State test data ‘terribly misleading’

Last week, the Rockville Centre School District gave a presentation on the results of last year’s state tests, reinforcing the message that the tests were a waste of time for both the district and for students.

Superintendent Dr. William Johnson said the tests, which are given in math and ELA in grades three through eight, gave the district no useful information about student abilities.

“I said at the time that we found them to be essentially useless to us as a school district, and we have begun to gather very credible evidence to suggest we were on the right track with that,” Johnson said. “The information that we have from the state on these assessments is, in fact, terribly misleading.”

Johnson cited the eighth grade math exam as an example, which is supposed to gauge how prepared students are for the algebra regents, which RVC students also take in eighth grade. Under the new state tests, slightly more than 40 percent of students passed the eighth grade math test, but 94 percent passed the algebra regents.

“There is an awful mismatch between what we know about children’s ability to read and do math and their scores on these tests,” said Johnson. “Consequently, there is an over-representation of kids in level 2 and level 1 that don’t belong there.”

Christopher Pellettieri, the district’s assistant superintendent of curriculum, explained the other standardized test the district uses, called the Northwest Evaluation Association exam, or NWEA. The NWEA is an online test that adapts to how much students know. Questions will get easier or harder based on student answers. Then, within 24 hours, teachers receive the results, showing which students succeed in which areas and where they need improvement.

The data that the district and teachers received on the state exams was next to useless, Pellettieri explained. The state showed which questions each student got right and wrong, but didn’t supply the district with copies of the test, so there’s no way to know what areas the students need to improve.

The district released the results of the last NWEA exam students took along with the state assessment scores that were sent home.

Though the district is required to administer the state tests, it still plans on using the NWEA to actually assess how much students know and whether they need extra help.

“Parents who made the decision last year to opt out of the exam, I think, made a very good decision,” Johnson said. “You’re looking at nine hours of testing to get results that don’t tell us anything more about the kids that we couldn’t get in 45 or 50 minutes using the NWEA.”