Mission Skills

Assessment
Assessing Character Traits in Middle School
Students

INDEX Mission Skills

Assessment
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Independent Schools Data Exchange

www.indexgroups.org
617-413-8382

Mission Skills Assessment

A Tool To Alter The Way Schools

Think About Education

MSA measures character strengths that have

proven essential for success in school and in life.

The assessment gives each school a more
scientific way to measure its curriculums success
at meeting the goals outlined in its mission.

INDEX Mission Skills Assessment

Who We Are
INDEX Schools: Three national benchmarking and best

practices groups of independent day schools:

Elementary (400+) 30 PK/8-9 schools Initial

Research Group
Mid-Sized (500-1100) 32 PK/K-12 schools
Large (750+) 50 PK/K-12 schools
Center for Academic and Workforce Readiness and

Success, Educational Testing Services (ETS).

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What is the Mission Skills

Assessment?
A longitudinal assessment measuring and

benchmarking student achievement and improvement

in core mission skills.
Teamwork
Creativity
Ethics
Resilience
Curiosity
Time Management
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The Assessment
Web-based - approximately 60 minutes total.
Assess 6th, 7th, and 8th graders once per year.
Three components: student self-assessment,

situational judgment/performance-based
questions, teacher-rater assessment
Correlate with outcome data (test scores,
grades, absences, etc.)
Institutional focus. No tracking of individual
performance.
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Noncognitive Skills
Research

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Assessment
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What are Noncognitive skills?

Not traditionally tested by standardized

assessments
Not new but newly important; 21 st century

skills
Essential capacities necessary for success in

school and in life

Often taught implicitly, but can be taught

explicitly
INDEX Mission Skills Assessment

Academic Success
Noncognitive skills correlate

positively with achievement on NAEP

and PISA.
Noncognitive factors predict college

grades as strongly as cognitive

variables do.

INDEX Mission Skills Assessment

ETS, (2008); Poropat, (2009)

Life Trajectory

Early childhood interventions do not

raise IQ, but improve noncognitive

skills which affect education,
employment, earnings, and crime.
Heckman et al. (2010)

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Life Satisfaction
Noncognitive variableshave been

demonstrated to predict happiness,

health marital satisfaction and peer
relationships.

Diener & Lucas (1999); Bogg & Roberts (2004); Watson, Hubbard, & Wiese, (2000); JensenCampbell et al. (2002)

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Demographics
The benefits of higher noncognitive

skills are demonstrable across IQ, socioeconomic class, gender, and race.
Tough, Paul. How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity and the

Hidden Power of Character. (2012)

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Analysis of
mission
statements of
30
independent
schools

Ethics
100%

Love of
Learning
73%

Resilience Creativity Teamwork

67%
67%
40%

INDEX Mission Skills

Assessment
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Analysis of University Mission Statements

(Oswald et. al., 2004)

Intellectual

Interpersonal

Intrapersonal

Knowledge and
mastery of general
principles

Appreciation for
diversity

Social responsibility
and citizenship

Continuous learning,
intellectual interest
and curiosity

Leadership

Physical and
psychological health

Artistic and cultural

appreciation

Interpersonal skills

Career orientation
Adaptability and life
skills
Perseverance
Ethics and integrity

INDEX Mission Skills

Assessment
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The Conference Board, Corporate Voices for Working Families, Partnership for 21 st Century
Working Skills, and the Society for Human Resource Management.
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Assessment
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The Character Imperative

1) Research shows that these skills lead

to positive educational and life outcomes;

2) Colleges, universities, and employers

are seeking these skills in students and

workers; and

3) We must demonstrate the value we

add.

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Constructs in MSA

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Assessment
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Teamwork
Models of teamwork

include
Cooperation
Influence
Conflict resolution
Guiding others

In high school students, teacher reports of teamwork were correlated with

grades across several subjects (Wang, MacCann, Zhuang, Liu, & Roberts, 2009)
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Creativity
Originality,
progressiveness, or
imagination
Tasks measuring
creativity, require
examinees quickly to think
ofa series of responses
fitting the requirements of
the task.

Creativity predicts graduate school outcomes beyond GRE

verbal and mathematics scores (Frederickson & Ward, 1975;

Bennett & Rock, 1995; Bennett & Rock, 1998)
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Assessment
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Ethics
Defined in our

study as cheating
and concern for
others

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Resilience
A level of adaptability that allows individuals to

survive and thrive in adverse conditions

Dent and Cameron (2003)
One way we measure resilience in the MSA is to

measure core self-evaluation or how capable,

worthy, and effective a person feels.

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Item Types

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Self-Report

INDEX Mission Skills

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Situational Judgment Test

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Assessment
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Biographical Data

INDEX Mission Skills

Assessment
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Creativity Performance Test

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Assessment
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Teacher Ratings

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Assessment
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Next Steps
Continual refinement of MSA assessment
Assessing underserved populations with MSA Horizons

Student Enrichment Programs (NCCS, Rumson CDS)

Expanding to all INDEX schools 69 schools, 17,000

students fall 2013

Gathering interest from additional schools, districts,

organizations

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Instruction
How can we teach these skills better and how

will we know we are succeeding?

Deliberate, explicit and implicit instruction and

interventions

Grade-level goals
Articulated, spiraled, integrated noncognitive

curriculum

Updated and analyzed curriculum maps

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Opportunities

Shared vision, vocabulary, and resources

Participation in regional and national

teacher networks, character summits

Shape report cards and parent conferences

Ongoing educationschool leaders, faculty,

students, parents

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Teacher Research
and Development
Team

http://bit.ly/16xde9m

18 Months

http://bit.ly/12nNuHW

http://bit.ly/10S1mAq

http://bit.ly/1481pX5
http://bit.ly/1abJqUm

Design Thinking

Sibley Rubric Development on

Creativity and Innovation: Road
Testing with Teachers
Free
Feedback/Iteration
Building/Tinkering
Problem Finding
Collaboration
Risk-taking/Failing
Empathy
Embracing the
Storytelling
Unknown

http://bit.ly/wFIem5

http://bit.ly/11FIza0

http://bit.ly/1abNmo4

Outside the Classroom: The Bridge to

Parent Engagement

QuickTime and a
H.264 decompressor
are needed to see this picture.

MCDS Explores

http://bit.ly/16xKU6N

Parent Engagement

http://bit.ly/10lwrdj

Left Brain Schools in a Right Brain World.

Goals
Inventory - whats
working?
Research - what are the
best practices?
Input from Experts in the
Field - what do you do?
Blueprint - where do we
go?
Isidor Rabi: Did you ask
a good question today?
http://bit.ly/137eL9h

http://bit.ly/12i87K8

What motivates
you to try to make
the world a better
place? What would
be your mobilizing
Who
is someone in your
issue?
profession that you hold up as a
role model? Why? Specifically,
what characteristics do you feel
define that persons
expertise/proficiency/mastery/et
c. in the field?
http://bit.ly/16xSBtI

Name one obstacle you have encountered on your career path. How did it impact you?

he smartest person in the room is the room

-David Weinberger

Wonder Lab: MCDS and Laurel Dell

Partnerships

http://indexgroups.org/msa/

Skills and Habits of Mind

http://f-l-o-a-t.com/

Capstone

http://bit.ly/18erKHf

Science Curriculum Review Process

Teacher Training and Curriculum

Development Coaching