This fall marks the 3rd year of the voluntary statewide roll out of the Virginia Kindergarten Readiness Program (VKRP)—an initiative to expand our understanding of the early learning skills that young children display at the beginning of kindergarten. Almost half of all school divisions are now participating, and almost 20,000 students.
That’s a lot of data! So, what’s next? Let’s make sure we use it wisely!
A recent Ounce of Prevention Fund report, “Uses and Misuses of Kindergarten Readiness Assessments”, provides helpful information about the Dos and Don’ts for using kindergarten readiness assessment (KRA) data.
Aligned with these recommendations, VKRP is designed to use data in ways that will help Virginia ensure that every young child has the supports they need to be successful in school and life.
Teachers can use the data to:
- Meet a student where they are and help them learn the next set of skills
- Refer a student for additional assessment or services
- Have a conversation with a family member to support a child’s learning at home
Principals and school leaders can use the data to answer questions to better understand each incoming cohort of students, informing decisions for deploying existing resources, and procuring additional supports by answering questions such as:
- How much variability is evident in readiness for incoming students?
- Is this variability similar or different across readiness skills (e.g., literacy vs. math)?
- Is the pattern of readiness similar or different across classrooms?
- How does our school’s data compare to similar schools within our division, or across Virginia?
Division leaders can use the data to:
- Look for variability within and across divisions
- Individualize professional development to teachers
- Align preschool, kindergarten, and elementary programming
- Create better transition practices
- Highlight the importance of developing students self-regulation and social skills
State leaders, advocates, and policy makers can use the data to:
- Identify statewide readiness gaps
- Understand variability from community to community to get a better picture of statewide needs
- Examine whether services prior to kindergarten contribute to improved readiness
- Examine data over time to identify patterns and trends across the state
It is appropriate and prudent to use VKRP data (and other sources of early childhood education information) to identify readiness gaps track system-level trends, and inform effective allocation of education resources. Statewide representative data tell us that on average, 34% of young children arrive to kindergarten in Virginia lacking foundational skills in the areas of reading, math, self-regulation, or social skills. But, it would also be easy to misuse VKRP data. Important to note is that VKRP was not designed to be reliable within a high stakes accountability environment, and therefore is not well suited for use as a specific consequence to students, teachers or programs! Rather, these data are primed to help key players in classrooms, schools, divisions, and government make data-informed decisions about how to best meet the needs of Virginia’s youngest students and invest strategically in early childhood initiatives.
Widespread participation in VKRP presents a valuable opportunity to use data to inform conversations among Virginia stakeholders when designing early learning programs, aligning educational practices from birth through third grade, and leveraging resources for maximum impact. When used in this way we should run toward data and not away from it.
Amanda Williford, Ph.D., is an associate professor at the Center for Advanced Study of Teaching and Learning within the Curry School of Education at the University of Virginia. She leads the Virginia Kindergarten Readiness Program.