California launched a new school accountability system on Wednesday called the California School Dashboard. It was meant to replace the Academic Performance Index or API to help communities across the state access important information about K-12 schools and districts.
According to the Pasadena Now, the California School Dashboard would display scores each year, based on state and local indicators. The indicators are specifically aligned with 10 priority areas of the state's Local Control Funding Formula.
The first five categories were made available this week and the rest will be made available in the fall. The dashboard measured graduation rates, student performance in the English language, arts and mathematics for grade 3-8, fluency and progress made for English students and student suspension rates for kindergarten through the 12th grade.
The California School Dashboard also aim to incorporate score information on parent engagement, school climate, college and career readiness, state standards implementation, and services, materials and facilities. These categories are expected to be applied by fall. Information on chronic absenteeism will also be included at a future date.
The Dashboard cover multiple measures of student performance that will give more comprehensive look at the district and school performance so that students graduate ready for college, careers and life.
There are five scoring levels in each category, with red the lowest level and blue as the highest level. From lowest to highest the levels are red, orange, yellow, green and blue.
The Poway Unified School District (PUSD) got high scores in everything except for the progress of students learning English. PUSD received blue level for graduation rate, English Language Arts and mathematice for grade 3-8. The district received a green level for its K-12 suspension rate and they received the yellow level for English learner progress for K-12. The fluency in English dropped 1.6 percent to 83.5 percent from last year.
The San Diego Union-Tribune reported that the assessment showed PUSD had an enrollment of 35,771 students, where 17 percent fall into the category of socioeconomically disadvantaged and 12 percent are English learners.
