A Florida Promise: A+ Accountability
Making Tests Matter
Standards define what students need to learn. Test scores indicate which students are mastering the necessary skills and which students are struggling. But these good tools are meaningless if they are not used to change outcomes.
So that’s what Florida did. In 1999, Florida adopted the A+ Plan for Education, a bold initiative by Governor Jeb Bush to return a culture of achievement and accountability to public schools.
Grading Schools Based on Student Learning
In 1999, Florida started using FCAT scores to grade schools the same way we grade students, on a scale of A through F. Letter grades were more easily understood by parents and the public than other methods tried by the state, including numbers and descriptors, such as “low performing” and “critically low performing.”
Half of the school grade is based on student performance – specifically, the percent of students who are performing on or above grade level in reading, writing, math and science. The other half is based on progress – essentially, the percent of students, with an emphasis on low performing students, who made learning gains in reading and math from one year to the next.
School grades are a direct reflection of student learning. Rewarding performance and progress maintains high standards and expectations for achievement, while giving credit to schools for improving the learning of struggling students even if they aren’t yet on grade level.
Learn more about school grades, School Grades FAQ.
Ending Social Promotion
Third grade is a critical time in elementary education. It is a time when students transition from “learning to read” to “reading to learn.” To succeed in later grades, third graders must learn to read independently, without assistance, by the end of the school year.
Florida eliminated automatic social promotion in the third grade for students who are struggling readers to give students the extra time and attention to gain the necessary reading skills to succeed.
Earning a High School Diploma
For more than 25 years, Florida required students to pass an exit exam called the High School Competency Test to graduate from high school with a diploma. It was an eighth grade level test. In 2001, 10 percent of high schools students failed the test.
In 2002, Florida raised standards by requiring students to pass the more stringent tenth grade FCAT to earn a Florida high school diploma. By 2007, only 8 percent of high schools students didn’t pass the tougher test.
