Examining the impact of school quality on school outcomes and improvement: A value-added approach

There has been a recent state-level emphasis on monitoring student outcomes to develop comprehensive school accountability. Such monitoring systems can include content standards and benchmarks to measure progress, statewide assessment instruments, and school report card data that policy makers, school personnel, and parents can also use to compare schools. To be fair, school comparisons should somehow take into consideration differences in communities and the background characteristics of students who live in these communities. Little previous research has examined what report card information might be used to identify school indicators that are related to student achievement and improvement gains across school settings with diverse student composition. The purpose of this study is to present an approach to statewide school comparison that focuses on the value-added effects of report card indicators of elementary schools educational environments on school achievement and school improvement after making school-level adjustments for student differences.