Using Student Growth Percentiles (SGP) to Plan Interventions (Contains Video) – Schoolzilla Pro

Many teachers see normed assessments as nothing more than a gut check. We already know which students are struggling, which are excelling, and which are somewhere in between. Rarely do their results on a standardized assessment surprise us.

What is more difficult to know, however, is how those students compare to similar students within the school and across the country. How is our instruction impacting them? Are they progressing at the expected rate? Making rapid gains? Falling farther behind?

Many assessments, including the Renaissance Star assessment and the NWEA MAP assessment, have started providing Student Growth Percentiles (SGP) in addition to achievement scores and rankings. These percentiles compare students to their academic peers - students of similar age who performed similarly on previous assessments - and allow teachers to monitor students growth in addition to overall achievement.

SGPs provide an opportunity to celebrate the significant growth a student is making, even if (perhaps especially if!) they are still not meeting grade level standards. SGPs also allow us to identify students who are currently meeting grade level standards but not making adequate growth. This provides teachers with an opportunity to adjust instruction or provide interventions before the students fall behind.

High Growth, Low Achievement

Continue current intervention supports until students meet grade level standards.
If many students are receiving the same intervention, consider expanding it to other students.

High Growth, High Achievement

Students are being well served by Tier 1 classroom instruction.
Provide additional enrichment opportunities.

Low Growth, Low Achievement

Students should be receiving targeted interventions
If students are already receiving interventions, they may need to be supplemented or replaced.
If several interventions have been tried, consider referring to a Student Support Team.

Low Growth, High Achievement

Monitor classroom assessments closely to ensure students are making adequate progress.
If resources allow, consider an intervention or curriculum adjustment to prevent students from falling behind.

The video below shows how you can use the Schoolzilla dashboards to look at achievement percentile scores alongside student growth percentiles to best serve all students.

Start on the Our Students Page

If you have access to all students in a building, use filters to narrow the list to students you serve. This might mean selecting only certain grade levels or students with or without IEPs, for example.
Filter by the assessment percentile score, using the clickable bar chart.
Sort or Filter by the student growth percentile metric.
Once you have a set of filters you would like to save and pull up periodically to see which students currently meet them, click "Save View" to save.
Consider focusing on students who are making below average growth. These are students in need of a new or additional intervention.
Create intervention groups in Schoolzilla so you can track students’ progress over time.

Learn more about how you can use the Intervention Groups feature to track this group of students over time here.

Schoolzilla does not calculate student growth percentiles. This metric will only be available if it is provided by the assessment vendor.