Reading
and writing: age, first grade methods, look-say approach
Accreditation
From: sr_joanna
Date: Wed Apr 14, 2004 5:45 pm
Subject: Accreditation [was: Reading and writing: age, first
grade methods, etc.]
Deborah
wrote:
Towards the end of my three years as business
manager at the Chicago Waldorf School, the school decided to
become accredited. The accreditation process involved being scrutinized
by the midwest association of private schools (can't remember
the exact name, so no caps) and simultaneously scrutinized by
AWSNA. Everybody working at the school and many of the volunteers
had to write up in detail what they did and how they did it.
This included the entire curriculum from the youngest kindergarteners
to the 12th grade. All of this material was reviewed by the accreditation
team which was, if I remember correctly, four waldorf people
and four non-waldorf people. At the end of the process the group
came and spent a week at the school, observing in every class,
talking to all of the teachers and staff and so on.
Congratulations to the Chicago school! Accreditation
is indeed an arduous process; the Detroit Waldorf School, where
my children attend (ed), has been through it three (3) times.
The first two times was via ISACS alone; the last time (last
year) was the joint ISACS/AWSNA team.
Back when I was on the Critics list, I wrote,
in part [9 Jan 1997]:
"The Detroit Waldorf
School is fully accredited by the Independent School Association
-- Central States organization. Their latest scrutiny was during
the past school year ('95-'96) and the school passed with flying
colors for the second time (the first time was 7 years ago)."
The response to confuse the Detroit school
with the Milwaukee Urban Waldorf School (that is, to insinuate
that we were a public school and so had to do this) and
then to doubt that ISACS was a 'real' accreditation agency. Sigh...
Now, this system is not designed to "critique"
waldorf,
Actually, it is designed to help you critique
yourself -- do you do what you say you do -- and, to some extent,
to critique how well you do what you say you will do. Every time
the school goes through the process, the evaluation team comes
up with suggestions for improvement -- and the school is revisited
at the 3 year mark to see how well you have implemented said
suggestions. Our school has found it to be a very helpful process.
but on the other hand inviting outside
observers to scrutinize every aspect of your curriculum and teaching
methods is not what you do if you are an evil cult with a hidden
agenda. Not if you want to keep your agenda hidden, anyway.
Well... not unless you are really really clever!!
<grin>
Musing on the dogmatism of the Critics....
JoAnn
...................................................................................................................................
From: Patrick
Date: Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:08 pm
Subject: RE: [anthroposophy_tomorrow] Accreditation [was: Reading
and writing: age, first grade methods, etc.]
Dear Deborah and JoAnn,
The Sacramento Waldorf School is also accredited
by the west coast version, WASC. They have gone through at least
two cycles. I don't know if they have had a third review that
included the joint team or not. When I was there, it was a very
good process that resulted in positive changes in the life of
our school, mostly with regard to our salaries! The process of
self reflection encouraged us to implement better mentoring and
evaluation processes, as well.
Patrick
...................................................................................................................................
From: Deborah
Date: Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:04 pm
Subject: RE: [anthroposophy_tomorrow] Accreditation [was: Reading
and writing: age, first
Dear Patrick and Jo Ann,
I'm beginning to feel sad that I missed the
second half of the process! I quit working at the school in May
and the team came in October. But the bit I did see was very
interesting.
I do think that participating in accreditation
by outside organizations is a sign of openness on the part of
waldorf schools.
What do you think Diana?
Deborah
...................................................................................................................................
From: winters_diana
Date: Wed Apr 14, 2004 6:20 pm
Subject: Re: Accreditation [was: Reading and writing: age, first
Deborah:
I do think that participating in accreditation
by outside organizations is a sign of openness on the part of
waldorf schools.
What do you think Diana?
I agree.
Diana
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