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Minnesota can now take into account individual student gains on statewide exams when it determines whether a school is making adequate yearly progress.

The U.S. Department of Education announced Thursday that the state could join 14 others in using such a system. Dubbed a "growth model," the system tracks individual student achievement from one year to the next, giving schools credit for improvement over time.

Chas Anderson, Minnesota's deputy education commissioner, said that in the next few years use of the model will have a negligible effect on how many schools fail to make adequate yearly progress. Last school year, 933 of 1,947 schools were placed on a state watch list.

But, Anderson said, the growth model will "provide another tool to help measure student progress."

As mandated by the No Child Left Behind Act, which calls for all U.S. students to be proficient in reading and math by 2014, states must annually compile a watch list of schools that fail to meet academic benchmarks.

Schools can make the watch list for many reasons, including attendance, graduation rates and test scores — by all students in a grade or by a subgroup. In Minnesota, reading and math tests are given every year to third- through eighth-graders and 10th- and 11th-graders.

Many educators have argued that growth models allow for an apples-to-apples comparison of student performance because they track students' progress as they move from one grade to the next. Traditional models, on the other hand, compare the scores of this year's fifth-graders with last year's class.

Growth models also recognize gains made by poor and minority students, who often start out behind their peers.

Michelle Walker, chief accountability officer for St. Paul Public Schools, said student demographics should be factored in when determining school performance.

She said St. Paul has been using growth measures for three years.

"It helps us get at how we're moving individual student groups," she said. "It just adds one more piece of information to tell teachers where the students need to be."

Minnesota released its own growth model last month to give parents, community members and educators more information about whether children are gaining, maintaining or losing skills. The results are included on the state's report card given to school districts and individual schools.

The federal growth model is separate from the one used by the state.

Megan Boldt can be reached at 651-228-5495.

http://www.twincities.com/education/ci_11410669