What are the targets?
Arbor uses several types of targets in our Summative Assessments. Understanding these is key to understanding the analysis of attainment vs. target.
This is a student's starting point for any assessment.
If the student was enrolled in the assessment during the last academic year, their final mark last year will appear as the Baseline this year.
It can be edited in bulk from the Baselines & Targets page. It can be viewed from the Marksheet page.
This is the first prediction ever made about a student's attainment at the end of an assessment. It is usually set at the beginning of an assessment by staff.
It can be edited from the Baselines & Targets page. It can be viewed from the Marksheet page.
If no Predicted Marks are entered for subsequent assessment periods, the Predicted Mark Baseline will be used as the Predicted Final Mark.
Each Teacher Target shows the mark a student should get at each assessment period, based on their Baseline and Year Target.
When you first set up your Assessment and have added a Baseline and a Year Target, the Teacher Targets are automatically filled with targets showing progression. For example, if you have three termly periods, the Baseline is 3 and the Year Target is 6, the teacher targets will be 4, 5 and 6. The final Teacher Target will be the same as the Academic Year Teacher Target.
It can be edited from the Baselines & Targets page. It is not displayed on the Marksheet page. Teacher Targets contribute to the judgement of whether students are working Above, At or Below on the Marksheet.
When you first set up your Assessment and have added a Baseline and a Year Target, the Academic Year Teacher Target will be the same as the Year Target. You can then edit this if necessary.
It can be edited from the Baselines & Targets page. It is not displayed on the Marksheet page.
This is input every assessment period and can be used to track changes in what the teacher thinks the student will achieve at the end of the assessment over time.
It can be edited from the Baselines & Targets and Marksheet pages.
It is used to set the Final Predicted Mark.
This represents the final grade that the teacher thinks the student will actually achieve.
It is non-editable. It can be viewed from the Baselines & Targets and Marksheet pages.
Predicted Final Mark is derived from other targets in a hierarchy. The system prioritises targets in this order:
- Most recent assessment period's Predicted Mark
- If no Predicted Marks exist, Predicted Mark Baseline
This means if a student has no Predicted Mark entered for spring, but has 7 entered for Autumn, the Teacher target, the Predicted Final Mark is 7.
If the assessment you have chosen is linked to a Curriculum, Arbor can suggest a mark for each student based on their curriculum results.
It is non-editable. It can be viewed from the Marksheet page only.
These are set at a school level by going to Students > Assessments > Assessment policy > School Target Rules. For instructions on how to do this, read our article here.
They can be viewed from the Baselines & Targets page.
They can contribute to the Year Target on the Marksheet and Baselines & Targets pages.
This is what the student is expected to achieve at the end of the academic year, for example, what level a student is expected to achieve at the end of year 10.
It is non-editable. It can be viewed from the Marksheet and Baselines & Targets pages.
The ‘year target’ is derived from other targets in a hierarchy. The system prioritises targets in this order:
- Teacher Target - Individual target, manually set
- Progress Target - Calculated from the baseline and desired progress points
- Attainment Target - A set target for all students based on ARE (Age-Related Expectations)
This means if a student has no Teacher target, the Progress target will be used, etc.
This is a stretch target for what the student could achieve at the end of the academic year.
It is editable from the Baselines & Targets page. It can be viewed from the Marksheet page.
This is what the student is expected to achieve at the end of the course, based on analysis of prior attainment, for example, what level a student is expected to achieve at the end of the GCSE. It is usually set at the beginning of an assessment.
It is editable from the Baselines & Targets page. It can be viewed from the Marksheet page.
Renaming the target columns
You can change the names for your summative assessment targets from Students > Assessments > Assessment Framework > Targets. Here you can see all the target names.
To add an alias of a target and rename the column in the marksheet, just click a target. Choose the alias in the slide over, then click Save changes.
To remove the alias, just click the target again and remove all the text in the Alias field.
You'll be able to view the renamed columns on these pages:
Target |
Baselines & Targets |
Summative Marksheet |
Full Marksheet |
| Year | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ (add using the filters) |
| Teacher | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ |
| Period | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ (add using the filters) |
| School progress | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ |
| School attainment | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ |
| Final | ✓ (add using the filters) | ✓ (add using the filters) | ✓ (add using the filters) |
| Aspirational | ✓ (add using the filters) | ✓ (add using the filters) | ✓ (add using the filters) |
How can I choose which targets to display?
Our Summative Assessment Baselines & Targets and Marksheet pages always show the ‘Year Target’ by default.
The filters at the top of the page allow you to display other targets.
Comments
why can I not see any A level Flightpath targets in the assessments and teacher marksheets, even though I have a) manually entered them and b) also done a bulk upload.
The ones I can see are because I have gone into Targets and Baslines and have manually overridden the target per student per flightpath (for a class of 3 A level students - this is 6 columns of targets, so 18 changes in total for 1 A level class in Year 12).
Why do the flightpath targets not appear when I upload the targets? The Year Targets appear but nothing else does?
Hi Mark, this sounds like a more complex query that we'd need to look into further with you! Please get in touch at myteam@arbor-education.com so we can get this sorted!
Thanks Gwyn - although this was posted two weeks ago....in that time the error has been something to do with uploading targets into the Year or Teacher target which creates derived flightpaths - I have sorted this out but the literature above needs to be clearer about the pitfalls of what targets need to be entered on the download sheets as its not that clear and if you have not had any training and just doing it blind - you are going to make lots of frustrating mistakes.
Hi Mark, thanks for your feedback on this article!
I'd love to work with you to improve the guidance here, so please get in touch at myteam@arbor-education.com to put forward your suggestions about how we can make this resource more useful for schools.
If your query is urgent, we'd always recommend webchatting, phoning or emailing us as you'll get a faster response that way.
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