The major concern of this study is comparing the diverse methods of educational accountability
evaluation using KELS(Korea Education Longitudinal Study) and finding the meaningful implication
for policy in Korea. To evaluate genuine school effects we have to consider the starting point of
students and the growth rates of students during school years. In this study I criticized the general
approaches and common perceptions about school accountability evaluation. In this society people
think that a school with a high student achievement level is an effective school, while one with a
low student achievement school is ineffective. This is a very unscientific approach and also distorts
teacher and school's efforts to teach students. And so I tried to compare the results of four methods
to evaluate the school effects. First, I calculated the mean score of first grade year for each school,
and ranked the order of the schools. And second, using the difference score of third grade score and
first grade score, I also ranked the order of the schools. Third, using 2-level HLM model I could
get the residual file, including the school score, and rank them. Finally I tried to run 3-level growth
model so I could get the school score and rank them also. Between these indexes there were no
positive relationship and consistency. These results show that using the simple mean score of school
to evaluate high-stake accountability is a dangerous and irrational approach. From now we have to
develop more reasonable school effect model to know the authentic school effect, and so we cannot
use school accountability system using school achievement level. More time and more efforts will be
necessary for adopting this school accountability system to our nation.