School and District Requirements
Rhode Island's Diploma System has specific requirements for schools and districts. Each school must have in place policies, procedures, and structures in order to ensure that all students have the necessary opportunities and supports to successfully complete the requirements for graduation by proficiency. Specifically, schools and districts are required to:
- Establish local criteria, policies, and procedures to implement the graduation-by-proficiency components of their high school Diploma System;
- Provide sufficient opportunities for students to learn and demonstrate that they have met the student requirements of the new Diploma System and the goals of their Individualized Learning Plans;
- Provide acceptable documentation of their district/school's diploma system through a Peer Review process and the Commissioner's Review;
- Implement rigorous curricula, high quality instruction, and valid and reliable assessments of student performance;
- Restructure high schools for personalization via advisories, teaming, academies, and partnerships with families and community;
- Provide educators with the support they need to enhance their teaching craft in the form of job-embedded professional development and common planning time; and
- Implement an effective communications plan to inform parents, students, and others about the school's High School Diploma System and results.
The comprehensive changes to Rhode Island's secondary system affirm – and deepen – the state's commitment to standards-based instruction and assessment. These changes are consistent with the direction the state has been moving, and creates, rather than erodes, curricular and instructional continuity with the high-quality standards-based work that has been going on across the state for the past ten years.
Rhode Island is part of a three-state consortium that has developed Grade Span Expectations (GSEs) for grades 9-11 in English Language Arts, mathematics, and science (in development). The GSEs clearly define expectations for student achievement at the secondary level and form the basis for the statewide assessment required of all students. The other core academic areas (Social Studies, the Arts, and Technology) must all be aligned to appropriate national standards.