As more schools are held accountable for current state educational accountability systems, many criticisms have been leveled at the inadequacy and inconsistency of status-based measures. This study helps to view school effectiveness as a measurement of growth instead of simple decisions regarding passing or failing at one-time point or even multi-time points. To further address the assertion that schools with a large proportion of academically disadvantaged students are usually evaluated and judged unfairly, this study takes into account school context and develops conditional school growth to make the “apples to apples” comparison possible.

By Yun Xiang and Carl Hauser