Data Sgp is an educational database designed to help educators track student growth. The database allows educators to easily pinpoint areas of achievement while making more informed decisions to boost student performance. Unfortunately, however, it can be daunting for educators to navigate; however, several steps can be taken to make using Data Sgp easier for educators.
At the core of any data use is data preparation: clearing away unnecessary information and making it more readable. While this can be time consuming, preparing the data properly for analysis requires dedication and perseverance. Once prepared for analysis, conducting actual analyses requires using tools available from SGP package such as abcSGP and updateSGP which make source code simpler by “wrapping” lower level functions like studentGrowthPercentiles and studentGrowthProjections into one function call that reduces code required for operational analysis using SGP analyses.
SGP (Student Growth Progress) measures student achievement progress relative to academically similar students. The score ranges from 1-99; with lower numbers representing lower relative growth and higher numbers indicating greater relative progress. Teachers and administrators can use individual SGP scores to assess whether students have grown more than, less than, or at an equivalent pace as their peers. Teachers can use Window Specific SGP reports or Current SGP scores as measures of this growth over a specific time period or current SGP reports which provide the most recent SGP score for any individual student.
As opposed to standard growth models, SGP calculations take multiple years of prior test scores into account in their calculations for more accurate assessments of student achievement than can be obtained with only a single year’s data. It also serves to motivate teachers by linking performance against measurable goals – something standard growth models cannot do alone. Michigan SGP systems include measures of student/teacher progress against official state achievement targets/goals which makes an essential element in educator evaluation systems.
SGP data for students in grades 4-11 is normalized to a scale from 0-100 before being displayed on growth graphs, to ensure all measurements can be made on an equal scale and that districts can display identical charts for every school in which their SGP students attend. SGP data is calculated based on student results from both fall and winter testing windows; therefore there may be some delay between taking the exam and receiving your SGP results due to verification procedures before SGPs can be calculated. Data is then made available to district offices for review and reporting; this delay does not appear in the graphs in the online Student Profile/Growth dashboard. Starting this fall 2019, this data will also include SGPs for high school students to provide an additional measure of growth and inform decisions related to course placements and support services in high schools.