ELA Growth and Math Growth Indicators FAQs

The Growth Indicators are a way of measuring how students' academic scores change between the current year assessment scores and the scores in the previous year. The indicators display the average growth in the current year.

Average growth scores can provide a picture of growth for students within a LEA, school, or student group. California’s student growth model was developed specifically to be used for accountability purposes only, and not at the individual student level, and therefore is focused on producing reliable and valid average growth scores.

Growth results are limited to students who were administered the Smarter Balanced ELA and Math assessments in grades 4 through 8. Students in grades 3 and 11 will not have growth scores because there are no prior year test scores available to calculate growth. This means that K-3 schools, high schools that only serve grades 9-12 and high school districts that only serve grades 9-12 will not see the ELA Growth Indicator or the Math Growth Indicator on their Dashboard.

Average growth scores for LEAs, schools, and student groups are calculated using scale scores from the Smarter Balanced Summative Assessments in ELA and math from the current year and two prior years. Scores from the CAAs and local assessments are not used in the growth score calculation.

Individual growth scores are calculated using scale scores from the Smarter Balanced Summative Assessments in ELA and math from the current year and prior year. Scores from the CAAs and local assessments are not used in the growth score calculation.

First, the expected growth score needs to be calculated. To do this, all students who completed the assessment in the current year are grouped together by grade level, with their current year scores on one single assessment along with their previous assessment scores in both ELA and math. For example, all students in Grade 4 who took the ELA assessment in 2025–26 would have their current year scores along with their 2024–25 Grade 3 ELA assessment and 2024–25 Grade 3 math assessment scores. All that information is used to calculate the expected score of those students in grade 4 in 2025–26. We then compare their actual score on the 2025–26 Grade 4 ELA assessment to the expected score calculated using the growth model.

Individual student growth scores are calculated using two years of assessment data. For the 2026 Dashboard, assessment data from 2024–25 and 2025–26.

Average growth scores, however, are calculated using either one year or two years of student growth scores. A simple average growth score, using only one year of student growth (for the 2026 Dashboard, two years assessment results from 2024–25 and 2025–26), is valid and reliable when it’s based on many student scores. Therefore, a simple average is used to calculate average growth scores for student groups with more than 500 students in an LEA. However, low year-to-year stability was found when using just one year of growth at other aggregation levels. To increase the accuracy of these average growth scores, California uses a weighted average of two years of student growth scores (i.e. growth from 2023–24 to 2024–25, and from 2024-25 to 2025–26) at the LEA, school, and school student group levels.

No. When growth scores are calculated, the groups of students are not separated by any demographic factors (that is, all grade 4 students are grouped together in the calculation). This allows us to see differences in growth between demographic groups once all final scores are calculated.

ELA Growth and Math Growth will be displayed as full state indicators beginning with the 2026 Dashboard. The State Board of Education (SBE) will continue conversations about how growth data may be incorporated into Differentiated Assistance determinations prior to the next cycle in 2029. The SBE will also evaluate the inclusion of ELA Growth Indicator and Math Growth Indicator into the ESSA support eligibility criteria for consideration following the 2026 identification cycle.

Yes, The DSEA rule is applied when calculating growth for Students with Disabilities who receive special education services at another district or county office of education. These students will be “sent back” to the district of residence, or DSEA, and included in the DSEA’s Dashboard. This rule applies to LEAs only. All schools, including charter schools, are held accountable for all Students with Disabilities. See the District of Residence Rule flyer on the Dashboard Communications Toolkit web page for additional information.

Growth scores for LEAs are calculated using a student’s current year score at the LEA where they tested and calculating an expected score and growth score from their previous year test. The school that a students attended previously is inconsequential to the calculation, as the growth being measured occurred at the school where the student tested in the current year.

Growth performance categories are included in Charter performance category determinations for Criterion 1.

Individual student growth scores are only computed as one step of the methodology for creating average growth scores at the LEA, school, and student group levels. Therefore, they are not published or shared by CDE with LEAs, parents, or students.

Yes, the ELA Growth and Math Growth Indicators will have an associated Technical Guide following the release of the 2026 Dashboard. Technical Guides for all indicators can be found on the Dashboard Technical Guide web page.