Methodology – Performance
These interactive dashboards are designed to show the relationship between student performance and education spending in Utah showing average testing proficiency and median growth compared to average per-student spending by LEA.
The dashboards integrate data that is collected and published by the Utah State Board of Education (USBE). Sources include Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence (SAGE) Reports, and Student Growth Percentiles (SGP) Reports as well as local education agency (LEA) Annual Financial Reports (AFRs) and Average Daily Membership (ADM) reports. By using interactive dashboards, the intent is to make it easier for the public to analyze complex data.
One important item to note is that capital expenses (such as building and bond costs) are often not reflected in common sources of education spending. The cost of buildings and other capital expenses are a sizeable portion of education spending. The dashboards include a toggle function that permits a user to see spending, including and excluding these capital expenses.
Data Integration Methodology- Spending and Proficiency Dashboards
- SAGE Proficiency Rates and Student Growth Percentiles were compiled from reports published by USBE for FY2014-FY 2018.
- USBE reports test scores at multiple levels of detail. The dashboard uses scores aggregated by LEA and subject. Subjects included in the USBE reports are Language Arts, Mathematics, and Science.
- Overall LEA growth scores use the Median Growth Percentage (MGP) as a district indicator. MGP is the median of all the student growth percentiles (SGP) of the given group. SGP refers to the percentage growth in student performance over time. These scores are calculated by USBE and included in its Student Growth Reports.
- LEA MGP scores for science were not recorded in the 2018 source data. There is no visualization for the topic in that given year.
- When LEAs have fewer than 10 test scores for a given subject in a given year (n<10) proficiency scores are not reported in order to maintain anonymity of the students. A small number of LEAs also have unspecific results reported (less than 2%, etc.) Those small groups and unspecific results are excluded from the visualizations.
- Reports in their original format may be found at: schools.utah.gov/data/reports
- The dashboard includes toggles to 1) view charter schools individually or grouped and 2) view per-student spending with or without capital expenses.
- See the Methodology – Spending page for more details on capital expense classifications and on how per-student spending was calculated.