How meaningful is the NCLB AYP measure?

With the 2007 reauthorization of the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) fast approaching, it's  worth asking the question: How meaningful is the "Adequate Yearly Progress" (AYP) measure that is at the heart of the legislation? How much should parents pay attention to whether their school is making AYP?

Two scholars have published an interesting piece in the Fall issue of Education Next which suggests that AYP is not very accurate or meaningful. They compared the Federal AYP designation to Florida's A-F accountability system and concluded that the Florida system is much better at identifying schools where students learn more, and also identifying schools that are truly bad.

Before exploring this issue further, a few words of background: to make AYP, a school needs to reach a certain threshold — set by the state — of students meeting the "proficient" standard on a state test. The state has to set targets that increase each year until 100% of students are "proficient" in 2014.

In contrast, Florida's A-F school accountability system is based partly on absolute test scores (the percentage of students who achieved certain levels of proficiency), but also partly on student year-to-year growth in test scores.

The authors of the Education Next piece, Paul Peterson of Harvard University and Martin West of Brown University, found that schools that did not make AYP demonstrated almost the same level of learning gains as did schools that made AYP. The authors write:

Because NCLB (evaluates) schools...primarily on the basis of achievement levels, the evaluation cannot readily detect how much growth is taking place within a school, simply because children come with dramatically different educational endowments. The correlation between school average levels and growth in the 2003–04 school year was just 0.63 in math and 0.71 in reading—a positive relationship, to be sure, but hardly one on which to construct a meaningful accountability system.

Peterson and West raise great questions: Should a federal accountability system be based at least partly on student learning gains? And how can we avoid the confusion that inevitably results when you have dual federal and state accountability systems? How can we improve NCLB when it is reauthorized?

Comments

[Donna]

Please, if the "no child left behind" is in place for the 2007/2008 school year, then why would a school not set up a writing class for children in elementary school who are having trouble? My son is very smart yet his writing is un-readable almost and he is in third grade. No teacher has actually set time aside to help him. I ask them if they had a writing class and they said no. I believe they (all schools) should have a writing class. This is the time they need it, when they are in elementary school. I believe it will help 100% for those students to get ahead and feel good about themselves....they will do better in every subject if they feel good about their handwriting.

[Oyunlar]

We LOVE to hear from you, and we think of this blog as a big dinner party. Y'all are our invited guests, but if you're being rude and obnoxious we'll let the bouncer toss you

[Donald]

Greetings:

I feel that this is a simular issue to "teaching by standards." There are two camps. One for and one against, where I have always felt that the "standards" are a great place to start.

Schools need to be rated by similar school, score, ethnicity, etc. to get a true idea of how they are doing and if in fact they are really growing. When I taught in CA. we were rated by test score overall AND by type of school It made more sense and also gave us a true picture of where we were.

[lamonte]

remember a childs age and stage are huge factors on how he or she develops mentally and must be assessed by his or her teacher. Profile of each child can help assist a teachers approch in determining the appropriate style of teaching.After all teachers are the educators and should address this issue with great concern.no child left behind act can over time improve the way children are being taught as before when scores were weak and drop offs were common. the school has custody of a child in a formal educational setting and every child should be provided with well trained teachers.

[Jackie]

I am a special education student teacher so I preface my remarks with the comment that I am looking at AYP with somewhat 'new' eyes. However, I don't see how evaluating schools AYP as if they were a uniform product with uniform and standard issue students can possibly be accurate. My students weekly test scores have steadily improved (even though they read at 3rd grade level and are being exposed to 5th grade level material and tests), but they are still not 'passing' as determined by test scores. There is growth, and greater understanding, but these students still need more time and modified curriculum to reach grade level - which is why they qualified for special education in the first place. Why is improvement in scores, and more importantly, understanding, not included as part of the total picture?

[John]

I think AYP is critical to watch as it eventually effects funding for a student while NCLB, as it exists, is in place.

Now, should the Feds be in the progress evaluation game and is progress an indicator of school quality as opposed to objective evaluation of what students actually know and can do? That's another story. ;-)

I have a question about GreatSchools and K12 Inc. What is GreatSchools relationship with K12 Inc.and why are advertisements for K12 Inc being included in parental school summaries such as the NCLB one I just received?

Thanks, John

[Tim]

I always wondered how you could use absolute scores to judge a schools performance. The underline assumption is that all children learn at the same rate, and that they all start at the same school in kindergarten.

The reality is not all children learn at the same rate, and not all children start and stay in the same school ( or school district) throughout their educational career.

Think about all the immigrant children who come into California schools at different ages and educational backgrounds. Why would you expect a school that had a large immigrant population to do as well on the APY as a school that had mostly local or US born children?

I think the true measure of a schools success would be test the child at the beginning of the year and then at the end. How much they learn at the school is a far better measure then absolute scores that don't take the background of the children into account.