Have you ever started reading the warning label on an over-the-counter drug like aspirin or ibuprofen? Ever finished one? Probably not.
Drug warning labels are classic examples of information overload—so packed with details that they become practically useless. Unfortunately, the school report cards produced by the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) suffer from the same problem.
In theory, these report cards should help parents and community members quickly understand how their local schools are performing. When well-designed, they can promote transparency and inform decision-making. But if a school report card is not organized and does not emphasize the most important information, it functions like a drug warning label. It can include a lot of detail but be of little practical value.
If you’re curious to see this for yourself, here is a link to the school report cards made available by DESE. Choose a district, then a school, and you can scroll through a vast amount of information. However, after you’ve taken the time to look through it all, you may realize you haven’t learned very much. DESE’s report cards may be comprehensive, but they fail to deliver what busy families need most: clear, accessible information about school quality.
Now, contrast the Missouri report cards with this report card for Briarmeadow Charter School in Houston, produced by the Texas Education Agency. At the very top, letter grades in four categories are displayed prominently:
- Overall Rating: A
- Student Achievement: A
- School Progress: A
- Closing the Gap: A
With just a glance, you know where this school stands.
Texas is not alone in this approach. States like Florida, Illinois, and Louisiana also use summary performance indicators on their school report cards to give the public a clear picture of school quality. Unlike Missouri, these states are courageous enough to rate schools based on performance, and most importantly, publicly identify schools that are failing to educate their students.
It’s no coincidence that students in states with strong transparency and accountability policies, including clear and informative school report cards, consistently outperform Missouri students academically. These policies are key drivers of school improvement, and without them Missouri is only likely to fall further behind. School report cards that are informative about actual school performance are a simple way to get our state moving in the right direction.
