P.E.I. education miracle

How Island students rose to the top on the latest national achievement tests

Some are already buzzing about a “P.E.I. Education Miracle” and they are not all residents of the ‘Mighty Island.’ Everyone, in the Canadian education world, is wondering how it happened and why it is at odds with recent provincial test results.

Amazing as it seems, Prince Edward Island students have achieved top scores on the latest national achievement tests.

Seemingly out of nowhere, P.E.I.’s Grade 8 students have catapulted to the top spot in “reading literacy,” edging out students from Ontario, the leading province in 2007, 2010, and 2013. Island students mean scores have jumped a remarkable 42 points, more than double the gains of other provinces with rising scores.

Here are the facts: On the Pan-Canadian Assessment Program (PCAP) tests of Grade 8 students, written in June 2016, those from the Island finished first in reading (513), fourth in mathematics (503), and second in science (516) among the ten provinces.

Ninety-one per cent of P.E.I. students achieved Level 2 or higher in reading proficiency, meaning just 9 per cent of the cohort qualified as struggling readers.

Dramatic changes in test results do not happen overnight and tend to be the result of a sustained, focused approach to improving student achievement.

The recent bump on the 2015 PISA test, reported in December 2016, gave some inkling that Island students were producing improved results.

Former Education Minister Doug Currie was bullish about the bump up in 2015 PISA scores and it is now looking much less like an aberration. How and why it happened remains something of a mystery.

The PCAP 2016 report and P.E.I. education spokespersons are of little or no help in providing much of an answer. The Island, we are informed, follows the Atlantic Provinces Education Foundation English Language Arts (ELA) curriculum, but so do other provinces with mediocre results. We are told P.E.I. has an “inclusive education system” and uses a “student-centred approach” and, again, that’s not a point of differentiation.

Far more plausible is the critical role played by literacy coaches and “progress monitoring” in improving the quality of early reading instruction. As part of the “system overhaul” since 2008, P.E.I. put a much higher priority on both instruction and assessment.

The province’s Director of Leadership and Learning, Tammy Hubley-Little, came closest to the mark. “This hasn’t happened overnight,” she said, following the PISA results. Over the past decade, she noted, the province “introduced very strategic supports in our primary education level with coaching, literacy block… (and) reading recovery.”

Committing to literacy coaches is rather costly, but it can work if the Department implements the program without adversely affecting staff complements in the schools. When the current PCAP cohort was in the younger grades, P.E.I. employed 26 literacy coaches (about one for every 2 elementary schools) with a laser focus on improving early reading.

One puzzling aspect is the clear discrepancy between national/international test results and provincial scores. Back in November 2017, the provincial test scores in reading and writing plummeted downward and caused quite a ruckus. Grade 6 reading and writing scores dropped significantly from 82 per cent meeting the provincial standard to 64 per cent making the grade, a drop of 18 points. Meanwhile, Grade 3 reading held firm at 77 per cent meeting the standard.

Speculating on the significance of one round of test scores can be hazardous. Trends matter more than results on one battery of assessments. The closer you look, the more complex it is, and the less likely you are to pronounce with certainty on the meaning of the latest student results. Paul W. Bennett, EdD, of Halifax, Director of Schoolhouse Institute, has spent much of the past six months researching student assessment, the topic of his April 14, 2018 presentation at researchED Ontario in Toronto.