SCHOOL MATTERS: What Every California Parent Should Know About the API

SCHOOL MATTERS: What Every California Parent Should Know About the API

New America Media, Q&A, Daffodil Altan and Carolyn Goossen, Posted: Mar 29, 2007

Traducción al español

Editor’s Note: The Academic Performance Index is one of the most important indicators for California parents of how their children are doing compared with other schools and with the state average. Bruce Fuller, professor of education at U.C. Berkeley, answers your questions about how to make sense of your school’s results and what rights you have as a parent.


What is the API?

The Academic Performance Index is a simple formula that converts all the standardized test student scores at your child's school into a school-wide average. Your school’s score will be between 200-1000. California has set its goal for schools at 800. The average score for the entire state in 2006 was 721.

When did the state start doing the API and what is its purpose?

The API was adopted in 1999 as a way to measure how schools are doing from year to year. All schools are expected to raise their scores by a minimum of five points each year.

Why should I pay attention to this week’s release of API scores?

Because it is one indicator of whether kids at your child's school are learning more, or at least learning skills that can be easily gauged on a standardized test.

What does my school's API score say about how well my child is doing?

Nothing, because the API score is an average of how well all the kids at your child’s school did on California standardized tests. It tells you how well your school is doing.

How can I find out my child's individual test scores?

Your child should receive a form with the results of the California standards tests he/she has taken. If the school doesn't distribute a form that has your child's individual test scores, go see the principal. Don't be shy. Demand it! And check to see where your child is weak, or needs more help, in particular reading or math skills.

What are "growth targets", and should I pay attention to them? What does "rank" mean?

Growth targets indicate the amount of improvement in children's test scores your school principal is aiming for. Two rankings are important to study: pay particular attention how your school is doing relative to other California schools serving similar kids. An API percentile ranking of 3-9 means that your school's kids are at about 30 on a 100-point scale (or the 30th percentile). But the 9 indicates how well your school is doing compared with other schools in neighborhoods similar to YOURS. A score of 9 indicates that the school is doing much better, 90 on a 100-point scale when you compare it to similar schools.

If my school has a high API score, does it mean it's a good school? And if it has a low API score should I consider taking my child out?

Don't worry about the API score for 2006 or ANY ONE year. What's important is whether your school's API score is climbing higher, or not. If there is no sign of growth, go meet with your school principal and ask why. If you are not satisfied with the answer, start to look for other schools. You have a legal right to transfer to another regular school, or magnet or charter school, located within your school district.

If my child's school's API score has gone up 5 points since last year, does that mean my child's individual score has improved?

No, again the API scores takes the average of all kids' scores.

Does it mean the school is improving or becoming a good school? If it's gone down 5 points, should I be worried?

If the API score is falling, you should be worried. This may result from changes in which families are moving into or out of your community. It may not be the school's fault. But if the API score falls a lot, or has been declining in recent years, start shopping for another school. Remember, you have a legal right to move your child to another school in your school district.

What do these scores tell me about my child's teachers?

It's most important to track your own child's test scores. His or her scores will be placed in "percentile rankings". If you child is scoring in the second percentile, that means that 8 out of 10 kids statewide are performing at a higher level than your child. Push your child's teachers or school principal to explain every number on the results form that your child should bring home from school.

Do these rankings compare my kid to all California schools, even private schools?

Just public schools.

How does the API relate to the federal policy "No Child Left Behind"?

The API is an index calculated by educators in Sacramento. It has nothing to do with President Bush's "No Child Left Behind" federal policies, directed from Washington D.C.

What does it mean if my school's score improved on the API, but it did not meet the AYP?

This is where politicians have made it very confusing. The AYP -- Adequate Yearly Progress index -- is like the API, except the AYP is set by a formula that's largely written in Washington, D.C. It provides a growth target -- but one that's very sensitive to whether your school serves kids from poor or affluent families. It most often penalizes schools that serve many children from lower-income families, since it's not very sensitive to growth in these schools. The state's API index, set by Sacramento officials, is more sound that the federal AYP benchmark.

Will my kid's individual scores be recorded on his academic record? Will high schools or colleges see his scores?

Yep, it goes in the "cumulative folder" although this doesn't go to colleges or employers, normally.

I've read in the newspaper that the API hides "achievement gaps". What does this mean?

These tests are sensitive to gains among students who perform at or below the average student statewide. The API is given as a score on a scale of 1-1000. California has set its goal at 800. This year’s statewide average, which includes all students of all ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds, is 721. But if you look at “subgroup” scores, which break scores down based on ethnicity, disability, economic status and English proficiency, you will usually see big differences in the average. This year the statewide average for Asian students, for example, was 847, compared with an average of 656 for Latino students and 801 for Filipino students. These differences in the average are known as “achievement gaps.” If your child belongs to an ethnic or other subgroup, pay attention to that subgroup score when looking at your school’s results. Your school’s overall score may have gone up a few points, but your child’s ethnic or other subgroup score may not have gone up or it may be much below the school’s overall average. If you notice big discrepancies, you should talk to your teacher or principal.

