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Discover how SAS is shaping tomorrow’s brightest analytical minds

Analytics | Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Top rated value-added school: Extreme test prep or well-rounded experience? A student’s perspective

A recent Charlotte Observer article provided a thoughtful investigation of growth and achievement in North Carolina’s Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools). The article juxtaposed two very different, yet highly effective, schools. The first, Ranson Middle School, is a low-achieving school with 84% poverty that demonstrated the highest academic growth of any similar

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Jennifer Bell 0
School, teacher, student data: Where do we grow from here?

Over the past few months, many US states and districts have received data about student growth and teacher effectiveness. Some educators experience the excitement of outstanding scores and, most importantly, the success of their students’ growth.  Some quietly plug along, satisfied to be meeting growth targets and deciding if it isn’t broken,

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English
Education | Government
Learn SAS | Programming Tips | Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Calling all High School STEM educators! Teach Your Students 21st Century Computer Science Skills

STEM skills are essential for many of the fastest-growing and most lucrative occupations. And SAS programmers are in high demand in all fields. A number of reports have documented a critical talent shortage, especially for graduates with advanced degrees in math, computer science or computer engineering. (See Running on Empty, Report to

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Jennifer Bell 0
"March madness" of student course enrollment gets assist from value-added assessment

As teachers head into the madness of student course registration, the madness of college basketball reinforces a critical point: Data is crucial to making the picks that lead to a winning bracket, and student growth. Value-added assessment has proven reliable in determining which students are ready for their "one shining moment". This

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English
Education | Government
Advanced Analytics | SAS Events | Students & Educators
Polly Mitchell-Guthrie 0
Skills needed for competitive advantage in analytics (hint, it's not just the math)

I'm a big believer in both/and thinking, so I'll stand squarely in the middle and say that the most important skills for competitive advantage in analytics include a combination of top-notch modeling abilities along with business acumen, critical thinking, and curiosity. I was intrigued by a blog post on this

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English
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Value-added myth busting, Part 4: Value-added models cannot measure growth of students who have missing data or are highly mobile

Students with missing test scores are often highly mobile students and are more likely to be low-achieving students. It is important to include these students in any growth/value-added model to avoid selection bias, which could provide misleading growth estimates to districts, schools and teachers that serve higher populations of these

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Busting myths of education value-added analysis, Part 3: Simple growth measures provide better information to educators.

Welcome to Part 3 of the value-added Myth Busters blog series. I have heard a variation of this many times. “Why shouldn’t educators just use a simple gains approach or a pre- and post-test? They can trust simpler methodologies because they can replicate and understand them more easily.” Simple growth measures

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Busting myths of education value-added analysis, Part 2: It is harder to show growth with high-achieving students

Welcome to Part 2 of the value-added Myth Busters blog series…have you heard this one before? Educators serving high-achieving students are often concerned that their students’ entering achievement level makes it more difficult for them to show growth. “How can my students show growth if they are already earning high

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Busting myths of education value-added analysis, Part 1: You must control for demographics

In the past five years, value-added models have been increasingly adopted by states to support various teaching effectiveness policies. As educators make the paradigm shift from looking at only achievement data to incorporating growth data, many misconceptions have developed. Compounding this issue is the fact that not all value-added and

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Transitioning value-added and growth models to new assessments

This summer’s education conferences have been dominated by sessions discussing the “next generation,” Common Core aligned assessments in English and mathematics.  As 44 states plan for the transition from their state tests to the new PARCC and Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium assessments, SAS has received repeated questions from our partners

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
NC teachers’ voices regarding use of student growth in educator evaluations

In 2011-2012, North Carolina became one of many states to restructure their educator evaluation system to incorporate student growth. The NC Department of Public Instruction commissioned the external expertise of WestEd to evaluate various growth models and recommend value-added technology that would help them best meet their mission of using meaningful evaluation to

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
Value-added data informing and improving TN Schools of Education

With the rapid changes in our education systems regarding new standards, assessments, accountability and evaluation, teachers are rightfully feeling the pressure of being underprepared. The majority of teachers were not trained or certified with these rigorous systems in place. Recognizing that higher education institutions need to play an active role

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English
Education | Government
Students & Educators
Nadja Young 0
More than “teaching to the test”: Value-added ROI persists throughout a student’s life

A 23-year Harvard and Columbia University study was recently published shedding new light on the long-term impacts of teachers with both high and low value-added estimates. Researchers Chetty, Friedman, and Rockoff tracked math and reading assessment data on over 2.5 million students from 1989-2009. They then incorporated 90% of these

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English
Education | Government
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