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CA Dashboard Participation Rate

California Charters, SBAC Participation Rate Matters More Now Than Ever!

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By Jennifer Reyes, Educational Support Services Manager

December 10, 2019

Starting with the 2020 CA School Dashboard, there will be a greater penalty to the Academic Indicators if a school’s participation rate falls below 95% on Math or ELA for the SBAC or CAA. The change will result in a greater decrease in Distance from Standard than the methodology used in the 2018 and 2019 Dashboards for schools that did not meet the participation rate threshold.  The Academic Indicators in the 2020 Dashboard will be calculated based on 19-20 CAASPP results.  That means schools have the opportunity NOW to plan for 95% or higher participation rates in Spring 2020 to avoid the new larger penalty.

Why the change?

The Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) requires states to test at least 95% of all students and student groups in ELA and mathematics.  California introduced a methodology for factoring participation rate into scores in 2018.  This methodology will be applied once more in the 2019 Dashboard release (with test results from 2018-19).  The federal Education Department reviewed the California Department of Education (CDE)’s methodology and determined that it does not meet ESSA requirements.

What is the current methodology?

For the 2018 and 2019 CA Dashboard data, CDE calculates the number of percentage points that the school, LEA, or student group falls short of the 95% participation target.  For each of these percentage points, they reduce the Distance from Standard (DFS) by 0.25 points.

What is the new methodology?

Instead of a 0.25 point penalty for each percentage point below 95%, the CDE will assign the Lowest Obtainable Score (LOSS) for each student needed to bring the school, district, or student group to a 95% participation rate.  Under the new methodology, the calculation will add the number of students needed to reach a 95% participation rate into the DFS calculations, and these students will be assigned a predetermined LOSS score.  The LOSS in Level 1 varies by subject and grade level.  The calculation will assign the LOSS among the school’s tested grade levels that penalizes the school the least.

Are there any exceptions to the participation rate requirement?

Students flagged with the “Medical Emergency” condition code will be automatically removed from the participation rate calculation unless they log onto both parts of the test.  English learners new to the country (enrolled in a U.S. school for less than one year) are exempt from taking the ELA portion of the Smarter Balanced Summative Assessments.  It’s important to note that parent waivers do not exempt students form the participation rate calculations. Also note that the same LOSS will be applied to students who do not take the California Alternative Assessments as for those taking the Smarter Balanced Summative Assessments.

What can I do to ensure 95% participation?

Awareness, advance planning, and strong systems can all be leveraged to ensure a strong participation rate.  Educate staff, parents, and students about the way in which your school performance is tracked and publicized on the CA School Dashboard.  When stakeholders mobilize around school goals, everyone is invested in having their school represented in the best possible light.  When planning the window and logistics of the testing, it’s important to solicit staff, parent, and student input to avoid unanticipated barriers to participation and optimize the testing schedule for everyone.  Be sure to include a cushion of time for make-up testing for absent students. Finally, set up systems for reminding everyone of their role in successful testing, and closely monitor participation rates while still within your window and respond accordingly until you hit or surpass 95%.

Is your school ready to hit 95% participation on SBAC/CAA Math and ELA? Let us know how you plan to prepare in the comments section below!

LCAP Community Engagement

Engaging Stakeholders in Your School’s LCAP Development

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By Jennifer Reyes, Ed.D., Educational Support Services Manager

September 9, 2019

Embrace Local Control

As one of the key pillars of California’s Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF), stakeholder engagement has a prominent section in the Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP).  The idea behind LCFF is that Local Educational Agencies (LEAs) will have “local control” over the use of their funds through the combined input of parents, teachers, school leaders and staff, and other community partners.  At the district level, LCAP engagement efforts may not address school-specific concerns, but charter schools can easily align LCAP engagement with the goals and plans of their unique school community.

Create a Plan to Engage all Stakeholders

 According to Ed. Code, the LEA must “consult with teachers, principals, administrators, other school personnel, local bargaining units of the school district, parents and pupils” in developing the LCAP.  They must describe in the LCAP the steps they took to engage parents, pupils, and the community and how this engagement contributed to developing the LCAP.  The CDE is preparing to introduce a new LCAP template in the coming months, and the proposed template requires a description of how the engagement of each group impacted the current plan (see below for a screenshot).