My child is an English language learner. Is he tested for the API? If so, are his scores included?

Some schools will give alternative tests for children who know very little English. But President Bush's AYP index includes all students, even those who lack English proficiency. If this applies to your child, it's very important that you talk with the school principal and perhaps a bilingual teacher, to ensure that they explain your child's test scores.

Where can I get a copy of my school's score? Do I have the right to get my child's score?

Yes, you have a legal right to obtain information from your school principal, or even from a teacher, about your school's API score, how student subgroups did at your school (by ethnic or income group), and how your own child performed on the tests.

Does my child automatically get to see his score? Or do I have to ask for it?

The results form should be handed out or mailed to the parent. But you have the right to get it and to consult teachers or the principal about what the different skill scores mean.

A New NCLB
Any response to the punitive nature of the NCLB must be balanced by recognition that there is a genuine need for helpful school accountability, particularly for those schools that serve communities of color and economically disenfranchised families. Opposition to NCLB doesn't mean opposing any and all forms of accountability. Rather, the law should be used to advocate for a way to develop genuine accountability that supports improved student learning and schools.

Advocates must work on several levels to move accountability beyond punitive tests and toward authentic forms of assessment that support teaching and learning practices that genuinely engage students. This can best be done at the school level through teachers and students collaborating with parents and communities to implement portfolios, exhibitions, student-led conferences, and other assessment strategies that promote real improvements in teaching and learning. Most importantly, teachers must use powerful "formative" assessments that can provide precise, useful feedback to each student. While this will be a difficult task in the face of high-stakes testing, there are schools and districts around the nation working in this direction.

On district and state levels, it can mean finding ways to use more authentic performance assessments that evaluate students on what they are capable of doing instead of how well they fill in a bubble sheet. The states of Maine and Nebraska are currently devising state assessment systems that will incorporate local assessments and minimize the role of state standardized testing. NCLB does allow such state assessment programs. By including local, particularly classroom-based data, much richer and more useful information will be included in accountability programs. While even these assessments can be misused in a wrong-headed accountability structure, they are worth exploring.

Ultimately, efforts at the local and state levels to make the best of a bad situation are unlikely to succeed unless Congress overhauls the federal law. Education reformers must work to amend ESEA or demand a new law that truly supports high-quality education for all. We must insist that federal and state governments provide equitable funding to all students. And we need a law that does not punish schools, educators, or students for problems they cannot resolve alone.

The law must change from one that relies primarily on standardized tests to one that encourages quality assessments and promotes better instructional practices in classrooms. Congress should cut back the amount of mandatory testing, prohibit the use of high-stakes testing for graduation or grade promotion, and encourage schools to focus on the use of multiple forms of assessment (as the law calls for but the Bush administration ignores). It should appropriate money to help teachers improve their classroom assessment practices.

Participatory democracy-local parents, educators, students, and other residents working together to make policy decisions about the school-should be at the heart of public school accountability systems. Ideally, information about student achievement would come primarily from student classroom work. This data would be combined with other important academic and non-academic information (including limited standardized testing) about schools to make decisions about school programs and student progress. Teachers and parents would collaborate to determine the areas on which to focus improvement efforts.

Similarly, there must be fundamental changes in NCLB's sanctions and school improvement strategies. En-couraging parents and students to flee schools and closing some down will not improve education. At the same time, we need to accept that schools that have adequate resources and are not doing a good job even with extra support should not be allowed to continue to miseducate children.

Keeping pressure on low-performing schools will undoubtedly raise a vast array of thorny issues: Even if funding is not adequate, cannot many schools still do better? How much better? Can accountability procedures avoid blaming schools for things they do not control while holding them responsible for what they can do? At what point and with what evidence should decisions to intervene in a specific school be made? If inflexible numerical triggers lead to "interventions" that undermine real education, will the absence of such triggers allow schools, districts, and states to continue to miseducate some children? Is there a way to pressure states to foster real equity without scapegoating local schools and districts? What should the role of the federal government be in promoting school improvement, and how much money should the federal government be contributing to education?

We already know a lot about how to create socially supportive and intellectually engaging environments for teachers and students. It takes hard work and resources. School communities need to have unity around goals and teaching practices. And schools need quality teachers, adequate support staff, engaging multicultural curriculum, useful assessments, adequate planning time and staff development, significant parent involvement, small class sizes, quality before- and after-school programs, early childhood education, and quality leadership.


- illustration: STEPHEN KRONINGER
Building a Reform Campaign
If there's any chance of changing this law in the next several years, we will have to build a powerful national alliance among education and civil rights organizations and strengthen our public engagement. Advocates can start by recognizing there is wide public concern around some key components of NCLB:

The one-size-fits-all nature of testing.

The unfairness of making decisions about individuals or schools based just on test scores.

The danger of teaching to the test.

We can demonstrate that the choice between historically inadequate education and test-driven "reform" is a false choice because there are other, better options.

