VARC Hosts SAGE Winter Summit
JANUARY 2014
VARC hosted a winter summit for partners in Wisconsin’s Student Achievement Guarantee in Education (SAGE) program, a multi-method longitudinal evaluation exploring the implementation and outcomes of a statewide class reduction program.
SAGE was established in 1996 with the goal of improving student achievement in participating schools through the limitation of class sizes from kindergarten through third grade and other school-improvement strategies. VARC has worked on evaluating the program for the past eight years. Its work is currently headed by project lead Grant Sim.
The SAGE Winter Summit, which took place on Friday, January 10, gave VARC the opportunity to update representatives from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction on its ongoing evaluation of the project. During their presentation, VARC staff explained its preliminary results, which used Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) data for students in grades kindergarten through third in SAGE and non-SAGE districts.
The next summit, to be held at the end of spring, will provide DPI with results from this year's analysis on the effectiveness of SAGE around the state.