No results, but it's time to test again (MORE LIBERAL OINKING ABOUT NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND)

Star Newspapers - Chicago ^ | February 25, 2007 | Tom Houlihan

[Chi-townChief]

Even in Illinois -- a state where governmental snafus are legendary -- this one is award-winning.

Take a bow, Illinois State Board of Education, which is responsible for overseeing the all-important achievement tests mandated under President Bush's ludicrous No Child Left Behind education "reform" law.

And while we're at it, how about some applause for our Illinois legislators, who set all this in motion about 15 years ago when they ruled there could be no school "reform" without state tests.

Since then, the tests appear to have become the driving force in Illinois education, especially in less-affluent school districts where scores on the exams -- the Illinois Standards Achievement Test for grade school students and the Prairie State Achievement Exam for high school juniors -- tend to be lower.

With the advent of No Child Left Behind five years ago, the tests assumed an even larger role; the federal laws had teeth and "failing" schools would face sanctions. Schools that continued to fail could eventually face state takeover or be forced to become charter schools -- that might happen under the law's most drastic step, known as "restructuring."

I've been writing about all this for years. Our Southland has the state's highest concentration of schools facing sanctions outside the city of Chicago and a number of schools have been forced to drastically change their curriculums as they try to bring up their test scores. About 15 south suburban schools faced restructuring this year. Many others, for a decade or more, have lived with a "failing" designation.

In the past, I've written about the "data giant" that this testing has produced. As the demands of No Child Left Behind have increased, so has the need for testing-related data. It is not hard to picture a giant, getting big enough to block out the sun as it devours data.

Now, though, it appears that the data giant might have toppled over. And it's showing little sign of getting up. Too much data will do that to you.

This is complicated stuff. But let me try to explain what's happened as simply as possible.

Under state law, the Illinois State Board of Education is to publicly release scores from the previous year's test -- which are given in the spring -- by Oct. 31. For reasons mostly related to the scoring of those tests, last spring's scores could not be released on time. Back in November, the ISBE said there was no way of knowing when the scores would be released. Then we heard they'd be coming after the first of the year. Last week, the ISBE announced the scores will be released sometime after March 6.

Which is just about when our schools will start this year's round of ISAT testing. That's supposed to begin March 12.

So, this state's testing oversight authority may effectively lap itself. It may succeed in moving into a new testing cycle before previous year's tests are made public.

It's an enormous, inexcusable blunder.

By releasing the test scores so late in the academic calendar, the state has pretty much made the results of last year's exams meaningless. You may recall that test scores are supposed to be released to school districts facing No Child Left Behind sanctions in August so that the results can be incorporated into the academic program right away. Also, the federal law requires that parents at sanctioned schools are notified of what opportunities may be available -- such as tutoring or "choice" transfers within the district -- within 30 days of the start of class.

Without the official numbers from the state, schools had to play a guessing game this year about what they should do.

Kevin Burns, the superintendent of Community High School District 218, told me school officials went ahead in notifying parents about tutoring and choice transfers and took steps to get programs ready that might be required once the test results are official.

Eisenhower High School is facing restructuring, Burns said, and officials from the district and the South Cook Intermediate Service Center put together a plan that complies with the demands of No Child Left Behind. However, that plan will not go into effect until the official test results are in.

Despite the state's tardiness with test results, Burns says area school officials are doing what's necessary to keep up with state and federal demands under No Child Left Behind.

Schools have also received the raw scores from the state and have figured out on their own how students fared on last year's tests.

But, Burns said, it's frustrating knowing last year's scores will have diminished value.

Remember -- the ISAT and the PSAE provide the benchmarks by which schools are judged on the state and national education levels. Schools and their students work very hard so that scores improve.

You'd think losing a year's worth of results on these tests would be cause for an investigation by Illinois General Assembly. After all, Illinois is the last state to not report its test scores from last year. But there has been virtually no reaction from our lawmakers. I can only guess that they think the system is working just fine. And federal education authorities say Illinois won't face any sanctions for the test score snafu.

Nope, in the end all this goes back to the local schools where, in a couple of weeks, a new round of ISAT exams begin.

And parents and students and teachers are supposed to get excited about these tests? Even with the data giant flat on its back and exposed for the sham that it is?

I wish I knew why.

mailto:thoulihan@starnewspapers.com

[Chi-townChief]

I get a kick out of these liberal so-called teachers getting their snouts out of joint about NCLB when they were the ones pushing for it, along with Chappaquiddick Fats, in hopes of a big payday. But they're satisfied paying their union dues, collecting their paychecks, and shelling out inflated grades to bump their students along.

[neorepublitarian]

This is what you get for lying down with Ted Kennedy. That and a nasty case of gonorrhea.

[NonValueAdded]

I can't speak to circumstances before nickel-B but I can assure you current school administrations are now acutely aware of each and every demographic group within their system. Isn't that the thrust of the program, that you stop ignoring the little pockets of difficulty? From that aspect, it is working.