Several national education groups are already focusing on these issues. For example, the American Association of School Administrators opposed NCLB in Congress and continues to work for changes. The annual representative assembly of the National Education Association (NEA) passed a series of resolutions opposing high-stakes testing and calling for changes in NCLB. The organization has endorsed legislation that would reduce some of NCLB's more harmful impacts. The NEA also is proposing a lawsuit against NCLB because it is an unfunded mandate.

But education organizations cannot do it alone. Individual teachers must take an active and prominent role in educating the public about the law and its negative impact. Public opinion surveys, such as the respected Phi Delta Kappan annual poll, conclude that teachers are the most respected voices in education.

Teachers can help mobilize the public to support change. Educators especially need to reach out to parents, who are likely to turn to teachers for information. Parents can speak credibly in public. In non-union states, where teachers who speak out can more easily be fired, the public role of parents may be more important. Because parents are only occasionally well-organized, educator groups may need to provide support to parents, while allowing parents to retain their autonomy.

Civil rights groups also can be a powerful force for changing NCLB. Some spoke out against NCLB when it was in Congress. Recently, the Children's Defense Fund (the creators of the slogan, "leave no child behind") has raised concerns about the overuse and misuse of tests in NCLB. The educational platforms of the National Conference of Black Legislators and the NAACP both oppose high-stakes testing for individuals and warn against teaching to the test. Few members of the Congres-sional Black and Hispanic Caucuses voted for the new law. Virtually all civil rights groups oppose privatization, and they call for increased funding and equity.

To be sure, the civil rights community remains somewhat divided on NCLB. Support from some civil rights activists, such as the Citizens Commission on Civil Rights, was important to passage of NCLB. Some view the new federal law as a powerful step toward ensuring that states and districts address long-ignored educational needs that have led to weak education for many students. Sanctions, they say, are necessary to force action. High-stakes tests for schools and districts appear to guarantee some sort of results.

The members and constituencies of education and civil rights groups are the people most affected by NCLB and have the most to gain from changing the law. But a successful campaign will require overcoming what are, at times, very different perspectives on the use of tests in high-stakes school accountability.

Over the next few years, an ESEA reform alliance will have to work to resolve these differences. There will need to be intense discussions with not just the national leaders of education and civil rights groups, but with classroom teachers, parents, and community activists. A key question remains unanswered: How best should the federal government intervene to help build a school system that serves to build a multiracial democracy in this country?

NCLB is a time bomb ticking at the center of the public education system. Unless we want to find ourselves standing amidst the rubble, we need to get to work.

Monty Neill (monty [at] fairtest.org) is the executive director of the National Center for Fair & Open Testing (FairTest) in Cambridge, Mass. See http://www.fairtest.org for more information.

What is the achievement gap?

The “achievement gap” is a matter of race and class. Across the U.S., a gap in academic achievement persists between minority and disadvantaged students and their white counterparts. This is one of the most pressing education-policy challenges that states currently face.


New urgency at the federal level

Recent changes in Federal education policy have put the spotlight on the achievement gap. The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) requires states to set the same performance targets for children:

From economically disadvantaged families
With disabilities
With limited English proficiency
From all major ethnic and racial groups
Within a school, if any student subgroup persistently fails to meet performance targets, districts must provide public school choice and supplemental services to those students – and eventually restructure the school's governance. This is required even if the school performs well overall.

In other words, schools now are considered successful only if they close the achievement gap. Many schools are struggling to meet this benchmark.


Measuring the achievement gap

There are several ways to measure the achievement gap. One common method is to compare academic performance among African-American, Hispanic, and white students on standardized assessments.

Data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) shows that reading scores for 17-year-olds narrowed dramatically for both African-American and Hispanic students from 1975 through 1988. From 1990 to 1999, however, these gaps either remained constant or grew slightly in both reading and mathematics.

Looking at the NAEP data, the Education Trust concluded that, “By the time [minority students] reach grade 12, if they do so at all, minority students are about four years behind other young people. Indeed, 17 year-old African American and Latino students have skills in English, mathematics and science similar to those of 13-year-old white students.”

Another way to measure the achievement gap is to compare the highest level of educational attainment for various groups. Here too there are gaps at all levels.

Hispanic and African-American high school students are more likely to drop out of high school in every state. Of these high school graduates, college matriculation rates for African-American and Hispanic high-school students remain below those of white high-school graduates – although they have risen in recent years. Furthermore, of those students enrolling in college, Hispanic and black young adults are only half as likely to earn a college degree as white students.


Evidence of progress

Despite these challenges, several states have demonstrated that the achievement gap can be reduced – if not entirely closed. For instance, according to the Education Trust:

Texas: Here, NAEP writing scores for eighth-grade African-Americans are equal to or higher than the writing scores of white students in seven states.
Virginia: This state boasts one of the nation's smallest achievement gaps between whites and Hispanics. Here, eighth-grade Hispanic students had the highest NAEP writing scores for Hispanic students in any state.


What about California where they seem to impune these same students or place them in special education or close low performing schools to make district numbers look better?