Making Students Visible: Comparing Different Student Subgroup Sizes for Accountability. Update. Policy Memo 16-2B

In May 2016, the authors released a policy memo comparing the effect of reporting subgroups at an n-size of 20+ compared to 100+. In response to this original memo, the U.S. Department of Education released a rule notice proposing changes to ESSA regulation §200.17 allowing states "to establish...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inPolicy Analysis for California Education, PACE
Main Authors Hough, Heather, Witte, Joe
Format Report
LanguageEnglish
Published Policy Analysis for California Education, PACE 07.07.2016
Subjects
Accountability
Comparative Analysis
Disabilities
Disadvantaged Youth
Educational Improvement
Educational Legislation
Educational Policy
Elementary School Students
English Language Learners
Ethnicity
Federal Legislation
Institutional Characteristics
Mathematics Achievement
Measurement
Race
Secondary School Students
State Policy
California
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Summary:In May 2016, the authors released a policy memo comparing the effect of reporting subgroups at an n-size of 20+ compared to 100+. In response to this original memo, the U.S. Department of Education released a rule notice proposing changes to ESSA regulation §200.17 allowing states "to establish a range of n-sizes, not to exceed 30." To support state-level policymaking under these new requirements, this update to the original policy memo will illustrate the trade-offs between subgroup sizes of 20+ and 30+. In this supplementary analysis, the authors show that: (1) The effect of moving from a subgroup size of 30+ to 20+ is not as stark as the effect of moving from a subgroup size of 100+ to 20+; (2) A substantially higher percentage of student data is reported at smaller subgroup sizes; (3) At a subgroup size of 20+, approximately 38 percent more schools report results for "all student subgroups" than at a subgroup size of 30+; and (4) The lowest performing racial/ethnic subgroup in the school is often excluded from schools reporting at the higher subgroup size. [This memo represents work underway as part of the CORE-PACE Research Partnership. For the original memo, see ED574823.]