How Did Berkeley Heights Schools Compare on Student Growth for Math and ELA?

May 2, 2024

Student Growth is defined in the NJ Performance Report as:

…..a measure of how much students are learning each year. New Jersey’s ESSA state plan outlines that academic progress will be measured with school’s median student growth percentile (mSGP) on statewide ELA and mathematics assessments. Each individual student receives a Student Growth Percentile (SGP) for English Language Arts (ELA) in grades 4 through 8 and for Mathematics in grades 4 through 7. The SGP measures their academic progress from one year to the next compared to other students with similar prior test scores (academic peers).

A student’s SGP falls between 1 and 99 and can be grouped into three levels. An mSGP below 35 indicates low growth, an mSGP between 35 and 65 indicates typical growth, and an mSGP greater than 65 indicates high growth. If the SGPs for all students are ordered from smallest to largest, the mSGP is the percentile in the middle of the list.

The NJDOE Student Growth page has more information about SGPs and mSGPs, including a video that explains how both SGPs and mSGPs are calculated.

Important Note for 2022-23: Student growth data is not available for the 2019-2020, 2020-2021, and 2021-2022 school years due to federal waivers and assessment cancellations. An alternate measure of academic progress, or growth, called Relative School Improvement Measure (RSIM) was used for the 2021-2022 school year only.

Last year we drew comparisons to an alternate measure used, as a means of demonstrating variance; this year however, the NJ Performance Report allows for an apples to apples comparison.

The state standard is between 40-59.5, the numbers below are a three year trend snapshot of Student Growth.

English Language Arts

In ELA, Berkeley Heights met the standard with a slight increase from 2018-2019.

Math

Berkeley Heights exceeded the standard in Math.

The graphs below show a grade by grade comparison of student growth on each subject across both time periods.

What does this tell us?

When looking at this information alongside our actual proficiency performance, it tells us that the Berkeley Heights Public School District is headed in the right direction but still has a good deal of work to do in catching up to comparable schools.

The multi- year effort on the part of the community has made proficiency part of the local conversation and an item within our District planning documents. The former needs to continue and the latter improved in order to make further progress.