Over the past 15 years, a national consensus has slowly coalesced around one of the most enduring and contentious debates in education circles: how to hold schools and districts accountable for improving outcomes. The Every Student Succeeds Act, or ESSA, is in many ways the culmination of the movement towards more sophisticated accountability systems and fewer federal mandates. The law’s new requirements give states the opportunity to design their own systems, while maintaining a clear federal role to protect historically under-served students.
This report analyzes the measures that states currently include in their accountability systems and examines how state systems compare with the new law’s provisions, which will take effect in the 2017-18 school year. Nearly all states will need to make adjustments to comply with ESSA. The information in this report is designed to help states as they consider a broader range of measures for student and school success.
The report finds that statewide accountability measures fall into one of seven main categories of indicators: achievement indicators, such as proficiency in reading and mathematics; student growth indicators in multiple academic subjects; English language acquisition indicators; early warning indicators, such as chronic absenteeism; persistence indicators, such as graduation rates; college- and career-ready indicators, such as participation in and performance on college entry exams; and other indicators, such as access to the arts. Please see Explore the Data for Making the Grade for a map that provides detailed data on each state.
For more detailed analysis and commentary, see http://blogs.edweek.org/edweek/campaign-k-12/2016/05/states_accountability_shift_to_essa.html
For the full report, see https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/education/report/2016/05/19/137444/making-the-grade/
