Giving Compass' Take:

• Education Dive examines data from the nonprofit group NWEA that shows that even the lowest income schools can show promise when it comes to student outcomes.

• One of the takeaways here is that we must not see impoverished schools as lost causes, but find ways to cultivate the successes in education wherever they are.

• Here's how schools in North Carolina are reaching more low-income students with breakfast.

Placing too much emphasis on achievement levels can be unfair to schools "producing excellent growth," the research suggests.

While it’s clear there is a strong connection between high poverty and low student achievement, a new analysis of growth data on MAP reading and math assessments shows a much weaker relationship between high poverty and low rates of growth, according to NWEA, the nonprofit organization that developed the assessments.

The lowest income schools in a sample of 1,500 schools — where at least 90% of students receiving free or reduced-price lunch — included those with low student growth and high student growth.

The findings, according to study author Andy Hegedus, a research consulting director at NWEA, have implications for how states measure school improvement under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). Putting a higher weight on achievement levels in accountability systems “fails to adequately recognize schools that are producing excellent growth,” he writes.

Read the full article about high-poverty schools and student achievement by Linda Jacobson at Education Dive.