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Ecolint
The International School of Geneva (Ecolint) was established as the first ever International School in 1924, to educate the children of the expatriate population working in newly formed international organizations such as the League of Nations and the International Labor Office.
Since its foundation, Ecolint has had a deep connection to the League and later the United Nations. Ecolint is the birthplace of the International Baccalaureate and an education for peace is at the core of the school’s mission. We take pride in being a non-selective, inclusive school with a child-centred approach to teaching and learning.
Ecolint has now grown to include three campuses with eight schools, educating roughly 4,500 students from age 3 to 18. With 140 nationalities and 80 mother tongues represented among the student population, our community is highly varied culturally, linguistically and in terms of learning profiles.
Using CEM assessments across the whole school
One of the things we value most is the way in which CEM data allows us to deepen our understanding of the ways in which assessment data can be used to improve individual student learning and for appropriately differentiating instruction.
For the younger students, what’s most important for their classroom teachers and for the school leadership teams is that they can look at the CEM results and really have a sense of the individual students, to know where they are in their own development.
When we get to secondary, whether it’s on the campus where they study iGCSE’s, or all 3 campuses where we have the IB results, we really value the Chances Graphs that come out of Alis, and the way that we can predict potential student performance.
Creating a tangible impact in the classroom
Given the highly mobile environment in which we function, baseline data is particularly useful for the appropriate placement of newly arrived students.
The assessment results from InCAS (now evolved into Cambridge Primary Insight), MidYIS, Yellis and Alis, are all studied carefully in the schools by both senior leadership teams and classroom teachers for diagnostic as well as target-setting purposes.
It is understood that an individual student’s results from an assessment provide a snapshot at a given moment in time that can be influenced by a variety of factors. Yet, longitudinal analysis of results, whether on an individual student level or on the school level, are what allow us to really measure areas of strength, areas for attention and progress over time.
Identifying areas of strength and weakness early on, along with continued monitoring of student progress, results in a tangible impact in the classroom.
Value-added analysis
In the secondary phase, the use of CEM’s chances graphs and value-added analysis has altered the way in which we discuss IB exam results and, consequently, the approach we use in explaining those results, such that our focus is on student learning.
The value-added data that is offered in correlation to IB results is tremendously important, particularly in terms of longitudinal analysis of identifying where we have real strengths and weaknesses, and in terms of subject areas and departments.
Demystifying the data
In the early years of adopting CEM assessments, some teachers expressed scepticism. Taking the time to demystify the data and to demonstrate its value for student learning has been essential in allowing us to move forward.
CEM assessments are used now from primary through to secondary, and the rich data these evaluations provide allow us to meet the needs of the diverse student body we serve.
Teacher collaboration
CEM data helps us to track student progress, identify students with specific learning needs and give our teams more to work with in departmental and grade level reflections on curriculum, teaching and assessment.
I think that where we see the impact of the analysis of CEM data is really in the ways in which teachers begin to collaborate with each other differently, in terms of improving their own delivery, whether it’s for the younger students across a range of subjects, or in the Diploma Programme in specific subject areas.
Most importantly, the analysis of CEM data promotes a culture of evidence-driven conversations about student performance at school.