What is Data Sgp?
Data sgp is an approach to geochemical data that seeks to be more flexible than large community databases (Genbank, EarthChem) and to better integrate data with the scientific literature. While the end goal is to migrate to full community databases, the initial objective is for researchers to collaborate on exciting research questions in their area of expertise, generating significant data and metadata that would not have been available otherwise. The collaborative nature of the Working Groups, and the opportunity to access these new data in a permanent database, provides an obvious incentive to contribute data and metadata.
Data Sgp uses R – an open-source programming language that is free to download and use for Windows, Mac OSX and Linux. R provides a rich set of tools for statistical analysis and is the most powerful programming environment for data sgp. Users will need to familiarize themselves with the basic tools of R before running any SGP analyses. A variety of resources are available on the CRAN website to help beginners get started.
A Student Growth Percentile (SGP) is a measure of a student’s relative performance on a subject-matter test as compared to students with similar MCAS score histories. A SGP score above 50 indicates that a student has made more growth than half of their academic peers on the most recent subject-matter test.
When used to compare the performance of students over time, SGP scores can help educators identify students who are not on track for reaching achievement targets or goals. They can also help identify accelerated programs that are making progress but still need more support to ensure all students are growing adequately.
At the state level, median SGP scores are usually 50 – meaning that half of the students show growth above or below this value. However, it is possible for two students to have very different SGP scores, especially if the norms are established using only the most recent test scores.
To run any SGP analyses, you will need to have a copy of the data sgp files. These files contain the data you will be analyzing and a list of variables to match against. Once you have these files, you can start the SGP analysis. If you have any problems, it is best to contact the SGP support team before posting an issue. Almost all errors in SGP analyses can be traced back to issues with the data preparation so it is crucial that these files are formatted properly. Once the data are prepared properly, SGP analyses are generally straightforward and any errors that occur will be reflected in the output of the analysis. Unless indicated otherwise, all SGP analyses will be done using the lower level functions studentGrowthPercentiles and studentGrowthProjections. These functions require WIDE formatted data while the higher level functions (wrappers for these lower level functions) will run on LONG formatted data.