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Data sgp leverages longitudinal student assessment data to produce statistical growth plots (SGPs) that measure students’ relative progress against their academic peers. These SGPs are used to inform educator evaluation systems in Michigan and elsewhere. While SGPs can be calculated from a single assessment, they are most meaningful and accurate when multiple assessments over time are used to compute them.

Creating SGPs from a single standardized test score history can be complex and error-prone, and there are numerous factors that can influence the results. To help educators gain familiarity with these new metrics, the BAA Secure Site released SGPs for individual students (4th – 11th grade) in January, 2016. While we strongly recommend districts begin learning about these new data tools, they should not apply them to educator evaluations at this time. This will provide three more years for the state-level SGP data to stabilize and ensure a sound implementation of this policy.

The sgpData spreadsheet is a convenient and straightforward way for educators to access and use their students’ SGP data. This data set, available on the BAA Secure Site, contains a single Excel file that displays student growth percentiles and other key school and district-level statistics for each student. The sgpData spreadsheet also provides an easy-to-use method for educators to sort and filter their data by various student characteristics, such as gender and socioeconomic status.

To view the spreadsheet, click the link below:

Note that the first column, ID, indicates a unique student identifier and the remaining five columns, SS_2013, SS_2014, SS_2015, SS_2016, and SS_2017, provide the scale scores associated with each of these years’ assessment tests. These data sets also contain the demographic variables VALID_CASE, CONTENT_AREA, YEAR and FIRST_NAME that are required if running SGP analyses.

When working with the sgpData data set, we recommend using its LONG format for operational analyses. This format is more manageable than the Wide format, and all higher level SGP analysis functions are designed to work with this data. For additional guidance on navigating and managing the data, consult the SGP Data Analysis Vignette for more comprehensive documentation.

In addition, the sgpData data set includes an embedded meta-data set containing school/district level details that is required for many of the SGP analyses. This data can be downloaded directly from the sgpData spreadsheet, or it can be retrieved by using the SGP Query Tool. Once the SGP Query Tool is loaded, users can select the school/district level meta-data from the drop down list and the tool will automatically update any subsequent SGP calculations with this information. This allows for a smoother transition between the different versions of the sgpData data set as it is released by MDE. In addition, the sgpQuery tool is a convenient way for educators to easily see if their schools and/or teachers have completed all required SGP calculations. In cases where calculations have not been completed, the Query Tool will prompt users to complete them. This will help to reduce the likelihood of errors in SGP calculations due to human error.