Education YES!
When Tom Watkins became Michigan's Superintendent of Public Instruction in 2001, he urged the State Board of Education to set their sights on a meaningful system of school accreditation. Consistent with the Revised School Code, he led the Michigan Department of Education in developing a system that speaks directly to educators, parents, and communities in promoting excellence in every school in the state.
Education YES! A Yardstick for Excellent Schools provides both a snapshot of current school performance and a ladder for improvement, supplying feedback and direction to assist schools on a path of meaningful change.
A key feature of Education YES! is the use of research and best practice to define indicators of school performance that credit the investments that schools make to improve student academic achievement.
A wide range of stakeholders were involved in shaping Education YES! to be a system that rewards schools for doing the right things to improve student achievement.
What is Education YES!
A meaningful accreditation system must be fair, challenging, and descriptive to help all schools be great schools. It must be a comprehensive picture of student academic achievement over time, as well as a snapshot of each school's efforts to improve student and school performance.
Education YES! measures both and reports a school's standing on multiple indicators of success. In fact, two academic achievement indicators and 11 school performance indicators are included in the school's Education YES! report card.
