The Impact of Student Mobility on School Ratings in Pennsylvania's School Accountability System

Considerable amounts of financial resources and human capital are dedicated to school improvement efforts in the state of Pennsylvania each year. The factors that guide school improvement designation stem from federal education legislation, and include achievement, academic growth, attendance, graduation, EL proficiency, and career readiness. At the same time, many of the schools designated for school improvement also experience high rates of student transiency. The purpose of this study is to examine the effect that mobile students have on school accountability indicators, and by extension, on school improvement designations. The school improvement accountability data from two school districts with a combined total of eight schools was examined. Transient students were identified, and mock school accountability indicators were calculated, controlling the percentage of transient students in the group to the regional average of 8%. These controlled-score accountability indicators were then compared to published all-student group values in an effort to identify the impact of high percentages of mobile students using a bivariate correlation analysis. The results of the study suggested a strong correlation between transiency rate and change in school accountability indicators for attendance, math growth, math achievement, and ELA achievement, and a moderate correlation with career readiness benchmarks. Of all the school accountability factors examined, the only factor with which student mobility had a small correlation was ELA growth.