BeatsExpectations
Demographically-adjusted score · methodologyTier
UNDERPERFORMING
Bottom 10% of NJ schools after controlling for student poverty
Actual proficiency
40.8%
composite math + reading, all grades
Predicted
61.2%
based on NJ schools with similar FRL share
Beats by
-20.4pp
below demographic expectation
What this means: About 41% of students here test proficient in math and reading, below the roughly 61% typical for New Jersey schools with a similar share of low-income students. BeatsExpectations compares each school with others at the same poverty level, not by raw scores, so a school lands here when its results trail those comparable schools, which is not the same as having low scores. A higher-scoring school can still fall in this tier if similar schools score higher still.
BeatsExpectations runs a per-state regression of proficiency on free/reduced-lunch share, then scores each school by residual.
How this is calculated →What is NJSLA?
NJSLA is the statewide standardized test administered by New Jersey public schools.
What does "% Meeting or Exceeding Expectations" mean?
It is the share of students at the school who performed at grade level or above on the test, summed across the top two of four performance levels. A higher number is better.
What does 35.9% mean for English Language Arts at Newell Elementary School?
It means about 35.9 percent of students tested at Newell Elementary School performed at grade level or above on the NJSLA English Language Arts test in 2024-25. The statewide average for New Jersey that year was 53.1%. The other students fell into the lower performance levels.
How is the state average calculated?
It is a weighted average, not a simple average of each school's number. We multiply each public school's score by how many of its students tested, add those together for all schools in New Jersey, and divide by the total students tested that year. This way a big school with 1,500 students counts more than a small school with 50 students, which is the right way to ask "how did the typical student do this year?". District and county averages on this page use the same method, just scoped to that district or county.
Where does this data come from?
New Jersey Department of Education, New Jersey Student Learning Assessments (NJSLA). Per-grade per-subject Spring administration: ELA grades 3-9, Math grades 3-8 + Algebra I/II + Geometry, Science grades 5/8/11. School-level All Students subgroup from the NJDOE Statewide Assessment Reports. Headline metric is the cumulative 'Meeting or Exceeding Expectations' rate (top 2 of 5 ELA/Math levels; top 2 of 4 Science levels).
How often is it updated?
NJSLA is administered once a year (spring). Results are released by the state in the summer or early fall. We refresh this page after each annual release.
