Newsletter 26 - Checking Your 9GR Values

Transcription

1 Newsletter 26 - Checking Your 9GR Values Date: April 2, 2009 The most important piece of SASI/PowerSchool information in the calculation of high school graduation rates and LHSAP rates is 9GR. The 9GR field is particularly important because graduation rate and LHSAP rate cover more than one school year. The purpose of this is to help you identify and correct 9GR values so that you will have less documentation to do later. Background Information The following information will provide a context for your identifying and correcting the 9GR values in your SASI databases for the , , , and school years: 1. The 9GR value identifies the school year in which a student enters the 9th grade for the first time. 2. The 9GR value is a fixed fact; it cannot be changed after the student enters the 9th grade for the first time. 3. The 9GR value determines when a student is expected to take HSAP for the first time, which has an impact on his or her inclusion in your school's LHSAP calculation. 4. The 9GR value determines the student's on-time graduation date, which has an impact on her or his inclusion in your school's graduation rate calculation when that student is expected to graduate. 5. The 9GR value for a student must be the same in all years' SASI databases after the student enters the 9th grade for the first time. 6. After the 9GR values are correct for all years' SASI databases, you will be able to identify every student who should be in your graduation rate and LHSAP calculations. 7. In a few weeks, we will send you a set of SASI queries so you can identify your LHSAP and graduation rate students. Those queries will *not* work if your 9GR values are wrong. 8. Until then, the SASI query in the following section will help you look at your 9GR values so you can be sure all your 9GR values are correct. 9. The query given below will export student information that you can import into Excel for analysis. 10. The following sections will show you how to export the data from SASI, how to import the data into Excel, and how to look at the data to check 9GR values.

2 Query for Exporting Your 9GR Values from SASI Without correct 9GR values, you will not be able to use the SASI queries that we will send in a couple of weeks to get accurate lists of students to be included in your graduation rate and LHSAP rate calculations. The following SASI query and procedures will help you look at all your 9GR values so you can determine if there are corrections to be made: 1. Run the following query in your , , , and SASI databases (be sure to check the box to show inactive records): a. EXPORT ASTU USCF PermNum StateID LastName FirstName MiddleName Grade NineGR Birthdate 1,Status EnterCode EnterDate LeaveCode LeaveDate DropReason DropDate NSReason CredAtmpt CredEarned SORT NineGR Grade LastName FirstName 2. You can highlight the above query, starting with ASTU, and click Edit/Copy in your window. Then log into SASI, open the query atom, and hold down CTRL and press the V-key to paste the query into the query build box. Or you can just type the query in the query build box. Be sure to check the box to show inactive records. 3. Choose Export in the upper left corner of the query window, which will turn on the Export button at the bottom right of the query window. 4. Click the Export button. 5. In the next window, be sure that Output Format is Variable Length, Field Delimiter is Tab, and Record Delimiter is CR/LF (Windows). Those should be the default values. Then click OK. 6. Navigate to your desktop (or a folder of your choice) and name the file NineGR-200x.txt, where the "x" is the number for the school year -- NineGR-2006.txt, NineGR-2007.txt, NineGR-2008.txt, and NineGR-2009.txt would be the exported files from each of your SASI databases. 7. After naming your file, click the Save button. When you get the message that your file has been exported successfully, click OK. 8. Be sure to run the above query in all four years of your SASI databases. Also, be sure to check the box to include inactive records. 9. The above query will create a file for each school year that can be imported into Excel. Importing the 9GR Data into Excel After exporting the four files from your SASI databases, use the following steps to import the data into Excel: 1. Open Microsoft Excel to an empty worksheet. 2. Click File/Open.

3 3. At the bottom of the Open window, in the "Files of Type" line, choose "Text Files." 4. Navigate to your desktop or to a folder in which you saved your exported files. 5. Double-click the name of the file you want to open. 6. The Text Import Wizard window will open. 7. Click "Delimited" and the Next button. 8. Click "Tab" and Next. 9. Highlight each column in the Data Preview section (by clicking the title of each column) and choose Text in the Column Data Format section. Every column should be Text when you're done. 10. Click the Finish button. 11. The data are shown in the Excel worksheet. 12. Click File/Save As. 13. At the bottom of the Save window, in the "Save as Type" line, choose "Microsoft Office Excel Workbook (*.xls)." You may have to scroll up to find that option. 14. Navigate to your desktop or folder, as needed. 15. Click the Save button. 16. Your file will be saved as NineGR-200x.xls, where "x" is the year. 17. Close the file. 18. Repeat steps 2 through 17 for each of the exported files. Analyzing the 9GR Data in Excel After creating your Excel files, you can open each file and look for patterns in the data. Use the following steps to look at your data: 1. Open the Excel file named NineGR-2009.xls. 2. Because the exported file did not have column headings in it, you'll want to put in those column headings now so you'll know what each column means. To do that, follow these steps:

4 a. Move the mouse pointer to the left side of row 1 in the worksheet; you'll see the pointer turn into a little black arrow that points to the right. When you see that arrow, click once to highlight the entire first row. b. With that row highlighted, click Insert/Rows from the Excel menu bar. c. Starting in column A, type in the following column headings: PermNum, StateID, LastName, FirstName, MiddleName, Grade, NineGR, Birthdate, Status, EnterCode, EnterDate, LeaveCode, LeaveDate, DropReason, DropDate, NSReason, CredAtmpt, and CredEarned, ending with column R. 3. The file is sorted by NineGR, Grade, LastName, FirstName, and MiddleName. 4. This sort order lets you see each 9GR value and the grade level associated with it. 5. You can see which grade levels don't seem to match the given 9GR value; these are the records to pay attention to first. 6. Because NineGR-2009.txt contains the seniors you want to check for correct 9GR values, you will want to check all students with Grade=12 to see if their 9GR makes sense -- and that it represents the FACT of their first-time entry into the 9th grade. Check each carefully. 7. You can use the BirthDate, EnterDate, LeaveDate, DropReason, DropDate, NSREason (no-show reason), CredAtmpt, and CredEarned information to help you determine the correct 9GR value; however, please remember that 9GR is a fixed fact and you cannot guess at it -- it must represent the actual year in which the student first entered the 9th grade. 8. Then check all your 11th graders to be sure that the 9GR value is the FACT for each. 9. Then check each 10th grader; then each 9th grader. 10. If you find incorrect 9GR values, be sure those are corrected before the 1st-day-of-testing for HSAP. 11. Repeat steps 2 through 8 for each of your Excel worksheets. 12. Note that we will not be extracting the 9GR values from previous years' data (we already have those data for cross-checking with the current year's data); however, the correct values for all four years will help you identify students who should be in your graduation rate and LHSAP rate calculations when we send you additional queries in a few weeks. If your 9GR values are not correct, those queries will not help you. 13. And, if you've forgotten, the most important piece of SASI data with regard to your graduation rate and LHSAP rate calculations is the 9GR value.

5 Conclusion You can use the Excel files to look at all your students to determine where the 9GR value might be wrong. You can sort the worksheets by any column you like in order to see other patterns in the data. Be creative in your review of the 9GR data -- but do not be creative in assigning the 9GR value. That value is a fact -- and it cannot be assigned just because someone thinks it should be this or that value. It must be correct. If you change a student's 9GR value and our cross-check with previous years' data shows that the value has been changed, you will be asked to submit the appropriate documentation for that change. That documentation must clearly show that the student's original 9GR value is incorrect. After correcting all your 9GR values this year, you should systematically include 9GR as data you collect for every student who enrolls in your school from today forward. In that way, you don't have to do this process of checking your 9GR values again.