L.A. Unified’s Scores Near the Bottom

Students in the Los Angeles Unified School District scored at the lowest levels in all subject areas in the latest--and last--batch of California Learning Assessment System tests, prompting officials to pledge changes in city schools.

The 1994 scores, released Tuesday by the state Department of Education, show that the vast majority of the district’s fourth-, eighth- and 10th-graders performed well below state standards in reading, writing and mathematics.

The tests, which have been scrapped by the state amid controversy over their content, measured 92,000 Los Angeles Unified students against tough statewide performance levels and are scored on a scale from one, the lowest, to six, the highest.

Several San Fernando Valley schools were among the highest-performing in the district. Balboa Gifted/High Ability Magnet in Granada Hills topped the elementary school list. Eighth-graders at Porter Middle School, also in Granada Hills, scored well, along with 10th-graders from the Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies.

Low-performing Valley schools included Pacoima and Roscoe elementary schools, Maclay and San Fernando middle schools, and Sylmar and Verdugo Hills high schools.

LAUSD Supt. Sid Thompson said he will use the scores to bolster a new effort to improve and update teaching in the district, the state’s largest and the one with the most poor and immigrant students.

“I want to talk to our teachers and administrators and we need to make fundamental changes,” Thompson said in an interview. “I’m taking the test results seriously. We cannot accept this. . . . Our kids have got to get into the mainstream.”

Among Los Angeles Unified’s results:

* Only 17% of the district’s fourth-graders scored in the top three levels in reading, compared to 22.8% statewide. In writing, 26% scored in the top levels, compared to 32% statewide.

* Among eighth-graders, only 24% scored in the top three levels in reading, compared to 38.8% statewide. In writing, 28% scored in the top half, compared to 46.3% statewide.

* Only 25% of the 10th-graders scored in the top levels in reading, compared to 34.6% statewide. In writing, 26% scored in that top half, compared to 38.9% statewide.

* Similar to students in comparable districts, most Los Angeles Unified pupils showed little or no understanding of math, essentially failing those portions of the tests. Of the fourth-graders, 85% scored in the bottom levels of the math test; 90% of the eighth-graders scored at the lowest three levels and 94% of the 10th-graders, compared to 72.2% of the fourth-graders, 76.9% of the eighth-graders and 85.7% of the 10th-graders statewide.

* Thirty-eight district schools, including 11 elementary campuses, Lawrence Middle in Chatsworth, Van Nuys and Cleveland high schools and 24 continuation campuses, received no scores. This was due to parents removing their children from the tests, too few students taking the exams and changes in the makeup of the student body.

School district officials attributed the low results primarily to the high numbers of students who don’t speak English. About 56% of the fourth-graders didn’t speak English fluently compared to 25% statewide; 38% of the eighth-graders were limited-English-speaking compared to 19% statewide, and 36% of the 10th-graders compared to 19% statewide.

Nonetheless, several principals said they feel the tests are a valid measure of students’ knowledge--and the curriculum--and are sorry the tests have been scrapped.

“My teachers like the test,” said Sherry Breskin, the principal at Porter Middle School, where 56% of the students scored in the top three levels in reading and 58% scored at the top levels in writing. “It was a very realistic test . . . and measured what we are really teaching.”

As a result of the more rigorous writing and open-ended questions posed by the CLAS tests, some administrators said teachers have altered their methods to require more composition and fewer right-and-wrong answers.

The low districtwide results show that even schools that typically perform well did not make it to the top levels of the CLAS test. Most schools, in fact, showed scores reflecting below basic mathematical skills.

At the Brentwood Science Magnet, for example, 60% of the fourth-graders showed a lack of understanding of basic math concepts. At the Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies, 85% of the 10th-graders scored in the lowest levels in math. And at Carpenter Avenue Elementary in Studio City, 53% of the fourth-graders scored at the bottom levels in math.

District students fared better in reading and writing but, again, even the schools that traditionally post high marks failed to do so on last spring’s CLAS exams.

Because the test measured students against high standards, district officials said they expected mixed results--even from typically high-scoring campuses.

“Our performance is lower than the state, lower than we’d like to have it,” said Linda Lownes, a coordinator in the district’s information technology division. “We still have a lot of work to do. We still have a long way to go instructionally to help our youngsters become critical thinkers.”

In most campuses that did not receive results, more than 25% of the parents refused to allow their children to take the CLAS exams. Because parents objected to what they believed were subjective, personal questions, the state Education Department allowed districts to exempt students.

Pockets of parents took advantage of that opportunity across the Los Angeles district, particularly in the west San Fernando Valley.

At Woodlake Elementary School in Woodland Hills, 55% of the parents refused to allow their children to take the CLAS tests, and the school received no scores. A parent from that campus last year filed a lawsuit against the district to stop the test from being given. A Superior Court judge ruled that the tests should continue but allowed the school board to review it in a private meeting.

Debbie Greenfield, who requested that her fourth-grade son be exempted from the test at Justice Street School in West Hills, said she objected to the subjectivity of the test and the reading selections. “If my mother had asked me those questions when I was 30, I would have blushed,” she said. “What business is it of theirs what these kids think about these things?”

At Lawrence Middle School in Chatsworth, 41% of the parents refused to allow their eighth-graders to take the writing portion of the test, 27% opted out of the reading portion and 20% opted out of the math. As a result, the school received only math scores.

Lawrence Principal Tony Ventresca said he would like to see the reading and writing scores but the parents were concerned about the writing questions, he said. “The kids who took the test did dedicate themselves--it would be nice to see those scores.”

Van Nuys and Cleveland high schools did not receive scores. At Van Nuys, the 19% of parents who exempted their children threw the campus’ demographics off balance, officials said. At Cleveland High, 6% of the parents opted out.

* CLAS SCORES

Individual school results by district. B2, B3