Perkiomen Valley School District Annual Report 2017-18 Annual Report 2017-18 1 | Page 6

FUTURE READY PA INDEX
p. 6
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State Adopts Future Ready PA Index
The accountability system for Pennsylvania public
schools has changed again, beginning with the report-
ing of data from the 2017-18 school year. Under the fed-
eral Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), public schools
are now required to measure school performance in
four categories: academic proficiency, academic prog-
ress (growth), graduation rate and English Language
Learner proficiency.
This data has been typically reported online by the state
through the release of School Performance Profiles (SPP)
for each school. Schools would receive a number on a
scale of 0 to 100, and the number was calculated based
on a variety of factors such as the ones listed above.
Pennsylvania has now moved to the Future Ready PA
Index, which is meant to be a more “holistic” approach
to measuring school performance. The Future Ready PA
Index will include the measures of academic proficien-
cy and growth, along with some new measures such as
career readiness and chronic absenteeism.
The idea is to recognize that students are more than
standardized test scores by assessing a school’s perfor-
mance on a variety of indicators. The following pages
will show you how Perkiomen Valley School District
performed in these various areas. You may also visit the
state’s “dashboard” at https://futurereadypa.org/ to see
how our schools are doing. The dashboard will show
you how a particular school performed on assessment
measures such as academic proficiency and growth,
how a school performed with regard to “on-track mea-
sures” such as English Language Learner proficiency
and student attendance, and how a school performed
with regard to “college and career” measures such as
graduation rates and career standards benchmarks.
The intent is for Pennsylvania schools to reduce by half
the statewide percentage of students not meeting the
targets of proficiency, language attainment or gradua-
tion by the end of the 2029-30 school year.
The majority of Perkiomen Valley School District schools
met or exceeded targets for academic performance as
measured by the Pennsylvania System of School As-
sessment (PSSA), but this year’s results have shown that
we have work to do in the area of promoting student
academic growth from year to year. Academic growth is
calculated using the PSSA as well as the Keystone Exams
(see page 8).
Taking a Look at the Dashboard
Visitors to the Future Ready PA Index website will
have the opportunity to search for schools and get a
snapshot of their performance in three areas: as-
sessment measures, on-track measures, and college/
career measures.
Seen at left is the “dashboard” for Perkiomen Valley
High School. Schools receive blue, green or red
marks in each of the categories that are assessed
indicating their progress toward this goal. Those who
want to look closer at the numbers behind these
marks can click on the “View All” button at the bot-
tom to review more details.