PRiME In The News: “Are Missouri Students Growing?”
Published On: February 12, 2026
Each December, the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) releases standardized testing results from the previous school year. Behind the scenes, the PRiME Center gets to work crunching the numbers to highlight the schools across the state demonstrating the highest growth in math and English language arts during the previous school year. Offering an alternative narrative to proficiency, growth accounts for where students start the year and determines how much progress they’ve made.
Dr. Vahle in her op-ed for the Missouri Independent:
Less than half of students in Missouri are proficient in math or English language arts. But what if we’re looking at the numbers all wrong? What if proficiency isn’t the best measurement of student progress? What we really want to know is if students are growing from year to year, and by how much. No one takes their child to the pediatrician for their annual physical and measures a child’s growth based on how tall they’ve grown since birth. Likewise, we should gauge student progress by assessing their improvement from one school year to the next.
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Several studies have connected teacher turnover to declines in student outcomes. First-year teachers are 70% more likely than the average teacher to leave Missouri public education. Fewer and fewer teachers persist through their early-career years, with only six in ten reaching their sixth year in Missouri public education. Policymakers and education leaders should strategize ways to improve early-career teacher working conditions, training, and professional opportunities.