As an alternative to traditional assessment reports, the MCAS Growth data sgp report shows students’ scores and how those scores changed from one year to the next. The report also provides information on the range of student performance across a content area and grade level. Educators use the results of this report to identify areas for improvement in instruction and support students’ learning.
The data sgp website provides access to an interactive tool that allows you to explore and compare the data at different levels. The tool also includes three stakeholder-specific guides — for administrators, educators, and families — with sample growth reports and prompts to help teachers, schools, and districts review and interpret their MCAS growth data.
What is a student’s growth percentile?
A student’s growth percentile is a relative measure of their performance on a state test. A student’s growth percentile is based on the performance of other students with similar score histories on previous MCAS tests. The higher a student’s achievement on the previous MCAS tests, the greater their growth percentile.
In the example above, students A and B both scored at the same level on this year’s MCAS test in a subject area, but they have very different Student Growth Percentiles (SGPs). This is because SGPs are based on comparing students with similar score histories, and students with very high achievement on previous MCAS tests will typically be placed in different academic peer groups than those with lower achievement.
SGPs are reported on a scale from 1-99 and tell us where a student stands in a group of students with similar score histories. A student with a 50 SGP has demonstrated that they have grown in the subject area equal to or better than half of students with comparable score histories on the state test.
What is the best way to analyze sgp data?
Getting started with SGP analysis can be challenging and requires significant effort in preparation. However, with the right software/hardware and the guidance of expert support, a thorough analysis can be completed relatively quickly. The process starts by downloading the student data file from the BAA Secure Site and entering the data into one of the two SGP data tools available on the website.
The sgpData data set, provided in the sgpData GitHub repository, contains 4 examplar data sets that can be used with the lower level SGP functions studentGrowthPercentiles and studentGrowthProjections. The first column in the sgpData dataset, SS_ID, provides unique student identifiers and the remaining five columns, SS_2013, SS_2014, SS_2015, SS_2016, and SS_2017, provide the grade level and MCAS test scores associated with each student’s record for the given year. The last column, sgpData_INSTRUCTOR_NUMBER, is an anonymized list of instructor numbers and the teacher with which each student was associated with for each test in a given year. The SGPdata package documentation provides detailed information on using the sgpData data set with these SGP functions.