- Departmen!

of
·= i i i i i i i- .Educat1on
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: Sara Gast
August 16, 2018 OFFICE: (615) 532-6260

Education Department Releases 2018 TNReady School-Level Results

Hundreds of Tennessee schools showed across-the-board gains

NASHVILLE—Education Commissioner Candice McQueen today released the school-level 2018

TNReady results as well as 2018 school and district student growth data. The TNReady scores show
that nearly 700 schools – more than 40 percent of schools in Tennessee – saw improvement across the
majority of their grades and subjects in 2018, and 210 of those schools saw improvement across all
grades and subjects. Additionally, 88 school districts – about 60 percent – met or exceeded student
growth expectations. There were 11 school districts that demonstrated the top level of growth in all
tested subjects.

While TNReady results look at students’ overall achievement and include whether a student scored as
on track or mastered on their spring assessment, growth scores look at how much students are
growing, regardless of whether they were proficient. Taken together, these results show a fuller picture
of students’ performance.

“While we know we still have room to improve, we also want to celebrate the hundreds of schools in
Tennessee that showed progress this past year,” Commissioner McQueen said. “Students and teachers
are making encouraging strides on both TNReady and in their overall growth, and today’s results point
to bright spots across the state where students saw across-the-board success this past year on the
state assessment. We want to learn from those places as we also continue to improve.”

Today’s release follows the release of state- and district-level TNReady results in July. As the
department noted at the time, while most students took TNReady on paper, the department had a
third-party expert conduct additional analysis to see if and/or how the online disruptions from this
spring impacted the scores. You can learn more about that context here.

On 2018 TNReady, students showed the most improvement in English language arts for grades 3-5,
and today’s school-level results show that nearly 60 percent of schools improved their achievement
scores in this area. Mirroring the mixed results that were seen at the state level, in most grades and
subjects around 30-50 percent of schools saw improvement in their achievement scores; for example,
in high school math, about 46 percent of schools improved.

Tennessee has calculated student growth for nearly three decades, and these scores, called the
Tennessee Value-Added Assessment System (TVAAS) scores, measure student growth year over year.
In calculating a TVAAS score, a student’s performance is compared relative to the performance of his or
her peers who have performed similarly on past assessments.

The TVAAS scores for 2018 show that the majority of Tennessee’s 147 districts met or exceeded growth
expectations, and 59 districts had an overall TVAAS composite of Level 5 – the highest level of growth.
Notably, 11 districts also earned a Level 5 in each subject-area TVAAS composite (literacy, numeracy,
science, and social studies). Those are:
 • Bartlett City Schools
• Greene County Schools
• Greeneville City Schools
• Hamblen County Schools
• Jefferson County Schools
• Johnson City Schools
• Loudon County School District
• Maryville City Schools
• Oneida Special School District
• Roane County School District
• Sequatchie County Schools

There were 65 schools across 36 districts that also earned a Level 5 TVAAS score across all subject
areas. About 575 schools had an overall TVAAS composite of 5 and with more than 1,000 schools
earned a Level 3, 4, or 5 score – meaning students met or exceeded growth expectations. .

A full spreadsheet with school-level TNReady results is available here. These will be posted in a visual,
user-friendly format on the department’s website this fall. The TVAAS scores for 2018 for districts and
schools are available here.

For more information about TNReady, visit the department’s website at TNReady.gov, where you can
also view the state and district-level results that were released earlier this summer. For media
inquiries, please contact Sara Gast, director of communications, at 615-532-6260 or Sara.Gast@tn.gov.