Impact of Marple Newtown’s missing tests downplayed
MARPLE >> The attendance was sparse, but the information was helpful as Marple Newtown School District administrators outlined the situation involving the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) tests lost this year.
The parents of the 72 Russell Elementary School students, four former thirdgraders and 68 former fifthgraders whose math tests never reached the scoring company, learned the mishap did not affect their children’s placement for the current or upcoming year. Families may opt for children to re-take the test, with the scores for their personal knowledge rather than factoring into the state results, but they need not sit for it again.
“My daughter’s biggest question was, ‘Do I need to take it again?’” said Julia Friedgen. “Her biggest disappointment was, ‘I put do so much time into it – what if the grades were good.’”
The moms and dads were in transit earlier initially alerted to the mixup by phone, then received an email from Superintendent Dr. Carol Cary. According to the email, the district learned that “through no fault of its own,” the tests were misplaced while being shipped by UPS between the school and Data Recognition Corp (DRC), the commonwealth’s assessment vendor headquartered in Maple Grove, Minn. The correspondence also included a letter from Pennsylvania Department of Education Secretary Pedro Rivera.
According to DRC, the box was last tracked to a UPS hub near the company, but UPS never delivered it and is unable to locate it. DRC receives and processes more than 63,000 boxes annually for the Pennsylvania program and the situation was the “first and only case” of a missing box between the company and UPS, it said in a letter to Cary.
Administered in language arts, math and science and technology, the PSSA is an annual standards-based assessment that identifies what a student should know and be able to do at varying grade levels. Every student throughout the state in grades three-eight is tested in the first two categories, with the latter subject added in grades foureight.
Individual scores can be used to assist teachers in recognizing students who may be in need of additional educational opportunities. The scores provide information to schools and districts for curriculum and instruction improvement discussions and planning, according to the state website.
“Even missing though we are the results from last year’s entire fifth grade from Russell, we have the scores from the other three schools,” said Math Supervisor Dr. Richard Slonaker. “We still have a good sample and know where to focus.”