"Is the State School Board now admitting that the grades on the tests over the past 10 years were wrong?  Does that mean the millions of dollars in taxpayer money was given out to the wrong schools, since, under the new method, many schools should have had higher scores and therefore gotten reward money?"

—Martin Cothran
Senior Policy Analyst
P. O. Box 22100, Lexington, KY  40522
Phone: 859-255-5400

Special Op-Ed for Community Papers
 
Martin Cothran 
The Family Foundation
About 730 words 
First Serial Rights
© The Family Foundation 

Testing, Testing ...
Has the State School Board finally admitted that Kentucky’s statewide tests were inaccurate?

When lawmakers turned Kentucky schools upside down in 1990 by passing the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA), every element of traditional schooling was considered suspect.  If it wasn’t new and different, it was to be purged from the system.

One of the practices that was thrown out was the practice of giving A’s, B’s and C’s to children for their schoolwork.  In most schools, the old way of grading was replaced by various methods of grading such as checks, minuses—and, in some cases, geometrical figures—to indicate the quality of student work.  There was also a lot of stress on giving long verbal descriptions of how the student was doing.

Because of this new inscrutable method of grading, many parents received report cards home that they simply couldn’t understand.  Even parents with graduate educations were left scratching their heads wondering how they were supposed to figure out how their children were doing in school.

But all this didn’t stop with report cards and homework grades.  Even the statewide tests were to be graded in a new and different way.

The KIRIS tests—which are now called “CATS” tests—have been a part of KERA from the start.  They are the statewide tests that drive much of what Kentucky schools do to this day.  They use an altogether different grading system.  Instead of A’s, B’s and C’s, they use the general terms “Novice,” “Apprentice,” “Proficient,” and “Distinguished.”

Now, however, members of the State School Board want to change the way children are graded—not by using new terms, but by changing the grading scale.

At their April 4 meeting, the Board announced that they were considering a proposal that would result in huge grade inflation in many parts of the tests.

Under the new plan, most of the students who have been ranked at the Apprentice level will be moved into higher categories, resulting in huge scoring increases on some parts of the tests.

If you compare 1998 KIRIS scores with the 2000 CATS scores under the proposed new standards, you come up with some interesting findings:

· Under the new scoring system the percentage of students rated at or above proficient in elementary practical living increases from 6 to 46 percent, an increase of about 700 percent.

· The percentage of middle school students rated at or above proficient in reading increases from 15 to 51, an increase of 340 percent.

· The percentage of high school students rated at or above proficient in practical living skills increases from 6 to 49, an increase about 800 percent.

These are the worst examples, but there are many others that are also large.  This inflation of scores results from the change in the grading scale.  It’s as if a teacher suddenly decided that all 92’s were now to be counted as A’s and all 76’s would count as D’s.  But the number of students who had 92’s was higher than the number of students who had 76’s, resulting in most of the class getting higher grades.

State Board officials argue that this change is needed since the new method is a more accurate way to rate students.

But if the new way is right, then the old way was wrong.  In other words, if the new method of grading the tests is more accurate, then the old way was inaccurate—in fact, very inaccurate if you look at the differences under the new scoring method.

Is the State School Board now admitting that the grades on the tests over the past 10 years were wrong?  Does that mean the millions of dollars in taxpayer money was given out to the wrong schools, since, under the new method, many schools should have had higher scores and therefore gotten reward money?

This is an incredible admission, and you can bet the State School Board, which has overseen the state tests since their implementation, will try to deny it.  But more and more people are going to be asking why it is that if the scoring method has been so wrong for so long, why the Board hasn’t noticed it before.

And many schools will be asking why it is that some schools got money, and others, who deserved it, didn’t.

Maybe the Board will fess up and admit they haven’t been minding the story like they ought to.

But I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Martin Cothran is senior policy analyst with The Family Foundation of Kentucky, a nonprofit educational organization dealing with public policy issues affecting families.