Students Aren’t the Only Ones Challenged by the State Exams

To California parents, the high-stakes test scores released this week will provide a complicated answer to a simple question.

“Is my child getting a good education?” asked Carolyn Leserman, whose three children attend Manhattan Beach Unified schools. “As a parent, I look most closely at my children’s scores. I read them. I pay attention to them.”

However, many parents like Leserman complain -- and state officials concede -- that the scores are difficult to understand.

“They are confusing, especially when they change tests,” Leserman said. “You have to figure out which test you are looking at.”

California’s state testing program actually is a complex mix of several tests, and they have changed a lot over the last few years.

This year, the largest component is the California Standards Test, which is based on material the state requires students to learn at each grade level. The scores show how well students are doing in key subjects such as math, science, social studies and language arts, and are considered the most accurate assessment of student performance, educators say.

Another is the California Achievement Test/Sixth Edition, also known as the CAT/6. It is a basic-skills exam that allows parents to compare their children’s scores with a national sample of students. It replaced last year’s Stanford 9 exam, which measured similar skills but scored and tested students differently.

Then there is the SABE/2, or Spanish Assessment of Basic Education, Second Edition, a test that native Spanish-speakers usually take during their first year in California public schools.

Also this year, the state is relying on the results of the California Standards Test and the CAT/6 to measure whether schools have shown “adequate yearly progress,” which is required under the federal No Child Left Behind education law. This progress is determined using a formula that includes test scores, graduation rates at high schools, the number of students tested, and proficiency levels in reading and math.

Title I schools, which receive federal funds because they serve predominantly low-income students, are under special scrutiny if they don’t make adequate annual progress.

If schools fail to improve, parents theoretically have the right to transfer their children -- with transportation costs paid by the school district -- to another campus. (But in practice, many districts say they can’t accommodate such transfers because there is no room.) These schools also may be required to offer extra tutoring and staff development.

Many California campuses, even those that do not receive any federal money, may face state discipline if their scores are too low and are not improving enough.

Those actions could include changes in staff, instructional materials and curricula. In addition, principals might be removed and the state could take over a campus.

To parents, all of these differing measures of performance can be hard to grasp, said Martha Powell, principal of Aldama Elementary School in Highland Park. To help ease the confusion, Powell said, she holds parent advisory meetings to walk them through the reports.

“We explain to them in English and in Spanish. We then tell them the important thing to do is to know how their children did the year before,” she said. “We explain to them it’s like if you go to a trainer to build up your muscles or get thinner: You have to know where you started and where you are now.”

These tests can be used to highlight students’ and teachers’ weaknesses and strengths. Some high school students earn scholarships based on the exams. Some parents move to a neighborhood based on a school’s test results.

The most informative assessment for individual student achievement is the California Standards Test, said Richard Diaz, a testing administrator for the California Department of Education.

“It is far more rigorous,” he said. “That’s what we’re pushing. That’s what we’re asking districts to do, so we have a systematic way of looking at what people are teaching across the state.”

The California Standards Test corresponds with what is being taught in the state’s schools, and they “are a fairly easy-to-grasp indicator of how a student is doing,” said Brian Edwards, a senior policy analyst for EdSource, a Palo Alto-based education think tank.

The scores tell “you something about how the kid is doing and may tell you about how the school is doing.”

The Department of Education divides up these scores based on five categories: far below basic, below basic, basic, proficient, and advanced.

State officials say the goal for all California students is to reach the proficient category, in which they demonstrate strong mastery of that grade level’s material. High school students at the proficient level are considered primed to enter a university.

If students fall below proficient, they may need extra guidance and help to improve.

Parents will receive their child’s numerical scores on the standards, along with a category ranking in each subject area.

To classify as “far below basic,” students would have scored as low as 150 to the middle or upper 200s, out of 600 possible points.

To be considered “basic” a student would have scored at least 300 in most subjects. “Proficient” students would have scored at least 350. “Advanced” students would have scored in most cases about 400 or higher.

“We’re going to be happy when we see an increase in numbers of students who are proficient and above,” Diaz said.

This year’s CAT/6 scoring and format are different from last year’s Stanford 9. For example, the CAT/6 exam has fewer than half the questions that the Stanford 9 had. So, it will be difficult to compare scores with last year’s grades, educators say.

It is likely that most students’ CAT/6 scores will be lower than last year’s Stanford 9 scores, testing experts say. They caution parents not to look back, and instead to concentrate on how their children rank against the national average, which is the 50th percentile. Their child will receive a national percentile ranking in various subjects.

Diaz said it is not unusual for state officials to change tests periodically, because they don’t want teachers getting too comfortable with one.

“When you use the same test over and over, people get used to it,” he said. “We want to know how much they really know. We want some variation.”

Most educators stressed that standardized tests are an important indicator of performance, but they should be just one part of a larger picture. There are times when a student’s report card does not match what the test scores say, Diaz said.

“That could be a result of the school not aligning to state standards, or students jamming up on the test,” he said. Sometimes questions are not well written, or students could have test-taking anxiety that affects their performance.

Students who are not fluent in English may not be able to read the questions correctly, and that could alter the demonstration of their knowledge of a subject.

Laura Hamilton, a testing specialist at Rand Corp., a Santa Monica-based think tank, said teachers remain the best source of information about how a child is doing.

“Teachers will have a much better read on the child’s abilities than you can get from a single test score,” she said.

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L.A. County and Inland Empire Report Card

In California, about 4.5 million public school students in grades 2 through 11 took tests last spring tied to the state’s academic standards in English/language arts, math, science and history/social science.

For the first time, students also took the California Achievement Test/Sixth Edition, known as the CAT/6. That compared students against a national sample in reading, language skills, math, spelling and science.

In addition, schools had to meet new criteria, including test score targets, for “adequate yearly progress” under the federal No Child Left Behind education law. For example, in many schools, 12% of students had to be proficient in English/language arts and 12.8% proficient in math. Proficiency means students have a strong mastery of their grade-level’s material. Schools that repeatedly miss targets may face corrective actions, especially those that receive Title I federal aid for educating low-income students.

Readers who want to know how a school in Los Angeles County and some parts of the Inland Empire is doing can use this listing of scores as a gauge. These are results for individual grades, not the entire school.

Results for all grades, schools and districts are available on the Internet at https://star.cde.ca.gov