educational metrics and thinking that compliance with them somehow signals effectiveness.

All that weight anchored to a single phrase, educational accountability, means that the instant the phrase is invoked so too is the negativity and the sense that getting out from underneath it will be near impossible. That weight makes it challenging even to imagine what something else might look like. Or that there could even be a something else.

When I say educational accountability I’m talking about the most transformational of all the leadership disciplines, more capable of supporting a great work environment, creating trust between an organization and its stakeholders, and helping to shape strong organizations well into the future than any of them. Do it well and the big issues that seemed unsolvable in the past can become solvable going forward. No other leadership discipline can make that claim.

I’m talking about the way great organizations of all stripes account for what they do such that it leads and guides them as effectively as possible into an uncertain future.

Does that sound like what currently passes for educational accountability?

Real accountability looks nothing like what currently passes for educational accountability. It doesn’t need or require standardized test scores. It doesn’t require census metrics. It is not data-led. It is high stakes, but its goals are not punitive. It is based upon the hopes and dreams parents have for their children, or in slightly different terms, on the benefits parents expect for having entrusted their children’s lives and educations to a school. It tells the truth. It focuses on the future. It is easy to understand by every single stakeholder.

However, when I invoke the phrase, educational accountability, and start to point to the research that outlines a better way to do it, what people are understandably conditioned to hear is that I’m yet one more person with a slick strategy to help a school avoid sanctions, or I’m offering a different test or data point, or I’m claiming some policy tweak will help make a lousy system a little less lousy. Because up to this point that is all anyone has offered. And none of those, to be frank, is worth a moment of anybody’s time. If that were what I was really offering, you should ignore me.

I know this is how people view the phrase educational accountability because of the thousands of people I’ve asked what they believed what was about to happen when they first walked into one of my courses or seminars. Their answers are almost the same: they expected to hear yet one more way to deal with the current accountability mess, and that given the choice they would rather be anywhere else. Again, if I were in their shoes, I would feel the exact same way.

My goal going forward is to help people see at the outset something very different indeed. I’m better at it than I was, but I’m not there yet.

When I talk about making educational accountability right, what I am signaling is the need for something entirely different than the corruption currently claiming that name. I am arguing for accountability that is good for schools, students, parents, and communities, which is a far cry from what we have. I’m accusing the current system being so bad and poorly conceived that it cannot be salvaged, but also—and this is a bright spot—of being so narrow and short-sighted that you can run a great accountability alongside and eclipse it, meaning we don’t need a policy change in order to make a huge dent in the problem—although make no mistake—a policy change is absolutely the goal.

And I’m stating, as loudly as I can, that if the public understood the technical details of what a standardized test score is designed to do and as a result, could see what it cannot also do, they would reject it as an accountability tool outright, as a terrible and stupid mistake. It needs to become clear that trying to use standardized testing as an accountability tool is akin to trying to pound a square peg into a round hole with a mackerel. I hope that image stays with you because it really is that dumb.

When I talk about making educational accountability right, it is not through a set of acronyms or quippy phrases that were created to sell books or consulting hours. Rather, accountability is an almost universal function in organizations, and when done well, follows a handful of underlying frameworks, each of them replete with common sense. Doing accountability right requires learning those commonsense frameworks, a shift in mindset regarding what accountability is and is not, and a few hours a month. Accountability is not supposed to be your job, or the 600 lb. gorilla. Rather, it is how to account for your work and effectiveness, including how you intend to be effective going forward. That is, as I said, high stakes to be sure, just as it should be with any and all work that is meaningful and worthwhile.

For someone who now researches and studies accountability and has discovered its wondrous possibilities for improving the health of organizations, meeting the needs of stakeholders, shaping the organization for the future, and making it a great place to work, the fact that I have to start with the word, accountability, automatically puts me at a disadvantage by bringing with it its mountains of baggage. A disadvantage I must spend weeks and sometimes months trying to overcome.

The alternative is to find a different word, but that puts me at risk of being accused of not caring about accountability. Of being an apologist for under or poor performance, or of not caring about kids. That would put me outside the conversation and prevent my mission of solving this accountability mess once and for all.

So, I’m not going to dismiss the term, but rather, embrace it. But I need every educator to meet me halfway, so that we can start with a shared set of assumptions at the outset. And here’s a strategy to do that. Every time I say the phrase educational accountability the first few times we talk, or you read something I wrote, please read it as educational ice cream. Ice cream makes people happy. It's delicious. We’re happier to have than to not. We can look forward to the next flavor of the month. We leave our experiences with ice cream feeling better than before we had it. Any negative feelings we have about the calories are almost always offset by how good it is.

Educational ice cream creates the right denotative flair for that old and weighted term accountability, which can serve as an emotional placeholder until I can show you how truly transformational real accountability can be.

And I like saying that I’m something of an expert when it comes to educational ice cream. My bet is that our conversations will start off at a more advanced stage, and on a more positive note, which gets us much closer at the outset from discovering that a better accountability really is out there.