ASSESSMENT REPORT PROJECT-PART 1 1

Assessment Report Project- Concept Definitions, Results, and Interpretations

Dawn Branch, Jamie Herd-Tesson, Erin Perman,

and Andrew Silbaugh

The University of West Florida

Introduction
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Arguably, one of the most important duties of a school administrator is managing the data

and achievement of the school. All of us have worked under administrators who actively used

data to drive the instruction of our respective schools. DiLoreto (2020) states that interpreting

data is important so that one can truly understand how students and teachers are performing. In

essence, without a thorough understanding of data, its computation, and its interpretations, an

administrator is not serving his or her students and teachers effectively. In this part of the

assessment project, our group will analyze the data of a group of teachers. Based upon the

analyses, this paper will define the concepts used, the data analysis and interpret the data as a

whole, by class, and by subtest.

Definitions of Concepts

It is important to understand certain terms when analyzing test data. The mean of a set of

data is the overall average of the numbers. To find the mean of a set of numbers, you add all of

the numbers together and then divide by the amount of numbers you have. Finding a mean could

be beneficial when determining your class average on a test, or comparing a class average to

another class average. You can also relate any given student’s test score to the mean of the class

(DiLoreto, 219).

The median of a set of data is the middle number after the data have been arranged in

order from lowest to highest or highest to lowest. In a situation where there are two numbers in

the middle, you would use the average of the two numbers. According to DiLoreto (2019),

median is frequently used to interpret income in America, and is typically used for descriptive

purposes. The mode of a set of numbers is the number that appears the most. Mode does not

give a lot of information about testing data, simply the most common score.
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Variance refers to the distance a number is from the mean (Hayes, para. 1). A large

variance shows a high variability of the sample from the mean, while a variance close to zero

shows that the values are close to the mean. Standard Deviation is a similar concept. It is how

the scores are spread around the mean (DiLoreto, 2019). Variance compares each number to the

mean, while standard deviation groups numbers based on their distance from the mean.

Standard error of measurement (SEM) is referring to the accuracy of a one time test

score. If a student were to take the test again, odds are slim they would get the exact same score

due to question difficulty, personal well-being, surroundings on test day, different distractions

that may occur, etc. Because of this, test results sometimes have a SEM to predict a range of

scores where the student would probably place on any given day. Confidence interval is how

likely the SEM is to be true. Confidence intervals are 68%, 95%, and 99.7%. These percentages

are how likely it is that the SEM range is accurate.

A scale may be used to place a student’s test score within a range of numbers to

determine a level. The student’s raw score, also known as the developmental scale score (DSS),

is placed on one of five levels. This system is used on the Florida State Assessment (FSA).

Each year, a student is assigned a level for Math, and a level for English Language Arts (ELA)

based on the given score ranges provided by the state. Level 1 reflects the student will need

substantial support in the next grade, level 2 means the student is likely to need support in the

next grade, level 3 means the student may need additional support in the next grade, level 4

reflects the student is likely to excel in the next grade, and level 5 means the student is highly

likely to excel in the next grade (FDOE, 2018).

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Overall Results

The following is an overall analysis of three 7th grade mathematics assessment results.

When combining the results of the three classes, the average developmental scale score (mean) is

239, which equates to a level 3. Out of the 48 seventh graders assessed, 30 are found to be

proficient, scoring a 3 or better. In other words, 62.5% of the students tested were proficient

overall in math. The median of all students’ scores is 237.5. The mode of all test scores is 240,

which appears four times. The range of developmental scale scores is 211-279.

Looking at the math levels of 7th grade students who took the assessment (Figure 1),

8.3% of students were level 1, 29.2% of students were level 2, 39.6% of students were level 3,

10.4% of students were level 4, and 12.5% of students were level 5.

Figure 1
Overall 7th Grade Math Levels

Class Results

We will be looking at three teacher’s class results. The teachers will be identified as

Teacher A, B, and C. Teacher A has 13 students, five male students and eight female students.
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Teacher B has 17 students, nine males and eight females. Teacher C has 18 students, nine males

and nine females. The class mean percentile ranks for the three teachers can be shown in Table 1.

The percentile rank means that as a class Teacher A’s students are the 34.8462th percentile.

Teacher B’s students average at the 41.7059th percentile and Teacher C’s students are at the

56.2778th percentile. Teacher C’s class mean percentile rank is 21.4316 points higher than

Teacher A.

Table 1

Number of Students and Class Mean Percentile Rank

Teacher Number of Students Class Average
A 13 34.8462
B 17 41.7059
C 18 56.2778

Looking at the Achievement Levels of the students in each class from Table 2 and we can

see that for each teacher 50% or more of their students have reached a Level 3 or higher. There is

an apparent difference between the number of students achieving a Level 4 or 5 in Teacher C’s

class than the other two classes. The average developmental scaled score for Teacher A was 235,

Teacher B was 234.529, and Teacher C was 247.111. Teacher A had a standard deviation of

11.619 for the DSS for the class, which would mean that their 68% confidence interval for the

class would be 223.283 to 246.619, 95% would be 211.762 to 258.238, and 99.7% would be

269.857 to 269.857. For Teacher B, the standard deviation of the DSS was 12.962 for the class,

which would make the 68% confidence interval for the class 221.567 to 247.491, the 95% was

208.605 to 260.453, and the 99.7% was 195.642 to 273.413. Teacher C had a standard deviation

of 16.869 for the DSS for the class, which would mean that the class 68% confidence interval
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would be 230.242 to 263.98, the 95% confidence interval would be 213.373 to 280.849, and the

99.7% would be 196.504 to 297.718.

