Keeping the Promise:
Florida's Education Report Card
Florida is successfully transforming the quality of education in public schools. But our work will not be finished until policymakers and public schools embrace a culture of reform — a perpetual cycle of assessment and reform that leads to a continual, incremental ascension toward excellence.
Advancing the next generation of reforms is the best way to ensure our continued success. Expectations for students and schools should be continually raised to bolster learning gains. Free-market principles work — and they should be applied to recruit, retain and reward quality teachers and principals based on performance. Most importantly, parents should be empowered with the resources to choose the education that is right for their children.
To keep us focused on the future, the Foundation for Florida's Future launched Florida's Education Report Card to annually measure how well our state legislators are keeping the promise of a quality education. In our inaugural edition, Florida's senators and representatives are graded on their support or opposition of policies in six important policy areas. Exemplary policymakers who champion the reforms advocated by the Foundation are also recognized as members of this year's Honor Roll.
Florida's Education Report Card graded Sunshine State legislators in these key policy areas:
- Accountability: To build on Florida's bold education reforms, our system needs stronger accountability and continued grading of our schools based on student performance, while providing rewards and incentives for gains.
- High Standards: Raising academic standards in Florida classrooms creates a more rigorous and relevant curriculum. It is no longer sufficient for Florida students to perform as well as their American peers. Our schools must exceed those of our economic competitors across the globe.
- Data-Driven Measurements: Measuring whether students are learning a year's worth of knowledge in a year's time is the cornerstone of accountability. The processes for testing students and grading schools must be data-driven, meaningful and transparent so parents, teachers, principals and communities can build on successes and correct failures.
- School Choice: All students can learn, but different students need different environments to learn and flourish academically, emotionally and physically. To better meet the needs of students, Florida's successful, cost-saving school choice programs need to be expanded.
- Quality Teaching: Next to parents and the students themselves, teachers are the single most important person in a student's academic career. To attract and retain the best teachers for Florida's schools, educators should be financially rewarded for their expertise, unique skills and duties, and their excellence.
- Funding and Governance: Providing a high quality of education for all of Florida's students must remain the state's top priority. School funding and governance policies should empower leaders to continue innovative education reform and ensure direct accountability for student learning gains.
Florida's Education Report Card gives parents and the public a clear and comprehensive assessment of who is making the grade in education reform.
