News
EN recommended for AdvancED accreditation
4/19/2011
Author: Dennis Nartker
Published by: The News Sun
The East Noble School District's teaching staff, its use of collaborative time and one-to-one new technology were praised recently by a team evaluating the district for accreditation by the largest educational accrediting agency in the nation.
The five-member team from AdvancED last week recommended the East Noble School District be accredited for another five years with the second-highest rating given by the agency.
"East Noble School Corp. has been looking forward to the AdvancED visit for several months," said East Noble Superintendent Ann Linson. "This was an excellent opportunity to have a qualified external team review our practices and procedures and provide us with valuable feedback."
AdvancED's evaluation team of educators from Indiana, North Carolina and North Dakota spent April 10-13 touring East Noble school campuses. The team interviewed 146 stakeholders including teachers, administrators, school board members, support staff, students and parents and evaluated data before recommending the district be accredited by AdvancED with an "operational" rating.
AdvancED evaluators assign one of four ratings (highly functional, operational, emerging and not evident) to each of seven evaluation standards before concluding with an overall rating.
Administrators and school board members learned last week of the evaluation team's preliminary findings. AdvancED's accrediting team consisted of: Bill Rivenbank, AdvancED lead evaluator, New Bern, N.C.; Don Street, West Central High School principal, Francesville; Louis Jensen, Floyd Central High School principal, Floyd Knobs; Maureen Stafford, Munster schools director of instructional programs, Munster; and Dori Schaefbauer, Mandan High School English teacher, Mandan, N.D.
AdvancED brings together the two largest U.S.-based accreditation agencies, the North Central Association Commission on Accreditation and School Improvement and the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Councils on Accreditation and School Improvement. AdvancEd serves more than 27,000 public and private schools and districts in the United States and 69 other countries educating more than 15 million students.
Accreditation is a voluntary method of quality assurance primarily designed to check that schools adhere to a set of educational standards. This the second time East Noble has used AdvancEd. The school district had been using the North Central Association Commission before its merger with the Southern Association to create AdvancED, according to Linson.
"East Noble's greatest strength is its teachers," said Rivenbank. "Teachers are caring, dedicated and well respected."
He said the team found the district's use of time for collaboration among teachers was effective and making a difference in the education of students, and the team commended the school district's introduction of computers for K-12 students next school year. "It's ambitious but the planning process has been well thought out and it will serve you well," Rivenbank told an assembled group of school board members and school administrators and teachers.
In what AdvancED calls 'required actions," the evaluation team recommended East Noble develop a strategic plan with stakeholder participation for continuous improvements.
"Some internal and external stakeholders didn't feel involved," said Rivenbank.
East Noble should learn in four to six weeks if it has been accredited by AdvancED. East Noble paid $3,850 for the accreditation process.
Asked the consequences of not being accredited, Linson said, colleges and universities will accept credits only from accredited institutions, and grants and funding can often be accepted only by accredited schools and districts.
"Accreditation is a validation to the community that we are doing good things for kids, and we have a process in place to ensure we are improving," Linson said. Back to Top