GGUSD Receives High Rankings on State’s New School Accountability Website

California School Dashboard

Last week, the California Department of Education promoted the first official results of the state’s new school performance and accountability website, the California School Dashboard.  Garden Grove Unified School District received high rankings in many categories including academic growth, graduation rates, student attendance, and more.     

The California School Dashboard was designed to provide parents with an easy-to-read tool with information about schools across the state.  The dashboard displays five color-coded performance levels with GGUSD ranking green, the second highest rating, for graduation rates, English Learner progress, English Language Arts, and Mathematics test scores for third through eighth grades.  The dashboard shows GGUSD’s chronic absenteeism at 7.4%, lower than the Orange County rate of 8.3% and California rate of 10.8%.

“While the official results shows our schools earned high rankings in many of the state’s accountability metrics, we remain focused on future growth to ensure our students are receiving the best education possible,” said Bob Harden, Board of Education president.  

The California Dashboard replaces the more narrowly-defined Academic Performance Index (API) by providing multiple measures of school success. It also allows the public to compare schools and districts.

The Dashboard was launched as a communication tool aligned to California’s new school accountability system based on 2013’s Local Control Funding Formula.  It was first publicized as a field test last year. 

“Our district is pleased that state education leaders are looking at more than just test scores to measure school success and we plan to use the data to make informed decisions around instructional strategies so that we can provide targeted support to all students,” said Harden.