We invite you to attend an information session about the College and Work Readiness Assessment (CWRA) and its Performance Task Academy workshops, to be held on Thursday, October 13, 2011. Two sessions are available (covering the same content): (1) 9:30-11:30 at Hamden Hall in Hamden and (2) 1:30-3:30 at Westminster School in Simsbury.

The CWRA—recommended by NAIS and endorsed by Tony Wagner (author of The Global Achievement Gap)—measures how students perform on constructed response performance tasks that require an integrated set of higher-order skills, including critical thinking, analytic reasoning and evaluation, problem solving, and writing ability. NAIS’ “Guide to Becoming a School of the Future” puts forth a new commission on accreditation criterion: that schools “provide evidence of a thoughtful process, respectful of its mission, for the collection and use in school decision-making of data about student learning.” The CWRA presents a useful mechanism for doing just that.

The Performance Task Academy—shifts the focus from general assessment to the course-level work of faculty members. This series of hands-on training workshops provides opportunities for faculty to receive guidance in creating their own performance tasks, building rubrics, and developing pedagogical practices to encourage the development of higher order thinking skills.

Together, these two programs emphasize the notion that, in order to successfully improve higher-order skills, institutions must genuinely connect their teaching, learning, and assessment practices in authentic and effective ways.

LOGISTIC INFORMATION

These information sessions will be held on Thursday, October 13, 2011. Two sessions (covering the same content) are available, one from 9:30-11:30 in Hamden and the other from 1:30-3:30 in Simsbury. We are incredibly appreciative of Hamden Hall for hosting the morning session and Westminster School for hosting the afternoon session.

The Hamden Hall program will be held in the Beckerman Athletic Center which is located at 225 Skiff Street | Hamden, CT 06517. Directions to their location may be found here.

Westminster School is located at 995 Hopmeadow Street | Simsbury, CT 06070. Directions to their location may be found here.

School	First Name	Last Name
Email Address	9:00 AM THURSDAY, Session Choices Click HERE to view Session Descriptions   Please choose ONE session below: 2a Surviving, Thriving and Enduring as a Head of School Michael Thompson & Rob Evans 2b Schools of the Future: Strategy & Design Pat Bassett, President, NAIS 2c Why We Have Too Few Women Leaders Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO (virtually via TED) 2d What Does That Really Mean - Introduction to Terms and Concepts in School Finance Robert Sedivy

11:00 AM THURSDAY, Session Choices Click HERE to view Session Descriptions   Please choose ONE session below: 3a Still Crazy After All These Years? Michael Thompson & Rob Evans 3b Governance 301: Governance and Leadership Pat Bassett, President, NAIS 3c The Rise of Global Schooling Chris Whittle, CEO, Avenues 3d Reporting Financial Information to Your Trustees Robert Sedivy	2:30 PM THURSDAY Measuring What We Value: 21st Century Assessments in Independent Schools Doug Lyons, Executive Director, CAIS and Andrew Niblock, Lower School Head, Hamden Hall Country Day School The strongest case for the independence of independent schools has been our history of success. Success in the 21st century, however, will be defined differently and will be less easily verified by the traditional self-reflective practices of our schools. The NAIS Commission on Accreditation has recently added two criteria to the standards of independent school accreditation. These criteria will require each member school to provide evidence of a thoughtful process, respectful of its mission, for the collection and pro-active use of data about student learning. The recent experience of mandated standardized testing in American public schools is a sobering lesson on the pitfalls of “one size fits all” student outcome measures. If our schools hope to lead the conversation about the skills the new century will require and reward in our graduates, we will need to become more sophisticated in measuring what we value. This workshop will present examples of emerging assessment tools.	If a guest is attending dinner with you on Wednesday evening, please provide their name here for seating purposes