Links for Portland Parents of Talented and Gifted Children
Portland Student Achievement Data Start Page
The best way to assess the learning students are doing in school is to look at the gains they make from one year to the next, not at the absolute level of their achievement scores. Portland Public Schools reports this information for all PPS students and also breaks it down by their achievement level in the previous year in five categories: very low, low, nearly meets, meets and exceeds. In addition, the gains made by students in these categories is also broken down by ethnicity and by whether the students are participating in the Federal Free and Reduced Meal program (a proxy for low-income students). The first chart below (Assessment Overview) shows the gains by all Portland students in these ability groups in three school levels: grades 4-5, 6-8 and 11, taken straight from the PPS website.
I used the data reported by PPS to assemble tables and graphs comparing the gains of students in four of the achievement categories broken down by free/reduced lunch, Hispanic and African-American. (I did not create a chart for "very low" students because their numbers were too small).
These tables and graphs show that student gains are inversely correlated with their level of achievement: students who exceeded benchmarks make lower gains than other students whereas students who were "low" made higher gains. They also show that students in the low income, Hispanic and African-American groups who exceeded make lower gains than the average students who exceeded, suggesting that the problem is not merely due to ceiling effects of the tests. Finally, they also show that the gaps among these groups are greatest among the students with the highest levels of achievement. The achievement gap is at the top. This is the final year for which these charts are available: the district is now using a different reporting system for Smarter Balanced results.
Previous years
2014 PPS Assessment overview by school level
2013-4 student reading and math gains by students who "nearly met" broken out by ethnicity/income
2013-4 student reading and math gains by students who "exceeded" broken out by ethnicity/income
2013-14 gains by students who exceeded: PPS compared to ACCESS
2012-13- PPS Assessment overview by school level
2012-13 student reading and math gains by students who "nearly met" broken out by ethnicity/income
2012-13 student reading and math gains by students who "met" broken out by ethnicity/income
2012-13 student reading and math gains by students who exceeded: broken out by ethnicity/income
2011-12 PPS Assessment overview by school level
2011-12 student reading and math gains by students who "nearly met" broken out by ethnicity/income
2011-12 student reading and math gains by students who "met" broken out by ethnicity/income
2011-12 student reading and math gains by students who exceeded: broken out by ethnicity/income
2011-12 tables of the differences in gains by students in different ability groups and ethnicities
2011-12 gains by students who exceeded: PPS compared to ACCESS
2010-11 report: The Achievement Gap is at the Top: Portland Data shows differences in gains for low income/minority students by ability level (.pdf file)
2010-11 student reading and math gains by ability and ethnicity/income: table and charts
2010-11 gains achieved by students who exceeded the previous year: PPS compared to ACCESS
2010-11 gains achieved by students' ability level: Grant High School compared to PPS
2009-10 student reading and math gains by ability and ethnicity/income: table and charts
2009-10 gains achieved by students who exceeded the previous year: PPS compared to ACCESS
2008-09 Student reading and math gains by ability and ethnicity/income: table and charts
2007-08 Student reading and math gains by ability and ethnicity/income: table and charts
2006-07 Student reading and math gains by ability and ethnicity/income: table and charts
06-07 Student reading and math gains by ability: West Sylvan, PPS and George Middle Schools compared
05-06 Student reading and math gains by ability and ethnicity/income: charts and tables
04-05 Student reading and math gains by ability and ethnicity/income
Jefferson Achievement Test Score Gains compared with PPS
Comments on Student Achievement to the Portland School Board, April 9, 2001