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Vermont’s accountability system places a strong emphasis on student growth over time.
While this can recognize schools for helping students progress, it does not place any weight on whether students are meeting the state’s standards. In particular, it uses scale scores rather than proficiency rates and includes a growth model based on how much students grow compared with their similarly performing peers. Absent some check against proficiency, the system won’t be able to recognize low performance and will not ensure all students are meeting standards.
Vermont plans to wait three years before calculating its growth model.
It is not clear why it needs to wait that long.
