The Washington Achievement Award is based on the Washington Achievement Index. The award celebrates schools for overall excellence and special recognition in: Language Arts, Math, Science, extended graduation rate, closing achievement gaps and high progress.
Washington’s School Achievement Index rates all schools according to specific outcomes and indicators from 2010 to 2012. The five outcomes are student performance in statewide assessments in reading, writing, math and science tests, as well as the school’s extended graduation rate, which includes those students who took longer than four years to graduate.
Those outcomes are each measured using four indicators:
- achievement of students who are not from low-income families;
- achievement of students who are from low-income families;
- achievement of a school when compared to “peers” (schools with similar student characteristics, such as the percentage of students who have a disability, are learning English, are designated as gifted, come from low-income families, and are mobile); and
- improvement in the achievement of all students combined from the previous year.
The average of the resulting 20 measures comprises the overall index.