Recent letters to the editor, a Boerne Star editorial and an "Inside BISD" column have all commented on the implications of TAKS results. The most often cited statistics are the "pass" rates for TAKS in these discussions. Unfortunately, these results are misleading and do little to inform a community about the actual academic abilities of students in a district or the quality of education our tax dollars are supporting.
The educational establishment in Austin buries the real implications of TAKS in curious scoring - raw scores are translated into a 'scaled score' that varies with every administration of the test. Each administration of the test uses a different conversion, supposedly to correct for differences in difficulty, but all are manipulated so that a scaled score of 2100 is a panel recommended passing score and 2400 is commended performance. But what does that mean to those of us who are used to needing a 90% or above to get an "A"?
The Association of Texas Professional Educators publishes a "TAKS Passing Standards Estimates Chart" , which translates the scale score into an equivalent percentage, using the April administration test. For 2006, the "met standard" on the eleventh grade English/Language Arts (ELA) portion of the TAKS had risen from previous years to the equivalent to getting 51% correct. The "panel recommended" standard eeked by at a slightly more stringent 58.9% and a requirement of a '2' or greater on the essay. I would encourage parents and taxpayers to go to the Texas Education Agency (TEA) website, look at released TAKS tests and check out the quality of the reading passages that students in 11th grade need to read and pass at a dismal 51% correct rate in order to graduate. The reading passages are closer in sentence complexity, structure and vocabulary to "see Jane run" than they are to "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times...".
In addition, although Boerne had 97% of its 11th grade class pass the ELA TAKS in 2006, it did not receive commended in ELA, which would have required that 25% of that class pass it at a commended level (equivalent to 84.9% correct answers).
An even more interesting indicator of the academic foundation our children are getting is something called the TSI, for Texas Success Initiative. It is also called the "Higher Education Readiness Component". What this eduspeak means is "are these children ready and able to do college level work when they graduate?". A positive TSI result requires a scaled score of 2200 (72.6% correct) on the TAKS and a "3" on the writing portion. Only 54% of 11th grade students in 2006 achieved that distinction. The ethnic breakdown was 56% white and 44% Hispanic passed at the TSI standard in ELA. By contrast, 78% of students passed the math TAKS at the TSI standard.
To David Maltzberger's hypothetical question "how many local taxpayers would be satisfied if Anglo elementary children scored in the 60 percentile..." I would add, "how many local taxpayers are happy with the reality that only 54% of the children in this district graduate college-ready in literacy skills? These results indicate a serious need in our district to improve the teaching of reading and writing.
What can be done? The most cost effective way to improve literacy rates is to focus on early grades. The Texas State Dyslexia statute requires districts to aggressively identify students with reading difficulties and provide intensive remediation from qualified teachers. The statute requires every campus to have a dyslexia designee and that person should be qualified to teach reading. Experts with Scottish Rite say that districts should be offering these kinds of reading programs to at least 3% of the student population in order to fully comply with the law.
A zero-retention policy in K and 1st grade with intensive tutoring for students struggling with reading would be more cost effective than retention. In 2006, BISD retained approximately 32 K and 1st graders. Every time a student is retained, it obligates taxpayers to fund another year of education for that student. In 2006, the average per pupil expenditure was $9522, which means that 32 students retained cost taxpayers over $300,000 in today's educational dollars. Considering that per pupil expenditures have increased at an average rate of over 10% per year since 1993, by the time that extra year gets tacked on 12 years from now, the cost will be substantially greater.
For those students who still lag in reading and writing, more emphasis should be placed on staff development and training, and less on purchasing computer-based programs such as Lexia and Plato Learning. Trained and dedicated teachers teach children to read and write, not computers.
Quality reading programs cannot stop once a child leaves elementary school. If they are still struggling in reading and writing, secondary students need access to effective, age-appropriate programs. All secondary campuses need meaningful and effective reading programs for these students, taught by knowledgeable staff.
Drop the requirement of a semester SAT/ACT prep class for graduation and substitute instead a required semester persuasive writing course. High SAT and ACT scores are predictive of one thing only - how well a student will perform on other standardized tests. For those students taking pathways other than college, to require them to spend an entire semester practicing taking a test they will not use is counterproductive. All will benefit from being able to write well and persuasively. SAT/ACT prep can remain an elective for those who do want to score well on these tests.
Finally, parents need to be proactive. If your child is having reading difficulties, educate yourself, ask questions and find out how your child is performing on grade level and age level equivalents.
If we, as a community, will put the same effort and passion into demanding that our students read well as we have in naming the new high school, we can assure that all our children will be able to read whatever name is eventually attached to that campus.
Thresa Fraser
