NAEP 2015 Best Practices Guide for Improving Twelfth-Grade NAEP Participation Shelly Pollnow, Ed.D, Director of AZ NAEP Fall 2014 Welcome and Introductions

Overview What is the Best Practices Guide (BPG)? The Grade 12 Challenge Accessing the BPG Using the BPG Strategies in the BPG Share What’s Worked Questions/Comments

What is the Best Practices Guide? A resource for high schools to help students, teachers, and parents understand the importance of NAEP Best Practices Guide (BPG) includes – History of the Grade 12 Challenge – Data on strategies that support student participation – Resources schools can use to promote student participation and motivation on NAEP – 2 versions this year 3

The Grade 12 Challenge Concerned about low participation and motivation of seniors on NAEP – Student participation on NAEP fell to an all time low of 66% in 2005 NAEP convened a Secondary Principals Working Group – Developed the idea for providing “best practices” for school leadership The BPG was implemented for the first time for NAEP 2007 NAEP began collecting data on strategies high schools used to increase student participation

History of Grade 12 School and Student Participation

NAEP 2015: Electronic & Enhanced 6 New design HTML version of the guide

NAEP 2015: Electronic & Enhanced 7 Everything you need is in the box – flash drive, lanyard, and my business card Just plug the flash drive in and you are ready to go!

Accessing the BPG Flash Drive Open your school folder Open the READ_ME file first for quick instructions Preferred Browsers: Internet Explorer 9, 10, 11; Safari; Google Chrome; Firefox To view resources: Adobe Reader, PowerPoint, & Word 8

NAEP 2015 Best Practices Guide Format for the NAEP 2015 BPG – flash drive Takes advantage of technology – Electronic resources all in one place – Presentations, videos and other resources ready to use – HTML version of the guide – Menu to navigate (left-hand side) 9 NAEP 2015 BPG HTML Menu

Using the Best Practices Guide The Best Practices Guide contains resources under the following chapters : – Prepare and Schedule – Encourage Teachers – Motivate Students – More on Twelfth-Grade Challenge – NAEP in Arizona – Information for Parents Resources and strategies are readily available on the flash drive – Some are customized specifically for your school 10

Strategies Used to Increase Participation Six strategies emerged from 2013 that were associated with increased student participation: – Announce NAEP prior to assessment day to parents, students & faculty; – Recognize students that participated at a school awards assembly or other announcement; – Hold a meeting with seniors to explain the importance of NAEP using the resources in the BPG; – Explain the importance of NAEP to teachers using the PowerPoint and video in the BPG – Invite teachers to attend assessment sessions; and – Give students an item, such as tickets to a school event, yearbook, etc., for participating in NAEP 11

12 Schools Used More than One Strategy: An Effective Approach!

Prepare and Schedule NAEP Add NAEP to your school calendar Notify students of the assessment – Sample student notification letter Make a morning announcement on the day of the assessment – Sample morning announcement 13

14 Working with Teachers Resources

Motivate Students Hold a meeting with students to explain the importance of participating in NAEP Use the PowerPoint presentation for students that has been customized for your school Show the 5 minute video Introducing NAEP to Students 15

More Resources to Motivate Students Thank students for participating in NAEP Announce the assessment at an assembly or senior meeting Appeal to students civic duty to give back to education by participating in NAEP Develop a school newsletter or newspaper article to share information about NAEP Provide food for students to show up to the assessment 16

17 Working with Students Resources

18 NAEP in Arizona NAEP in Arizona 8 th Grade Mathematics

NAEP Parent Brochure Available on NAEP in: English – nsreportcard/pdf/parent s/ pdf nsreportcard/pdf/parent s/ pdf Spanish – nsreportcard/pdf/parent s/ pdf nsreportcard/pdf/parent s/ pdf 19

Share What Works How many of you have participated in NAEP before? – What strategies worked for your site? What strategies do you plan to use this year? 20

Debrief by NAEP Representative 21 NAEP representative will record the strategies you use to increase student participation and motivation Strategies will be collected, analyzed and shared for future NAEP assessments

Thank you! If you would like any other information on the Best Practice Guide or NAEP please contact: Shelly Pollnow, Ed.D Arizona Director of the NAEP Program (602) Jessica Eilertson, M.Ed. Assessment Support Specialist (602)