Proposed New LCAP Stakeholder Engagement Section:

Leaders will need to be prepared with specific responses for the applicable groups.  This can be accomplished with a little bit of backwards planning.  For example, I may hope that by year’s end I would like to be able to state that my English Learner Parent Advisory Committee carefully reviewed the actions and services dedicated specifically to English Learners and made recommendations.  I can plan now for those committee agendas and surveys to include LCAP input.  I can do the same to ensure that LCAP is part of the agendas for board, parent, and staff meetings periodically throughout the year.

Avoid Information Overload

Now that I have planned LCAP engagement into the calendar of meetings for each stakeholder group, how do I make the information digestible?  What kind of input do I ask for?  Again, we can think ahead to the impact we would like each group to have in our LCAP development.  I might decide that I want all my parents, students, and staff to be able to articulate my school’s three big goals.  I want to be able to review data points with all three groups to keep them invested in achieving the goals.  Then with my advisory committees, perhaps I want to do a deeper dive into the curriculum or professional development initiatives.  I can select key components to review with each group instead of asking them to sift through the entire plan.

Make it Meaningful

 Hopefully your school has an LCAP that is well organized and aligned to your school’s mission and vision.  If not, you can redesign it.  The more the plan speaks to your community, the easier it will be to align it with the work you do and the conversations you already hope to have with all your stakeholders.  By taking a few steps now to set up the system of engagement for the year, you can ensure that you have much to say about the impact of your various groups on your school’s LCAP.

 

 

 

 

California Charters, Stay Calm and Focus on Your LCAP Submission and the 2019 Dashboard!

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By Jennifer Reyes, Ed.d., Educational Support Services Manager; Chris Lim, Senior Director of Data Management; and Annice Weinstein, Senior Manager, Assessment Data and Analysis 

April 16, 2019

California charter leaders, as you enter the last few months of the school year, pay attention to these important tasks to help you stay on top of your LCAP submission as well as ensure accurate reporting on the 2019 Dashboard.

CALPADS Submissions and the Dashboard

Demographic data reported to CALPADS informs the subgroup information reported on the CA School Dashboard. The CA Department of Education (CDE) typically extracts this information shortly after CAASPP testing is completed, so review the 8.1 ODS report in CALPADS to be sure the right demographic information is reported for each student: race/ethnicity, socioeconomic status, homeless, foster, English learner, and disability status. For corrections, update the information in your student information system (SIS) first, then push an updated extract up to CALPADS, so the original source of your data (your SIS) is accurate and matches what’s in CALPADS.

We also recommend you push up an enrollment update to CALPADS prior to testing to make sure all students enrolled at your school are represented in TOMS.

The end-of-year submissions (EOY 1, 2, and 3) provide information on program eligibility, chronic absenteeism, suspension rate, and other disciplinary incidents, as well as college and career readiness. EOY information is also used to determine graduation rates along with cumulative enrollment, which the CDE uses to determine which students will factor into each of the Dashboard calculations.

LCAP Annual Update

Coordinate with your staff to gather the data necessary to update all the measurable outcomes defined in your LCAP. You’ll notice that some of the measures may be a year old (SBAC scores or graduation rate from 2017-18),but do your best to gather current data when available (example: local assessment data). Gathering the data early will give you a chance to share progress with your stakeholders and get their feedback, as well as use the data to determine if the actions or services you implemented are showing the results you anticipated. If they aren’t, this is the perfect time to update your plans in the 2019-20 LCAP.

If you haven’t been coding your finances to align with your LCAP goals, actions, and services throughout the year, you’ll need to start reviewing your general ledger to identify how each of the expenses line up with your LCAP. The Annual Update requires you to include your estimated actual expenditures for each action/service, including the funding source (base, supplemental/concentration, title funds, CSI), so this task can take some time.

It’s also a good time to start planning for that final round of stakeholder engagement prior to Board approval.  This will allow you to get quality input on your draft LCAP so that your entire school community is represented in the plan.  You will be able to include these efforts in the stakeholder engagement section and show that you are meeting this LCAP requirement.

One last item to start preparing is your responses to how you’ve addressed each of the local indicators. You will need to present the information at a regularly scheduled board meeting either at the end of this school year or the start of the next school year. Your overall score – Standard Met or Standard Not Met – will be entered by your Dashboard Coordinator next fall, but since you will be including that information in the LCAP Annual Update, it makes sense to prepare your narratives for the Dashboard local indicator reporting at the end of 2018-19.

The end of the school year will be here before we know it! We recommend planning ahead and allotting time to get these items right, as they have a significant impact on your school. For additional questions on the LCAP, Dashboard, or CALPADS submissions, please contact LCAP360@edtec.com.