{"schemaVersion":"121-methodology-document-v1","productKey":"121-school-index","version":"v2","title":"121 School Index methodology — v2","summary":"School-level indicators built from published education data. The product does not assign an area-level school grade.","sections":[{"heading":"Definition and components","paragraphs":["The 121 School Index summarizes individual-school evidence; it is not an official school rating and not an enrollment guarantee.","Academic change has 45% weight, academic performance 30%, college/career readiness 20% for high schools, and attendance 5%. Missing components are reweighted only when at least 60% of eligible weight is observed."],"items":["Academic change: published year-over-year change in California distance-from-standard status for English language arts and mathematics. It is not a longitudinal growth model.","Academic performance: published distance-from-standard status for English language arts and mathematics.","College/career readiness: published prepared percentage for eligible high-school cohorts.","Attendance: published chronic-absence evidence, oriented so lower absence is stronger."]},{"heading":"Comparability, coverage, and fairness review","paragraphs":["Percentiles compare schools only within the same school level and only when the comparable cohort and published sample meet v2 minimums.","Alternative, continuation, special-education, adult, primarily virtual, closed, and otherwise non-comparable records do not receive a numeric indicator. Every record shows coverage, confidence, school year, and source vintage.","Subgroup missingness and score distributions are release checks, not public subgroup ratings. A gap above the review threshold blocks release unless a release-bound independent adjudication records approve_with_disclosure; reject and methodology_change_required decisions remain blocking."],"items":["Minimum component sample: 20 students.","Minimum comparison cohort: 20 schools.","Minimum observed eligible weight: 60%."]},{"heading":"Sources, licenses, and attribution","paragraphs":["Source bytes are stored as immutable, checksummed release artifacts. Each public record links to the exact release and source vintage."],"items":["California Department of Education Public Schools and Accountability Dashboard files — California public data terms and source attribution apply.","National Center for Education Statistics Common Core of Data — U.S. Department of Education public data terms and attribution apply.","District or county attendance-boundary sources are used only when their authority, vintage, and feature identifiers are recorded."]},{"heading":"Limitations and refresh cadence","paragraphs":["The registered California Dashboard chronic-absence indicator covers TK–8, so the attendance component is generally absent for high schools and the observed high-school components are reweighted with disclosed coverage.","Published indicators do not measure every aspect of a school and should not be used alone for enrollment, housing, or family decisions. Attendance boundaries, choice programs, transfers, charters, magnets, and capacity can change independently.","Registered sources are checked monthly. A candidate school release is normally rebuilt annually when official source versions change, with correction releases when verified source errors require them.","Version v2 is permanent. Later methodology changes receive a new versioned URL; this page is not silently rewritten into a different method."],"items":["Corrections require a new checksummed release and validation report.","Previously approved releases remain available for rollback and audit."]}],"sources":[{"label":"California Department of Education data and reports","url":"https://www.cde.ca.gov/ds/"},{"label":"National Center for Education Statistics","url":"https://nces.ed.gov/ccd/"}]}