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NWEA Launches New National Dashboard to Track Student Achievement and Growth

In a major development for educators and policymakers, NWEA, a renowned K-12 assessment and research organization, unveiled a groundbreaking national dashboard designed to monitor and interpret student achievement and growth across the United States. This innovative tool is set to provide timely and impactful data, particularly useful for tracking how students fare in reading and math from kindergarten through eighth grade. The nationwide dashboard is being made available free of charge, fostering transparency and accessibility within the education sector.

Key Features of the Dashboard

The dashboard's primary function is to showcase how K-8 students are performing on the NWEA MAP Growth assessment. This means leaders in districts, educators, and policymakers can quickly evaluate local student performance against national averages. The information presented in the dashboard will be refreshed three times annually, immediately following testing sessions that occur in the fall, winter, and spring semesters, ensuring that stakeholders have access to the most current data.

Drawing from the achievements of over 7 million students across 20,000 schools, which represents approximately 25% of public K-8 institutions in the U.S., this dashboard creates a robust and representative snapshot of educational trends nationwide. Users can explore diverse sections that highlight various aspects of student achievement, enabling them to filter insights by specific grades, groups of students, or even individual states. Additionally, a section documenting trends over time allows for evaluations of progress since the pandemic, with benchmarks set against 2019 data to facilitate the ongoing analysis of academic recovery.

Importance of Reliable Data

Dr. Karyn Lewis, NWEA’s Vice President of Research and Policy Partnerships, emphasized the necessity of reliable, timely student data for driving strategic actions in education. Reflecting on the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, she stated, “Academic recovery has been slower and more uneven than expected, and research funding is increasingly constrained. Schools need evidence-based insights to make decisions through this complex landscape.” The dashboard is intentionally built to support educational partners as they navigate these challenges, providing updated national trends three times yearly.

An Evolution in Educational Data Access

This national dashboard is a culmination of NWEA's extensive history in delivering reliable data for educational metrics. More than two decades ago, NWEA pioneered the Growth Research Database, an initiative that offered access to precious academic growth data for education researchers and scholars. This database has supported pivotal research initiatives, continuously informing education policy and practices.

Trend Snapshots Report

Alongside the dashboard, NWEA researchers are set to release a Trend Snapshots report with each seasonal update. This report will highlight critical observations within the data, providing nuanced insights regarding what the latest data reveals about student performance. The inaugural report released alongside the dashboard offers a comprehensive overview of achievement and growth trends for the academic year of 2024-25.

Insights from the Report

The latest findings indicate a modest yet incremental recovery in math achievement, especially among historically underserved demographics. Notably, there are signs suggesting that achievement gaps are narrowing since the spring of 2021, with the most significant progress observable in elementary grades. Conversely, reading achievement exhibits stagnation, showing little movement towards pre-pandemic achievement levels—patterns that seem consistent across varying racial, ethnic, and socio-economic backgrounds. In certain grades, deficiencies in reading are reported to be equal to or more severe than those in math.

Dr. Megan Kuhfeld, Director of Growth Modeling and Data Analytics at NWEA, acknowledged the disruptions faced over the past five years, underscoring the importance of understanding local needs through national trends in academic recovery. “Given the unevenness of recovery, even within schools and classrooms, national trends like these are an important first step to understanding where to dig deeper at the local level and ask critical questions about the necessary support and resources that are specific to the individual needs of each student,” she remarked.

The release of the Trend Snapshots report and dashboard marks a significant step toward empowering educational leaders with actionable insights, furthering the commitment of NWEA to championing reliable data in the education sector. For those eager to delve deeper into the findings, the Trend Snapshots report can be accessed here and the MAP Growth National Dashboard is available here.

NWEA remains steadfast in its mission to support students and educators across 146 countries through comprehensive research, innovative assessment solutions, and professional development programs tailored to meet the diverse needs of educational communities. To learn more about NWEA's efforts, please visit NWEA.org.