Rate of Improvement (ROI) and Goal Setting
To get an estimate of an individual student’s rate of improvement you need at least three data points to calculate “slope” of “change over time”, which is the basic formula for “rate of improvement”.
The three data points can be a fall benchmark and then two progress monitoring measures or three progress monitoring measures — all of the same measure type — (ideally administered far enough apart so that the student might be expected to show some improvement (a minimum of 2 weeks for the basic literacy measures such as LN, LS, SEG, WRF, PRF and a minimum of 3 weeks for the more challenging constructs such as math, vocabulary, and reading comprehension).
Once a student has taken three different tests of the same test type and grade level, the system will automatically calculate that individual student’s rate of improvement (increase in score per day), which you can access by downloading a .CSV of the report. To export assessment data for specific groups of students, go to the Reports tab and select the Groups tab then click on the Export CSV link for the desired group. The link will download the data into a comma-separated values (.csv) file, which can be opened in Excel or other spreadsheet programs.
If, however, you simply want a more general reference of what score might be “expected” on a particular measure at a particular time point in the year, please refer to the Detailed Percentile Lookup Table, located under the Reports tab, where you can find the raw score associated with the different percentile ranks. If your goal is to get the student to “grade level proficiency”, then you would select the raw score that is closest to the 50th percentile (the 50th percentile represents the mathematical “average” for students from that grade level, on that measure, at the time of year you’ve selected (fall, winter, spring). You can then use that “hoped for score” to calculate the ROI for your student.
Take hoped for score and subtract the student’s fall benchmark score from that number. This will give you the number of points a student needs to improve on that measure in order to meet the grade-level expectations by the winter or spring (depending on which time point you selected).
Then, estimate the number of days in between the day the student took the first test and the winter or spring benchmark date (again, depending on which time point you selected).
Divide the total number of points needed to reach grade-level proficiency by the number of days in between first and estimated last test, and that will give you the required rate of improvement for the student to reach the grade-level proficiency goal by the time you’ve selected.
The Rate of Improvement (ROI) score can be found in the downloadable .csv files that are available once you’ve begun testing students.
To export data, login to your account and go to the “Reports” section. Next choose the “Groups” tab. To the right of each group name is a link to do a "Data Export" by exporting a .csv file. Choose the group whose data you want to export and an Excel file in the .csv format will be downloaded to your desktop. A .csv format means a document has no formatting associated with it.
The ROI used for easyCBM is calculated based on the formula mandated by the state of TN (where teachers must provide ROI information for every student being progress monitored / provided Tier 3 instruction). It is not a linear regression method.
The formula is fairly simple. We subtract the students’ most recent prior score from their current score and then divide by the number of days in between the two scores. As a student takes additional assessments, the ROI is updated to reflect, always, the change over time (‘rate’) from one score / assessment to the next.
The Rate of Improvement is a simple computation based on change in score / # of days between testing sessions. When developing instructional goals, however, we encourage you to refer to the national norms, and to set goals based on having students meet or exceed the 50th percentile on those on-grade norms for the various measures. The raw score associated with the 50th percentile varies by measure and season, so using the percentile lines displayed on the Individual Reports can provide a nice referent as well (you can set the ‘target’ goals for these lines through your Account —> Systems Settings page.
For more detailed information please refer to: Chapter 20, View Reports and Use Data to Make Decisions, in the easyCBM User's Manual