Education in Pennsylvania - NCLB AYP Levels

NCLB AYP Levels

Under No Child Left Behind each state set its own rates for Adequate Yearly Progress. Children with disabilities received customized testing related to their IEP (Individualized Education Plan). While Science is tested in 4th, 8th and 11th grades, no AYP level is set. AYP is reported at a district level, a school level and a tested grade level. Attendance and graduation rates are included in achieving AYP each year. A school district can achieve Adequate Yearly Progress status even though one or more of its schools do not. If a school or school district does not make adequate yearly progress, it is required to create a School Improvement Plan to address academic deficiencies and submit it to Pennsylvania Department of Education for review and approval.

Pennsylvania backloaded AYP setting it as follows:

Adequate yearly progress results are reported for the student body as a whole and for subgroups several: boys, girls, low income students, students who are limited English proficient, minorities and children with disabilities as mandated by NCLB. The law gave each state the power to define subgroup size, in Pennsylvania 40 students in the group. Additionally, the law permitted schools to report data using a statistical device called a confidence interval. When a school achieves AYP via a confidence interval a (CI) is noted on the school's official state report card of academic achievement.

In 2011, 94 percent of the 500 Pennsylvania public school districts achieved the No Child Left Behind Act progress level of 72% of students reading on grade level and 67% of students demonstrating on grade level math. In 2011, 46.9 percent of Pennsylvania school districts achieved Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) based on student performance. An additional 37.8 percent of school districts made AYP based on a calculated method called safe harbor, 8.2 percent on the growth model and 0.8 percent on a two-year average performance.