Understanding Your Student’s SBAC Test Results
Confused about how to read your student’s CA Assessment of Student Performance and Progress (CAASPP) Smarter Balanced English Language Arts/Literacy and Mathematics results? You’re not alone!
First, a little background:
Back in the 2010s when the country was implementing Common Core education reforms, California joined the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) and participated in developing new standards and tests. The SBAC tests were developed to be computer-adaptive, meaning that a student would use a computer (not paper and pencil) to complete the test, and the computer-based test would present different questions based on the student’s answers to prior questions.
As part of the SBAC/CAASPP rollout, SFUSD piloted the tests in spring 2014. During the 2014-15 school year, SFUSD and other CA districts administered SBAC tests to students in grades 3-8 and grade 11 in mathematics and English.[1]
Now, on to the SBAC test results your student received:
After students take the SBAC test, families receive a score report with three components for English and mathematics:
- Scaled Score: the scaled score is the student’s overall number score for English or math. The score falls in a range between 2000 to 3000 that illustrates the student’s current level of achievement and can be used to assess their academic growth over time
- Achievement Levels: based on the scaled score for English and the scaled score for math, a student is placed into one of four categories of performance called achievement levels. There are four achievement levels for both English and math:
- Standard Not Met (Level 1)Standard Nearly Met (Level 2)Standard Met (Level 3)Standard Exceeded (Level 4)
- Students performing at Levels 3 and 4 are considered on track to demonstrating the knowledge and skills necessary for college and career readiness. Families may want to talk to your student’s teachers if the SBAC report shows achievement at Level 1 or Level 2.
- Area (Claim) Descriptors: based on the student’s performance on specific content areas within the English and math tests, the SBAC report will describe whether your student is “above standard”, “near standard”, or “below standard” in different areas of academic performance.
- Areas tested within the English Language Arts/Literacy test are:
- Reading
- Writing
- Listening
- Research/Inquiry
- Areas tested within the Mathematics test are:
- Concepts and Procedures
- Problem Solving/Modeling and Data Analysis
- Communicating Reasoning
- Families may want to talk to your student’s teachers if the SBAC report shows “below standard” in any English or math content area.
- Areas tested within the English Language Arts/Literacy test are:
One way of interpreting the SBAC score is that each data point provides you with a little more detail on your student’s performance on the test: you first get an overall number score, then context about whether the number score meets a state academic standard for English or math, and then a little more information about how well your student performed within different areas of English or math.
Still confused? Here are more resources:
- California Department of Education’s (CDE) Understanding SBAC Reports page:
https://caaspp-elpac.ets.org/caaspp/UnderstandingSBResults - Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium’s (SBAC) Reporting Scores page:
https://validity.smarterbalanced.org/scoring/ - Joint CDE/SBAC Understand Your Child’s Student Score Report page:
https://ca.startingsmarter.org/ - To research SBAC scores by school or at the district level, visit the Education Data Partnership (Ed-Data) SFUSD summary page and click on “+ Performance”:
https://www.ed-data.org/district/San-Francisco/San-Francisco-Unified
[1] https://www.ppic.org/publication/implementing-the-common-core-state-standards-in-california/