Commissioner’s test scoring plan tougher than FCAT, but tough enough?

This is the first year Florida has used a high-stakes test that is linked to standards largely based on Common Core.

State Sen. John Legg, R-Trinity, said he believes the superintendents and the education department can work together to find a middle ground, though the state said it fully intends to release school grades. “This should be used only as a baseline year”, Calderone said. “These recommendations are in line with the performance we should expect from our state’s students at each grade level for each subject in order to prepare today’s students for future success”.

The superintendents were clear: They support a strong accountability system, but it must be accurate and fair to students, teachers and schools. That means they are at odds with the tougher scoring some members of the Florida’s State Board of Education have said they want to see.

“To change a cut score on a test that we don’t have enough data on, I think is irresponsible at this point in time”, Seminole County School Board Chairman Tina Calderone said. Those reports won’t show how a student improved from one year to the next but will provide comparisons to other students in the state.

The bill also calls for a comprehensive review of the accountability system by the Department of Education, which in turn, would be submitted to Gov. Rick Scott and the Legislature by next December. Investigators said they could “reasonably state that the spring 2015 administration of the FSA did not meet the normal rigor and standardization expected with a high-stakes assessment program like the FSA”.

Those members argued that the results of the FSA should be more closely aligned to how Florida’s students fare on the National Assessment for Educational Progress, a test in which less than 40 percent of the state’s students scored “proficient” in math and reading.

Delay the issuance of school grades until the 2015-2016 school year. “As test data gets so aged between the time students sat for the test and when we’re presented with the results, we lose touch of how we can use those results in a meaningful way to strengthen instruction, which is really the point of these assessments”. If approved, 50 percent of students in third through eighth grade would pass the English exam. For the math portion, 45 to 59 percent of students are expected to pass.

That’s how this unprecedented dispute between the state and local school districts developed in the first place. “It’s a misinformation to the public and not a good start for the new accountability system”.