MANKATO — By 2014, there would have been a goal of 100 percent student proficiency on the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments tests. Which, according to Sam Kramer of the state Department of Education, is completely unrealistic.

“If everybody’s failing, what does it mean to be failing?” he asked at the Intergovernmental Center in Mankato Wednesday afternoon.

His opinion goes to the heart of why No Child Left Behind has been so controversial the past decade and why Minnesota’s request for a federal waiver from the law is so heavily supported by area districts. Mankato Area Public Schools Supt. Sheri Allen said flexibility and support for teachers are two reasons the more nuanced system of school accountability proposed under the waiver would be a welcomed change.

State Education Commissioner Brenda Cassellius and Kramer outlined the plan to a room full of area superintendents, school board members, principals, state representatives and others. Instead of just looking at Adequate Yearly Progress from test results, the system would look at individual student growth, reductions to the achievement gap and graduation rates, in addition to proficiency in certain subjects, to create a rating for each Minnesota school.

Expected to be approved this spring, the flexibility request would result in the following No Child Left Behind criteria to be waived: 100 percent proficiency by 2014; sanctions on schools and districts for not making AYP; mandatory financial set-asides for school choice and supplemental education services; identification of schools in need of improvement, corrective action and restructuring; and identification of districts in need of improvement or corrective action.

Cassellius said the waiver shouldn’t be mistaken for a lack of accountability.

“What we are changing is the way we use the assessment data to hold our schools accountable,” she said. “We really wanted to focus on growth. ... Now there’s this expectation that all our kids will grow.”

At the core of the new system is the use of “multiple measurements for accountability.” While AYP centered on proficiency, an MMR — Multiple Measurements Rating — uses four ratings, weighted equally, to measure school performance: proficiency related to AYP goals; growth of student performance on the MCAs; achievement gap reduction; and graduation rate.

Using the MMR, schools can fall into three groups: Reward Schools (top 15 percent); Focus Schools (lowest 10 percent of schools related to proficiency and achievement gap); and Priority Schools (5 percent most persistently low-performing schools).

The achievement gap is what Kramer describes as the crisis in education in Minnesota, and the new plan aims to close the achievement gap by 50 percent in the next six years. However, not only the under-performing students will be expected to make gains while the students who make AYP remain stagnant. All students are expected to make progress.

While the assessment standards would become more nuanced under the new system, the responsibility would still be on the local districts and schools to implement programs when performance improvements are needed, as each school will have different needs. One idea Cassellius discussed was having a shared system among districts and schools to exchange ideas.

“The best way that teachers learn is from each other,” Cassellius said. “Right now, there’s not a lot of sharing.”

Also, many districts have already implemented programs to make gains based on previous years’ AYP results.

“We already have a growth model,” Allen said.

During the meeting, Allen asked if “set-asides” would be reallocated after the waiver is approved. If schools didn’t make AYP for three years, mandatory funds were set aside for transportation (if parents opted to send their child to another school) and tutoring. The unused funds, about $270,000 in District 77, aren’t being used. Cassellius said usage of the funds hasn’t been determined, but it’s a possibility they could be rolled back into the budget.

Cassellius ended the presentation by emphasizing the positives when it comes to Minnesota student achievement.

“We just would not be No. 1 in ACT scores in the nation if all our schools were broken,” she said.

If the waiver is approved, the new system could be in place as soon as this year using last year’s test scores, although the timeline hasn’t been determined.