States are taking advantage of the added flexibility given them under the federal Every Student Succeeds Act to adopt a wider range of indicators for measuring schools’ educational progress, according to a report from the Learning Policy Institute.
The report looks at indicators in five areas: suspension rates, school climate, chronic absenteeism, extended-year graduation rate, and access to a career- and college-ready curriculum. It finds just five states are using all five indicators. The most popular indicators—used by 39 states and the District of Columbia—center on college and career readiness. Almost as many states are using student-absenteeism rates and extended-year graduation rates for accountability purposes.
