The sgp tool provides an easy and efficient way for educators to calculate growth percentiles and student growth projections for their students. These tools utilize the historical growth trajectories of Washington State Star examinees to provide projections for what a student needs to reach proficiency.
A student’s SGP score is based on the student’s performance on a given assessment relative to his/her academic peers who have similar prior test scores (i.e., academic peers). Students are compared to their academic peers regardless of student demographics or program participation. Thus, SGP scores are a useful measure of a student’s achievement and academic progress because they allow for an equitable comparison of students despite starting points or other differences.
SGPs are important to the state’s accountability system because they help identify students who need additional support, especially those that begin school below proficient in English language arts and mathematics. This is especially true for low-income and minority students, who often have lower than average SGPs. SGPs also give teachers a better sense of their classroom’s performance, as they can compare the results of their students to those of their peers in other schools and districts.
In order to create a student’s SGP, one must first have the students test record in WIDE format with a valid student identifier and the associated content area, year, scale score, grade level and attainment level. The sgpData exemplar data set, installed with the sgptool, models this format and serves as an example for formatting longitudinal (time dependent) assessment data in WIDE format. However, higher level functions that perform SGP analyses require longitudinal data in LONG format for their calculations and many of these functions rely on the embedded sgpstateData meta-data to perform their calculations.
LONG formatted data must be in a specific file structure with the variables VALID_CASE, CONTENT_AREA, YEAR, ID, SCALE_SCORE and ACHIEVEMENT_LEVEL to be used by higher level functions such as studentGrowthPercentiles and studentGrowthProjections. In addition, a file must contain the variable sgpData_INSTRUCTOR_NUMBER that stores an aggregation of teacher/student information (e.g., student class/teacher assignments) to be used by the sgpsummarizeSGP function.
Lastly, an integer must be provided to indicate the maximum grade forward that cohort based projections should be established for. By default, projections are established for the highest grade that is available in a panel of years.
SGP is a complex process and OSPI recognizes that it will take time for educators to become familiar with this new tool. To assist educators, we are hosting several webinars to introduce the tool and answer questions. The first will be on September 25 and is open to all educators. Click here for more information and to register. A recording of the webinar will be available here. Educators interested in participating in additional SGP training should visit our OSPI Professional Learning page to sign up. The webinar series is scheduled to continue throughout the fall. A schedule of the remaining events can be found here.