Students do well on tests, but district "fails" anyway

Overall, Supt. Tim McMurtrey is pleased with the results of the state-mandated achievement tests for students in the Mountain Home School District, even though, at a technical level, the district got a failing mark.

District-wide, students scored well above the current state goals for reading and math skill performance on the Idaho Standards Achievement Tests (ISAT) last year, and hit almost exactly the state average for scores in those two areas.

But state and federal law (which mandates the ISAT under the No Child Left Behind Act) require that the test scores be broken down into a number of subcategories, and for a district to "pass," every subcategory must also score above the current state goal level, which is 72 percent or better of all students reading at grade level or above, and 60 percent of all students scoring at grade level or above on the math section of the test.

Overall, the district exceeded those marks by a significant amount, with 83.04 percent of its students reading at grade level (the state average was 82.9 percent), and 75.37 percent scoring at grade level on the math section (the state average was 77.52 percent).

But the district failed in three subcategories.

Hispanic students scored only 67.03 percent (of the required 72) on the reading portion of the exam, and only 52.69 percent on the math portion (of the 60 required). The state averages in those subcategories were 62.71 and 58.99 percent, respectively.

Students identified for special help due to limited proficiency in English, the language in which the test is given, also scored only 58.02 percent on the reading portion of the ISAT exam, but met the state goals on the math section by scoring 64.81 percent. The state averages for all students in that category in Idaho were 54.48 percent and 54 percent, respectively.

And in the third subcategory where the district failed, students with disabilities (the special education program), those students scored only 43.73 percent reading at grade level (the state average was 44.04 percent) and only 37.99 percent scoring at grade level for the math portion of the test (the state average was 42.63 percent).

Because of those subcategory failures the state report officially says that the district did not make its Adequate Yearly Progress goal.

As a result, the law requires the district to send a letter to parents of all high school students informing them that they have the right to request that their students be transferred to another high school in the district. Since there isn't another high school, the end result is just a cost to the district in postage and paper, McMurtrey noted.

But McMurtrey, who is beginning his first year as superintendent of the district, gives the tests themselves mixed reviews.

On the one hand, he believes they are enormously useful to teachers, who can look at individual student test scores and identify areas where that student may need special attention. And district-wide, the tests help identify areas of weakness in the curriculum that must be addressed.

But on the other hand, they can sometimes give an erroneous impression of actual performance by the district's teachers. West Elementary, for example, which has the highest percentage of Hispanic and low-income students in the district, had the Hispanic students there score only 0.57 percent under the state goal, well above the state average for that subcategory, but as a result, the school still got a failing grade.

And in some of the subcategories the district saw improvement of up to 20 percent in the scores reported this year over last year, and all of the subcategories improved over last year, but still the state gave the district a failing grade in its "pass/fail" analysis of each district in the state.

The ISAT scores also work against larger districts in the state, McMurtrey said. Subcategories aren't counted if there are less than 34 students who qualify in that category.

For example, the district wasn't scored in the Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander category because there aren't 34 students in the district in that category. But some school districts in the state barely have 34 students total, let alone in each category.

"If you look at the state results, the small schools look like they do very well," McMurtrey said, "but for districts our size and larger, I think only Meridian had a passing grade. It's almost impossible to meet your AYP (Annual Yearly Progress goal), for example, if you have at least 34 special ed students. I mean, how much of a surprise is it that they can't read at grade level? I think we do very well with our special ed programs. They're very successful. But it makes it pretty tough for the district to get a passing grade the way the law is set up right now."

Students from low-income families often have trouble performing at levels of students from families with better economic advantages. But the law, McMurtrey says, doesn't allow him to give the names of those students to teachers so they can get some extra help.

And the ISAT test doesn't seem to match the state curriculum standards, either, meaning his teachers have a choice of teaching to the test or teaching to the standards, but rarely can they do both.

The state "report card" given to each district from the ISAT tests, McMurtrey said, "doesn't make sense. We did better than the state average (in almost all categories) and we're still considered deficient."

At the same time, he said, the district takes the results seriously. "We've worked hard over the last few years on our reading program, and we're seeing the results," he said.

"But we also know we need to improve our math curriculum, and these tests help us with that."

This year the district will be launching a math initiative similar to the one it launched in reading several years ago.

In general, the district's students do well in math in the elementary grades, but falter at the middle school level, before coming back up to par at the high school level.

The drop in scores at the middle school level, McMurtrey said, "reflects the fact that that's where the kids start to get the more abstract math, like algebra and geometry," and for some the transition from basic math can be rough. "That's the area we really need to focus our efforts," he said.

The ISAT test is given each year in grades 3-8 and grade 10. Students must pass the grade 10 test in order to graduate, regardless of how many credits they earn. If they fail as sophomores, they can take the test again as juniors or seniors.

It's one component of a tougher state standard for graduation, although for more than a decade the Mountain Home School District has required 52 credits to graduate, well above the state minimum requirement of 42 credits.

Now the state is increasing that minimum requirement to 48 credits, requiring students to take an additional four credits of math (from four to eight) and an additional two credits of science (from four to six).

McMurtrey has no problems with tougher standards, but those mandates, like the tests themselves, are costly to the district. "Do those (math and science) teachers grow on trees? There's a shortage of teachers in those fields right now, so it's tough" to find them, he said.

In addition, he noted, the extra requirements take away from elective courses, and that can hurt students who aren't going into math and science fields after graduation, since they'll have fewer classes they can take in the fields where they are intending to pursue a career.

Overall, however, McMurtrey is pleased with how well the district is doing teaching its students.

On another test mandated by the state, for example, the Idaho Reading Indicator, "our IRI scores are awesome," and reflect the fact that "the teachers are working very, very hard."

In part, he said, that's because analysis of previous testing helped the district identify weaknesses that resulted in a major curriculum change to "a scientifically based, very scripted program," called Open Court, that has helped students make significant progress in their reading proficiency.

"Now we're looking at a similar program for our math series," he said. "The teachers want it. They want the kids to do well."

Overall, he said, "we are doing very well. We know what we have to focus on, and we're doing that.

"But the way the No Child Left Behind law is currently written, it is virtually impossible for districts to make their AYP (Annual Yearly Progress). So we all wind up looking bad. That gives the politicians all kinds of ammunition to fire at us, but it doesn't reflect the significant progress we've been making."