Table 2

Students Achievement Levels in Each Class with Percent

Teacher Level 1 Level 2 Level 3 Level 4 Level 5

A 1 (7.69%) 5 (38.46%) 6 (46.15%) 0 (0%) 1 (7.69%)
B 3 (17.65%) 4 (23.53%) 8 (47.06%) 1 (5.88%) 1 (5.88%)
C 0 (0%) 5 (27.78%) 5 (27.78%) 4 (22.22%) 4 (22.22%)

Table 3 shows how each class did on each of the subtests. Students in Teacher C’s

classroom scored higher on all three subtests than students in Teacher A and B’s classes.

Students in Teacher A performed the best on number sense, while in Teacher B’s class students

performed the best on Geometry, and students in Teacher C’s class performed the best on Ratios.

Table 3

Class Percentages by Subtest

Teacher Geometry Number Sense Ratios Overall
A 52.07% 59.44% 57.69% 56.25%
B 56.11% 54.55% 54.41% 55.07%
C 67.95% 65.15% 70.83% 68.06%

Subtest Results

We will be looking at the results for each of the subtests by the student's raw scores and

score range. The three subtests are Geometry, Number Sense, and Ratios.

The frequency table for student raw scores for Geometry is shown in Table 4. This table
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shows the range (12-2) is ten and that most students (8) answered ten out of thirteen correct

(76.92%).

Table 4

Raw Scores for Geometry Subtest

Raw score number Number of Students who

scored this number
0 0
1 0
2 2
3 1
4 1
5 5
6 6
7 6
8 7
9 7
10 8
11 2
12 3
13 0

The student score range for Geometry frequency table (Table 5) and histogram (Figure 2)

show the range (92-15) is seventy-seven which is the second smallest of the three subtests. Most

students (14) scored in the 61-70 point range which is the largest number of students in one

range although the point range is the second highest of the three subtests.
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Table 5

Score Range for Geometry Subtest

Score range Number of students who

scored in this range
0-10 0
11-20 2
21-30 1
31-40 6
41-50 6
51-60 6
61-70 14
71-80 8
81-90 2
91-100 3

Figure 2

Score Range for Geometry Subtest

The frequency table for student raw scores for Number Sense is shown in Table 6. This

table shows the range (10-3) is seven and that most students (11) answered eight out of eleven

correct (72.73%).
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Table 6

Raw Scores for Number Sense Subtest

Raw score number Number of Students who

scored this number
0 0
1 0
2 0
3 2
4 5
5 7
6 8
7 9
8 11
9 4
10 2
11 0

The student score range for Number Sense frequency table (Table 7) and histogram

(Figure 3) show the range (91-27) is sixty-four which is the smallest of the three subtests. Most

students (11) scored in the 71-80 point range showing the highest point range for the three

subtests.

Table 7
Score Range for Number Sense Subtest
Score range Number of students who
scored in this range
0-10 0
11-20 0
21-30 2
31-40 5
41-50 7
51-60 8
61-70 9
71-80 11
81-90 4
91-100 2
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Figure 3

Score Range for Number Sense Subtest

The frequency table for student raw scores for Ratios is shown in Table 8. The table

shows the range (12-2) is ten and that most students (9) answered eight out of twelve correct

(66.67%).

Table 8

Student Raw Scores for Ratios

Raw score number Number of Students who

scored this number
0 0
1 0
2 1
3 0
4 3
5 6
6 7
7 7
8 9
9 6
10 7
11 1
12 1
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The student score range for Ratios frequency table (Table 9) and histogram (Figure 4)

show the range (100-17) is eighty-three which is the largest of the three subtests. Most students

(13) scored in the 41-50 point range, which is the lowest point range for the three subtests.

Table 9

Student Score Range for Ratios

Score range Number of students who

scored in this range
0-10 0
11-20 1
21-30 0
31-40 3
41-50 13
51-60 7
61-70 9
71-80 6
81-90 7
91-100 2

Figure 4

Student Score Range for Ratios

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The overall results for the three subtests are shown in Table 10. The table shows the

measures of central tendency and dispersion. The three subtests show all the data is negatively

skewed because the mean and the median are less than the mode. Negatively skewed means

more data falls above the mean. Geometry regarding percent has the lowest mean and median

with the largest variance and standard deviation. This means the data is more widely dispersed

or spread out for the Geometry subtest. The Ratios data shows the mean, median and mode are

the closest together and has the second highest variance and standard deviation.

Table 10

Overall Results by Subtest

Geometry Number Sense Ratios

Raw Score Percent Raw Score Percent Raw Score Percent

Mean 7.729166667 59.46% 6.5833333 59.85% 7.375 61.46%

Median 8 61.54% 7 63.64% 7.5 62.50%

Mode 10 76.92% 8 72.73% 8 66.67%

Variance 6.159131206 3.64% 3.184397163 2.63% 4.53723404 3.15%

Std Dev 2.481759699 19.09% 1.784487927 16.22% 2.13007841 17.75%

Conclusion

Overall, after looking at the examples above, we all can conclude that while data

calculation can be a tedious task, it is very important that school leaders look at their school’s

data. School leaders cannot be in every classroom at every second of the day monitoring the

progress of students, therefore one must rely on the data in order to make informed decisions and

choices regarding the direction of the school. While this data calculation and collection is
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overwhelming, it is necessary not only for the success of the school, but also for the students

who need an academically rigorous and appropriate environment to grow. School leaders cannot

afford to ignore their data, as one must always think about their students first.
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References

DiLoreto, M. (Ed.). (2020). Testing and measurement (preliminary ed). Cognella.

Florida Department of Education. (2018, October). 2018-2019 FSA ELA and mathematics fact

sheet. http://www.fldoe.org/core/fileparse.php/5663/urlt/FSAELA-MathFS1819.pdf

Hayes, A. (2019, September 2). What is variance?

https://www.investopedia.com/terms/v/variance.asp