Can the student growth percentile be interpreted the same way regardless of the year?
Not necessarily. The same trajectory of scores could yield higher or lower student growth percentiles depending on the trend in performance statewide. Let’s suppose a student scored 220 in mathematics in grade 4 in 2006, 222 in grade 5 in 2007, and 228 in grade 6 in 2008, and that the change from 222 to 228 represented a student growth percentile of 65. Now let’s suppose that in 2009, the entire state’s performance in mathematics improves quite rapidly, so that a substantially larger percentage of students are Proficient across all grades. In that case, the same test history might represent less than 65th percentile growth, since performance is increasing overall statewide.
Not necessarily. The same trajectory of scores could yield higher or lower student growth percentiles depending on the trend in performance statewide. Let’s suppose a student scored 220 in mathematics in grade 4 in 2008, 222 in grade 5 in 2009, and 228 in grade 6 in 2010, and that the change from 222 to 228 represented a student growth percentile of 65. Now let’s suppose that in 2011, the entire state’s performance in mathematics improves quite rapidly, so that a substantially larger percentage of students are Proficient across all grades. In that case, the same test history might represent less than 65th percentile growth, since performance is increasing overall statewide.
