Fact Sheet 26-3: ESSA Local Leaders' Guide to Accountability Measures and Requirements

Updates & Replaces Fact Sheet 19-1

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Overview

The state accountability system is governed by the federal Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA).1 The New York State Education Department (SED) is required to craft an accountability plan which is then subject to approval by the United States Department of Education to implement ESSA in New York State. This guide is designed to help local leaders understand why their schools have been identified for improvement, what steps the district is required to take, and the first steps recommended for local leaders.

How Districts Are Notified

The SED has released updated school accountability determinations under the current ESSA plan. These updates include changes to both the identification process and the terminology used for school designations.

School Designations
Schools are identified in two categories:

• Comprehensive Support and Improvement (CSI): Includes the lowest-performing 5% of schools statewide and high schools with graduation rates below 67%. These schools are identified every three years.
• Targeted Support and Improvement (TSI): Includes schools with consistently underperforming student subgroups. These schools are identified annually.

Performance Levels
The state accountability system assigns each performance indicator a level from one to four. Level 1 represents the lowest performance (bottom 10% statewide), while Level 4 represents the highest.

District Reporting
SED provides districts with an “Accountability Status Data” file. This report includes performance levels for each accountability indicator, disaggregated by student subgroup, for every school in the district.

Download complete fact sheet for:

• Scenario Tables
  
  
• Understanding the Data
  
  
• Converting Raw Scores to Levels
  
  
• Measures of Interim Progress (MIPs) and Long-Term Goals (LTGs)
  
  
• Interventions for CSI and TSI Schools
  
  
• Diagnostic Tool for School and District Effectiveness (DTSDE) Rubric
  
  
• ESSA and Receivership
  
  

Advice to Local Leaders

Because the accountability system relies on relative performance scales and a small “n” size of 20, outcomes may be unpredictable. Schools that expect to be in good standing could be designated as CSI, while other schools may exit the CSI or TSI lists as new schools are added. Additionally, the TSI list is expected to grow over time, since there is no limit on the number of schools that can be identified and designations occur annually. NYSUT recommends that local leaders take the following steps:

• Review the data and know which indicators led to the school being identified.
• Prepare members for the DTSDE review and survey. Local leaders should be involved in decisions regarding who will participate in the focus groups.
• Continuation (formerly intervention) plans must be developed collaboratively. Recruit members to serve that have expertise in the areas identified for improvement.
• Review the professional development plan for alignment to the continuation plan.
• Review the quarterly reports to know where you are making progress.

Additional Resources

• NYSUT ESSA Fact Sheet
• Accountability Resources and Fact Sheets: https://www.nysed.gov/accountability/school-and-district-accountability-resources-and-data
• SED DTSDE Tool and information: https://www.nysed.gov/accountability/dtsde
• SED ESSA webpage: http://www.nysed.gov/essa
• SED Receivership webpage: http://www.p12.nysed.gov/oisr/

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 April 2026
CP/SR/AR/cl