Some Grumble, but Most Praise Harder State Tests : Schools: Officials complain of glitches or say standards are too high. But many see results, though dismal, as useful.

If the dismal results produced by California’s pioneering new student performance tests offered a bitter pill to public school educators and parents this week, not everyone was willing to take the medicine.

The president of the state’s biggest teachers union complained that the math questions were too hard. Many school district officials said students and teachers were not given adequate time to prepare. Others griped that the state’s new performance standards were too high and that the scoring method was too subjective.

At least two school districts won an admission that some of their reported scores were in error, and several other districts have asked state testing officials to check into possible mistakes.

Still, the architects of the new testing system said the public seems to be taking heed of what the scores say about the need to improve schools and are focusing on how to make them better.

“I’ve been pleased that the response by teachers and school administrators has not been overly defensive,” said state Sen. Gary K. Hart (D-Santa Barbara), a teacher whose legislation gave birth to the new system of testing, which measures student performance against tough standards.

“There are concerns . . . but I am not seeing the kind of backlash I was concerned about. People are not saying these (tests) are fundamentally flawed . . . and that is healthy and encouraging.”

Which is not to say the first scores from the new system have not stirred dismay--and some confusion--throughout the state. For the first time, student work was judged against a series of tough standards--a sharp departure from past practice of comparing districts and schools against each other. Many were shocked by the outcome.

Few students attained the new higher standards in reading and writing, and in math California’s public school students were found to be very deficient. The standards were developed by a task force that included business leaders, school board members, testing experts and educators. They were approved by the State Board of Education.

Harry M. Weinberg, superintendent of the San Diego County Office of Education, which advises 43 public school districts in that county, said the response to the tests has been positive.

“We feel challenged by the results, but at least now we know what we have to shoot for, and that is great,” Weinberg said.

In a reference to the tight budgets that school districts have been experiencing since the state slipped into recession nearly five years ago, he added:

“The only downside is that we need the resources to help us meet this good goal. We’ve been given this beautiful new racecourse and told to complete it in record time with an old Chevy.”

Maureen DiMarco, Gov. Pete Wilson’s secretary for child development and education, found a similar reaction Thursday when she addressed a Bay Area meeting of 35 superintendents from districts throughout California.

“There was some talk about problems with (the testing system), but that was a secondary discussion for them. This is awkward and uncomfortable, and there is some concern about the reliability (of) parts of it,” DiMarco said. “But they were in favor of having these high, clear standards; they were very focused on how to do better.”

Still, criticisms of at least some aspects of the testing system were abundant in the aftermath of the public’s first look at the scores.

Del Weber, president of the California Teachers Assn., which has been an enthusiastic backer of the testing system, said the way results were released was confusing and the volume of data made it seem as if the tests “mean more than they really do.”

Weber, whose union is in the middle of an advertising campaign touting school improvements, advocated a return to rankings based on school-to-school comparisons. He said it will take five years of testing and refinement before the results will be meaningful.

“I don’t want the whole process discredited,” he said.

But Weber said the math questions may have been too tough. The math portions of the test required students to diagram and explain their thinking about real-life problems, eschewing the typical battery of arithmetic exercises.

“I’m not sure all those math questions should have been asked of the average high school student,” he said. “A majority of our students are not going on to college . . . and certainly not to the University of California.”

A coalition of mathematics teachers and university professors disagreed.

“We have, to our great distress, not held ourselves to high standards in the past, and we have got to be doing much better,” said Kenneth C. Millett, a UC Santa Barbara math professor and member of the California Coalition for Mathematics and Science, which strongly supports the new standards.

The math test and the standards are supported even in districts where students fared among the worst, including the Los Angeles Unified School District. There, more than 80% of the students showed only “limited mathematical thinking,” attaining only the first rung or two of the test’s six-tiered ladder of achievement standards.

“The test is reliable,” said Amy McKenna, the district’s director of instruction. “It does give us a picture of where we are and where we need to go. They are not too high for what is going to be expected of our students” as adults.

Sid Thompson, the district’s superintendent, also did not object to the standards, but he argued that the low scores do not take into account the hardships that many of the district’s 640,000 students bring to the classroom. The district has high proportions of students who live in poverty or who have limited English fluency, both of which have been shown to be important factors in academic performance, Thompson said.

Genethia Hayes of Project Ahead, which works with parents in 10 of the district’s inner-city schools, said the problem is not the standards, which ought to be high, but the continuing unwillingness or inability of schools to help struggling families overcome the obstacles to achievement.

“If we know the home situation is the greatest factor in success,” said Hayes, “then why are we not doing more to reach out to parents in ways that help them understand what is needed?”

Pam Bruns, the parent of a student at Palisades High School in Pacific Palisades, said she disliked the old, multiple choice-based tests but also has criticism for the new system.

“The old tests were a total crock,” Bruns said. “I have not spent a lot of time studying (the new tests), but I have a feeling they will need to do a lot of work on them.”

Problems in scoring have also surfaced.

Results in two Orange County schools--Corona del Mar High in Newport Beach and Fred Newhart Elementary in Mission Viejo--were thrown into doubt when the private company that processed the results acknowledged it had discovered a problem in response to challenges by the schools.

Additionally, officials of the Downey Unified School District complained of missing writing scores and discrepancies in the numbers of students taking the math and reading tests, which they believe skewed the results.

State testing officials said they are investigating about 15 such complaints statewide.

Gerry Shelton, a consultant on the testing system, said his office also is getting questions regarding the fact that not all the tests were scored. To save money, the state scored 40% to 60% of the tests, depending on the subject and grade level.

He said the sample of tests used was more than sufficient to produce reliable results. He noted that when individual student scores are added to the system, beginning this spring, all the tests will be scored.

Times staff writer Howard Blume contributed to this story.