Panel Reviews Efforts to Close Achievement Gap

The Senate Education Committee met Tuesday, November 10, to review a 2015 report on the achievement gap in Minnesota and to hear related testimony from individual schools across the state. The achievement gap is the difference in school performance between groups of students. The report includes a Multiple Measurements Rating (MMR), which is an accountability system designed to measure how schools perform in relation to the different types of Minnesota students.

Department of Education Commissioner Brenda Cassellius began the hearing by stating the department's desired outcome for reducing the achievement gap. "We made a very ambitious goal," Cassellius said. "That goal was to close the achievement gap 50 percent by 2017...we also have a goal to reach a 90 percent graduation rate overall, with no student group below 85 percent by 2020," she explained. The commissioner also told the committee that the state has seen a steady increase in the graduation rate over the past ten years.

Committee members and testifiers discussed achievement gap challenges and successes, including educational partnerships between schools, parents and their communities. While student graduation rates continue to rise, the Department of Education says disparities among student groups still persist, and that eliminating the achievement gap will continue to be a top priority.