More accurate test results are welcome

EDUCATION officials warn the results of this year’s state tests may shock parents, because the share of students performing at grade level could plummet. Yet parents deserve to know a child is behind schedule while the child is still in school, not after.

For years, it’s been well known among policymakers, if not the general public, that there are big gaps between reality and the academic results reported to students’ parents. On state tests, large majorities are consistently shown to be “proficient,” or performing at grade level. Yet on National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) tests, which are given to students in all 50 states and are not subject to state manipulation, the proficiency rate of Oklahoma students is far lower.

In 2015, state tests showed 75 percent of Oklahoma eighth-graders were proficient in reading, compared with just 29 percent on NAEP. Similar discrepancies existed for fourth-grade reading and math and eighth-grade math.

Such gaps exist in most states, but Oklahoma has long been one of the worst offenders. On eighth-grade math tests in the 2012-2013 school year, there was a 42-point gap in the share of students shown proficient by Oklahoma state tests compared with NAEP. That was a bigger gap than all but seven states.

On the ACT test in 2017, just 16 percent of Oklahoma students were found to be college and career ready in all four subjects tested.

There’s good reason to think the NAEP and ACT figures are accurate. Of the share of Oklahoma high school graduates who go on to college, 39.1 percent were enrolled in remedial courses in 2015, which means they paid college tuition to retake high school courses. The associated out-of-pocket cost was more than $22 million.

Now the passing grade for Oklahoma state tests has reportedly been set closer to the levels used by ACT and SAT college entrance tests and NAEP. State schools Superintendent Joy Hofmeister says this will close the “honesty gap.”

What matters most is how parents respond upon getting more accurate (if disappointing) test results, and how school officials respond. We hope parents demand improved service, and that school officials don’t try to blame lackluster results solely on budget challenges. This problem predates Oklahoma government’s current financial woes.

In 2009, a study funded by the Oklahoma Business and Education Coalition found, in the words of an Associated Press report, that “Oklahoma public school students may be misled to think they are doing better academically than is the case because of a low bar set in state achievement tests.” That problem has persisted.

Too often, school officials are quick to dismiss any evaluation that is less than glowing. Thus, administrators at schools receiving D or F grades on state report cards often criticize the system. When state officials required students to answer roughly 70 percent of questions correctly to pass a state high school biology test, instead of the prior 52 percent rate, and passage rates plummeted, administrators lobbied successfully to have the test repealed.

State tests results should reflect reality. Parents should receive accurate information. If this move in the right direction increases pressure on policymakers to enact meaningful reform and school improvement measures, so much the better.