Actual Grade Vs. Grade Equivalent

Grade equivalence compares students

Following standardized testing, schools give parents score reports indicating their children's actual grades (AGs) and grade equivalents (GEs). The actual grade score tells where a student is in her education career. The grade equivalent score is more complicated, because it involves comparing the student with other students.

Actual Grade

Actual grades indicate how long students have been in school. A student who is tested after completed the first 9 months of 4th grade would have an actual grade of 4.9. If a student has skipped a grade, the AG is the grade in which the student is enrolled. If a student is home-schooled, the AG is the grade in which the student would be placed in the local public school district. For example, if a district places all students who will be 8 on or before September 1 in grade 3, an 8-year-old home-schooled child would have an AG of 3. If public school is three months into the term, the AG would be 3.3, regardless of how the home schooling is progressing.

Grade Equivalent

If a student with an actual grade of 4.9 has a grade equivalent of 7.2, parents might think that the student is ready to work at the 7th grade level. That is not what the score indicates. A GE score outside the student's AG indicates that the student's score has been compared to students in other grades. A GE of 7.2 in this case indicates that the 4th grader and a 7th grader would be doing equally well on the 4th-grade test. A 4th grader with a 7.2 would be demonstrating an advanced understanding of 4th-grade material, but the score does not indicate how that 4th grader would perform with 7th-grade material.

How Actual Grades Relate to Grade Equivalents

If a child in 4th grade has an AG of 4.9, parents might expect the grade equivalent to also be 4.9. However, grade equivalents are score comparisons between students. Students are compared to other children with the same actual grades. If a student with a 4.9 AG has a 4.9 GE, that student is performing at an average level compared to other students who are nine months into 4th grade. The comparison score is determined by the test manufacturer, and involves measuring a wide range of students of varying abilities.

Actual Grade and Grade Equivalent Uses

If a grade equivalent score is higher than a student's actual grade, the student is capable of advanced work. This indicates that the student is capable of working beyond the actual grade level. If a student has a GE that is lower than the AG, the student may benefit from remedial work. It does not mean that a student belongs in a lower grade. Many students in a classroom may have tested in a similar GE range, and the teacher will adjust class assignments accordingly.

Using Scores to Measure Progress

Students will obviously increase their actual grades at a steady pace. When a student moves into 5th grade, his actual grade is 5.0. The grade equivalent score is of more interest to parents because it can indicate if a student is behind other students, on pace with other students or advanced beyond other students. Since a GE score can vary between tests, parents should not get too attached to a particular number. A student who has advanced GE scores should continue to have advanced GE scores in that subject area, until the tests measure content that the student has not learned. If a student has advanced or average GE scores and starts to have scores indicating a lower grade equivalent, parents should be concerned.

Potential Problems with Score Reports

The Center for Applied Linguistics points out that there are some caveats that parents should be aware of with score reports. The Evaluator's Toolkit notes that test scores "become very unreliable as they get further from the student's actual grade level. For example, if a fifth-grade student gets a reading score of 9.3, that student reads very well, but he or she cannot necessarily effectively read the same material that a ninth-grade student can. For one thing, the fifth-grader probably does not have the experiences associated with ninth-grade material." If a student's grade equivalent is significantly different from her actual grade, parents should consider that the scores are giving a rough range.

References

• Center for Applied Linguistics: Evaluator's Toolkit