Identifying and definitional attributes | |
Metadata item type: | Data Quality Statement |
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METEOR identifier: | 396282 |
Registration status: | Community Services (retired), Superseded 04/04/2011 |
Data quality | |
Institutional environment: | Test administration authorities for the states and territories collect data and their data management teams provide data for analysis. As project manager on behalf of Australian Education Systems Officials Committee (AESOC) for National Assessment Program–Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN) 2008 and 2009, Curriculum Corporation (CC) supplies data to the central analysis (national data) contractor (ACER). ACER undertakes analysis of national data and is advised through a process of consultation with the AESOC-appointed Expert Advisory Group (EAG). The process is endorsed by the EAG. All analysis is undertaken with a parallel independent process as a quality assurance measure. Test administration authorities for the states and territories audit the content of the final report. CC is a company limited by guarantee of which the members are the Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers of Education. The Board comprises appointees of each the Ministers, a nominee of the National Catholic Education Commission, a nominee the National Council of Independent Schools’ Association, two representatives of MCEETYA (the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs), one representative of teachers and one representative of parents. CC’s authority to collect the data is found by reference to: |
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Timeliness: | The NAPLAN tests are conducted every year in early May. The 2008 test dates were 13th, 14th and 15th May. The Summary National Report was released in September 2008. The National Report: Achievement in Reading, Writing, Language Conventions and Numeracy 2008 was released by Education Ministers on 19 December 2008. |
Accessibility: | The National Report: Achievement in Reading, Writing, Language Conventions and Numeracy 2008, released by Education Ministers on 19 December 2008, is publicly available on the MCEETYA website. The NAPLAN website makes explicit reference to this document and provides a link with the website. Raw data collected by jurisdictions is held as work-in-progress by the Contractor for the purposes of conducting the analysis and generating the National Report. Its purpose is to inform national reporting and is not available for other purposes. |
Interpretability: | Commentary and notes are provided in the National Report to assist with the interpretation of the statistical data. The 2009 Data Standards Manual (MCEEDYA) provides information to assist schools and school systems to collect student background information from parents as agreed by Education Ministers. |
Relevance: | The aim of NAPLAN is to test all schools and all students in Australia in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9. Under the National Education Agreement, all schools are required to participate in NAPLAN testing. Students are classified in three ways: assessed, exempt, absent/withdrawn. Participation rates are calculated on the basis of all assessed and exempt students as a percentage of the total number of students reported by schools, which includes those absent and withdrawn. Exempt students are defined as follows: Students with a language background other than English, who arrived from overseas less than a year before the tests, and students with significant intellectual disabilities may be exempted from testing. Exempt students are not assessed and are deemed not to have met the national minimum standard. Data on assessed students is collected from test booklets. Data on exempt and absent/withdrawn students is collected from schools. |
Accuracy: | Student achievements for literacy and numeracy are reported on five national achievement scales. The scales consist of 10 bands to cover the full range of student achievement across Year 3 to Year 9. School participation data is not collected. The National Report includes only student participation rate. Participation rates for Indigenous students are reported for each of the five domains, each year level and each state and territory. Participation rates differ across each of these categories. Participation rates for non-Indigenous are not published as a separate category but could be calculated using the student participation for all students and student participation for Indigenous students. Achievement rates as reported by band levels are provided for both Indigenous and non-Indigenous students by domain, year level and state and territory. 95 per cent confidence intervals are reported for the average (mean) scale scores, percentage of students in each band and percentage of students at or above the national minimum standard. In the majority of tables, percentages are expressed to one decimal place. In a small number of cases, percentages are rounded to the nearest whole number. The percentages of students represented in all tables are rounded and may not sum to 100. The results for the National Report are calculated based on five sets of plausible values drawn based on students’ responses and conditioning on background variables. No weightings were applied. Missing data for parental education and parental occupation Due to the high ‘not stated’ rate of parental education and occupation in some school sectors in States and Territories, this information is reported at the national level only. Proportion of all students with parental education ‘not stated’: Year 3, 45 per cent; Year 5, 47 per cent; Year 7, 40 per cent; Year 9, 44 per cent. Proportion of all students with parental occupation ‘not stated’: Year 3, 47 per cent; Year 5, 49 per cent; Year 7, 42 per cent; Year 9, 46 per cent. Parental occupation/parental education may not have been stated on enrolment forms or may have been labelled optional. Non-response for ATSI status The non-response for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) status is approximately 3 per cent nationally.This data is captured from student test book covers. 3 per cent of students did not state their ATSI status on the test bookcover. |
Coherence: | The same tests are used for all schools and all students. Average age and years of schooling for all students are reported as at the time of testing. These differ between states and territories. Data for Indigenous status is collected from student test book covers. Data for SES (parent occupation/parent education) is collected by schools on student enrolment. Data is reported for Indigenous students for each domain, year level, and state and territory. Further data is provided by geolocation. |
Relational attributes | |
Indicators linked to this Data Quality statement: |