ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses issues related to the quality of school-level data collected as part of state accountability systems, including the reliability and validity of school-level test scores as a measure of the value added by schools to student learning. It outlines various ways in which school-level data can be usefully analyzed and illustrates the challenges inherent in doing so, including the challenges of aggregating data across states to find an overall program effect. The chapter describes the implications of the arguments presented here for measuring changes in school performance and linking these effects to a specific program. It presents issues related to the quality of school-level data collected as part of state accountability systems, including the reliability and validity of school-level test scores as a measure of the value added by schools to student learning. The chapter focuses on the challenges of aggregating results across states to find an overall program effect.
