Are Virginia's school testing results fraudulent?

[Karmadillo]

http://www.dailyhowler.com/index.shtml

THE STORY-TO-DATE CONTINUES: It seems that Christmas came early for Maury Elementary of Alexandria, Virginia last year. In the spring of 2005, only 5 of Maury’s 19 third-graders passed the state’s “Reading/Language Arts” test, a passing rate of 27 percent. (Statewide, 77 percent of third-graders passed. We’ll call this test “reading” from this point on.) But yes, Virginia—there is a Santa Claus! Thanks to bizarre statistical manipulations, the state ended up reporting that 17 of Maury’s 19 third-graders had passed—and Maury was soon at the top of the Washington Post’s front page, hailed as “a study in pride, progress” (full links below). How did five out of 19 become seventeen? How did an abysmal passing rate become a source of community “pride?” Simple—according to Alexandria testing director Monte Dawson, an undisclosed number of Maury fourth-graders also were given the third-grade test. When 12 fourth-graders passed the third-grade test, they were added to the third-grade total. We know, we know, it sounds impossible—but no, we’re really not making this up. Indeed, Dawson sent us a lengthy excerpt, apparently from a technical manual, which outlined the absurd procedure. What do you do when a school’s passing rate exceeds 100? The excerpt even explained that!

Once again, we’re not making this up. And according to the material Dawson sent, this absurd statistical procedure has been used in Virginia since 2001; presumably, it may have inflated official “passing rates” at many other schools in the state. If this has occurred, then the state has been systematically defrauding its citizens through this public reporting (“accountability!”) system.

Have other schools displayed the pattern observed at Maury last year? Have “passing rates” been inflated statewide by the use of this absurd procedure? For example, have elementary schools in the Norfolk system had their passing rates inflated? As we noted last week, Norfolk won a prestigious national award for urban school systems last year, granted by the Broad Foundation. But did Norfolk win this national prize based on inflated school passing rates? This may be the world’s most obvious question—and it’s a question we simply can’t answer.

The question is obvious, but it can’t be answered—because the state of Virginia has now removed its “school report cards” from public view. (These are the public records posted on-line to inform the public about public schools. The “school report cards” have been unavailable since at least March 3.) Of course, nothing on-line disappears completely; some readers tell us that they have been able to access some of these records through various machinations. Yesterday, for example, a reader sent us material he had accessed in an Excel file. Uh-oh! We don’t have Excel. And the basic question, of course, is this: Why are these records being withheld from normal public inspection?

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[dsc]

1. as the writer well knows

any test is open to playing games in reporting. This is admittedly a new one, but it isn't all that different from what Houston did which was get kids to drop out before taking the test and thus keep them from messing up the scores.

[CornField]

5. In addition, many of those drop-outs are listed as "homeschoolers"

so the districts will not have a high drop-out rate -- and some can claim half-credit (half payment) for students listed as homeschooling through their HAPs.

[Jane Austin]

2. Sounds a lot like the statistical gymnastics that allowed bush to be made

to look like a "Reformer with Results" with respect to education in Texas.

Those statistics were as phony as his Texas accent.

Is Rod Page the superintendent in Alexandria?

[bobbieinok]

3. didn't Daily Howler say a bit ago it was going to concentrate on

US education and the reporting thereof???

that there was as much or more mess there than in politics???

[Karmadillo]

4. I'ts been all education for several weeks. So far, it's been

well worth reading.

[Greyhound]

6. See, they do have "a better way". n/t

[VAMom]

7. ...it's referred to as the "recovery" test

"Recovery" tests are given to 4th, 6th and 9th graders in the areas of reading and math for those that failed those areas the year before. These students receive extra remediation and then retake the test the following year. Generally the ones that pass the test after a year of work are those that were close to start with, say a 375 (400 is passing) or up. Special education students take these frequently.

For better or worse, these scores are counted with the younger kids, in fact, schools get a "bonus" with these scores. My principal told me that the recovery kids are added to the numerator, and not the dominator, which would explain why a school could get over 100%.

Whether it is "fair" or not to include these scores is a good discussion question. These kids DID pass the test, often with a lot of hard work in staying late or coming in early for tutoring.