The Office of Accountability was created in 1990 by House Bill 1017 and operates under the governance of the Education Oversight Board. The Governor's Secretary of Education also serves as the office's Chief Executive Officer. The office administers two state programs, the Oklahoma Educational Indicators Program and the Oklahoma School Performance Review Program.

The Oklahoma Educational Indicators Program has an award winning track record of providing high quality reports on school performance at the State, District, and School level. The Office of Accountability's charge is to provide school performance information that is comparable and in context. The office is painstaking in its efforts to gather accurate data and keep it consistent over time.

The office gathers data from the State Department of Education, State Department of Career and Technology Education, State Regents for Higher Education, Office of Juvenile Affairs, State Department of Commerce, The College Board, ACT, and through their own in-house survey. In all, over 100 statistical measures of curriculum, budget, educational programs, student performance, and community characteristics are generated and provided to education stakeholders.

COMPREHENSIVE, CONSISTENT, and ACCURATE: The reports of the Educational Indicators Program are the most comprehensive, consistent, and accurate source for Oklahoma educational statistics that exist. Reports are provided to parents, educators, researchers, grant writers, and policy makers. The office serves as a clearinghouse for education data and shares its information with all that desire it. The office is the State's "one-stop-shop" for educational statistics. Requests for "stock" information, such as school report cards, are filled and mailed the same day they are received. The office regularly prepares custom tabulations and data runs upon request. Custom data requests are most often delivered within a week.

EFFORT, QUALITY, and CUSTOMER SERVICE: Through the Educational Indicators Program the Office of Accountability:

• has distributed over 6 million school report cards to the parents of public school students,
• is approaching 1 million downloads of School Report Cards from their web site (most go to parents),
• has placed their reports in every public, university, and military library in the state,
• has provided data to grant writers, bringing millions of additional dollars to Oklahoma schools,
• had their school report cards reprinted by virtually every newspaper in the state,

INDEPENDENCE, TRUST AND INTEGRITY: The Education Oversight Board and the Office of Accountability were both created by HB 1017. The Oversight Board is committed to the independent operation of the Office of Accountability and believes it is vital to maintaining the trust of Oklahoma citizens and the reputation of high integrity for the Educational Indicators Program.

EXPERIENCE and DEDICATION: The Office of Accountability has four highly trained, hard-working, and dedicated staff members. Collectively, they have served the state of Oklahoma for over 55 years and public education for over 75 years. The Education Oversight Board has high expectations for the Office of Accountability and the Educational Indicators Program and is exploring expanded roles that the program might play in improving public education in Oklahoma.

The Oklahoma School Performance Review (OSPR) program, administered by the Office of Accountability, was created in 2001 to identify ways districts could to hold the line on costs, reduce administrative overhead, streamline operations, and improve educational services.

As a part of each review, contracted outside management experts will conduct detailed studies. In the process they will consult with a wide range of community groups, business leaders, students, parents, teachers, principals, and administrators. They will hold public meetings, arrange special focus group forums, conduct private interviews and solicit calls from concerned citizens.

OSPR will then provide districts with a final report, which will include a set of recommendations, an estimate of savings and/or improvement, and a proposed timeline for implementation. They will work to balance their review by also highlighting "Exemplary Practices" which the district may have already established. The exemplary practices will also be made available to all other schools in the state via the Office of Accountability's web site.

After a year's time, Oklahoma School Performance Review will conduct a follow-up to determine the number of recommendations completed, the number of recommendations in progress, the number of recommendations not implemented, and the number of recommendations that were rejected by the district. All cost savings attributable to implementation of review recommendations must go toward classroom expenses such as teacher salaries, textbooks, teaching material, technology, or other classroom equipment.

Items Targeted for Review

• District Organization and Management
• Educational Service Delivery and Performance Measures
• Personnel Management
• Community Involvement
• Facilities and Energy Management
• Asset and Risk Management
• Budgeting and Financial Management
• Management Information Services and Educational Technology
• Purchasing and Warehouse Services
• Food Service
• Transportation
• Safety and Security