Managing an SIS product (from the vendor side) is like providing accounting software in a country where not only are multiple currencies used, and multiple theories about accounting standards co-exist, but the very idea of money is still in dispute. Some sectors of the economy run on fiat money, some pegged to the gold standard, others a currency representing in hours of labor, a few kibbutzes are doctrinaire communist, and a few others are exploring a pseudo-romantic historical fantasy about purely barter-based economies.
This is why even corporations like Apple and Pearson eventually get out of the business. Corporate scale irritation.
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I'm in the middle of this because one SIS vendor that many local districts used out here went belly up a few years back (Zangle), and we've now switched over to a new vendor (Infinate Campus). In the meantime we're doing report cards and gradebooks on the system, which requires the software to do (or not do as the case may be) things in a way that was not necessarily intended by its creator.
I think this may just be a retrenchment, and the next big move will be...standardized grades (and gradebooks). When test scores are out of alignment with grades, they'll be complaints that those silly teachers can't possibly know what they're doing on grades, blah, blah, blah.
Meanwhile, the tests will be splntering more and more (it's happening already even as we are just rolling out these new multi-state exams) as states add their own bells, whistles, standards and questions.
I could be wrong, but...
Teachers are pretty protective of how they calculate grades... I wouldn't count on that changing much.
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