Georgia CCRPI

1. Georgia CCRPI College and Career Ready Performance Index: Reforming Accountability and Reframing Success

2. Part I: The Learning Problem • In the 2010-2011 academic year only 41% of Georgia High Schools were designated as having met annual yearly progress (2010 State AYP Report). • In one district only two schools—the local high schools—failed to meet annual yearly progress in 2010-2011. • Repeated failure to achieve annual yearly progress under the edicts of No Child Left Behind led state officials to apply for a ESEA flexibility waiver in 2011. • Georgia was one of ten states granted a waiver for NCLB in 2012. The waiver was granted in exchange for the promise of educational reform within the state. • The cornerstone of these reform efforts is the development implementation of the College and Career Ready Performance Index (CCRPI), a new measure of accountability that policy makers and state educational experts hoped would reframe the portrait of school success.

3. Part II: A Review of the Literature The Challenge of Accountability • AYP failure is not strongly related to student performance on state-wide accountability tests; rather, they are the result of states’ idiosyncratic implementation of policy. Thus, the label “failed AYP” may have more to do with the way in which a state measures AYP than with the actual academic growth of students (Reback, Rockoff & Shwartz2014). • Experts caution against accountability programs that increasingly resulted “in invalid inferences…based on too narrow[ly] on a concept of effectiveness”(Chester, 2005). • Schools that fail AYP have some similarities across contexts including—not surprisingly—a relatively high enrollment of poor and minority student; additionally, failing schools are also more likely to be designated be high schools than elementary schools (Davidson et al., 2014).

4. Part II: A Review of the Literature The Problem with Context (secondary and state) • Furhman and Elmore (2004) argued that under NCLB “[h]igh schools are being asked to do something they have never done before—something they were not designed to do—to prepare all students for the same academic endpoint” (p. 170). • An examination of state waiver requests that analyzed the proposed constructs for measuring annual yearly progress according to four criteria: construct validity, reliability, fairness and transparency reveal that Georgia’s new accountability system is strong in many respects, they suggest that transparency may be an issue (Polikoff et al, 2014).

5. Part II: Review of the Literature A Policy Context for the Development of CCRPI • “4 out of every 10 new college students take remedial courses and many new employers comment on the inadequate preparation of high school graduates. And while states have developed assessments aligned with their standards, in many cases, these assessments do not adequately measure student growth or the knowledge that students need, nor do they provide timely and useful information to teachers” (Blueprint for Reform, 2011). • CCRPI core value as defined by the state: “Accountability is about giving leaders a roadmap for improvement. It is not about threatening schools. It gives them levers to effect change and a yearly opportunity to measure the pace of change. Every stakeholder in the school has access to data and can play a role in a continually improving success story” (CCRPI Media Brief, 2013).

6. Part II: Research Questions • How does the new accountability model—the College and Career Readiness Index—compare to the previous accountability system regarding student achievement? • How do the CCRPI scores for one district’s failing high schools compare to the accountability report from the year immediately prior to the CCRPI’s implementation? • What additional information regarding student achievement for individual schools can be determined by analyzing the component scores of the CCRPI for one district?

7. Part III: Participants Two Failing High School, One District—District Summary • Location: Georgia, Southeastern United States • Census data (2010) indicates that the district contains a small to mid-size population of approximately 65, 400. • The district is comprised of 13 schools—2 high schools, 3 middle school and 8 elementary schools—serve more than 10,000 K-12 students each year. • State demographics indicate that 60-70% of students enrolled in area high schools for 2013-2014 are considered “economically disadvantaged.” • More than 60% of students enrolled in area high schools for 2013-2014 are black. • The district is home to a large-scale military facility that contributes to the local economy and to the student body at both area high schools.

8. Part IV: Procedures for Data Analysis Procedures by Research Question • Question 1 • Conduct open coding on research documents: District AYP Reports 2009-2011, GA ESEA Flexibility Waiver, State documents that outline the implementation of CCRPI. • Question 2 • Analyze accountability data from AYP reports 2010-2011 that led to the label “failed AYP.” • Analyze data from CCRPI across the first two years of implementation. • Compare the frameworks for understanding the data and its implications for the two district high schools; depict this comparison graphically. • Question 3 • Disaggregate CCRPI data by achievement components • Examine the CCRPI data for the district and the two district high schools. • Analyze trends in student achievement, looking specifically at information that shows school gains/loses for low-performing students

9. Part V: Conclusions– Analysis of AYP and the CCCRPI Model Summaries

10. Part V: Conclusions--Accountability Reports By Model A Comparison of District High Schools Achievement by Accountability Model

11. Part V: A Closer Look at Student Achievement at Two Schools CCRPI Scores Disaggregated by Achievement Components

12. Part V: Conclusions Conclusions broken down by research question • Q1 Conclusions: The CCRPI is a more robust system for assessing districts and individual schools; its complexity is masked by an easy to understand points system and results are contextualized not only as the result of relative value out of 100 but also within the larger state and district contexts • Q2 Conclusions: CCRPI data frames student achievement more positively than the previous accountability model, which only identified success or failure. CCRPI data offers a single numeric value that suggests the extent to which schools are impacting student achievement. CCRPI scores may also be valuable to stakeholders than labels; CCRPI is sensitive to educational contexts. • Q3 Conclusions: When scores are disaggregated, the CCRPI offers insight into the ways in which individual schools impact student achievement and growth that the previous model did not provide. CCRPI design offers more nuanced information about the achievement of low-performing students. The system would benefit from improved transparency in data handling practices and calculations.