Area schools examine test successes, failures on MAP

Over the past five years, school districts in Southeast Missouri have seen little improvement on their annual state assessments.

Districtwide scores from 1999, when the communication arts, math, science and social studies tests were first administered through the Missouri Assessment Program, show little variation from this year's scores.

What has changed is that schools are now accountable for certain groups of students whose scores may have been lost in the mix in past years.

Under the federal No Child Left Behind Act, subgroups of students based on race, learning disabilities, English proficiency and socioeconomic status are separated from the scores of the overall student population. All schools must have 100 percent of students scoring proficient or above on state tests by 2014 or face penalties such as allowing students to transfer to better performing schools or extending the school year.

Here's a look at how three local school districts fared in the first year for the federal adequate yearly progress standard.

Cape Girardeau

School officials in Cape Girardeau expressed concern over an achievement gap between white students, minority students and students enrolled in the free and reduced lunch programs, which schools use to measure poverty.

The district failed to make adequate yearly progress in either communication arts or math this year due to low scores among the minority and free and reduced lunch program students.

On average, Cape Girardeau's black students scored an average of 22.8 percentage points below white students on the 2003 MAP. Students on free and reduced lunches scored an average of 8.8 percentage points behind all students on the communication arts and math tests this year.

"We can't make any excuses. We need to give those students what they need, whether it's a breakfast program or crayons and pencils," said Pat Fanger, the district's director of curriculum and assessment. "And we have to have high expectations."

Some parents say they're not sure whether pulling out the subgroup data, as required under NCLB, is a good or bad.

"It's OK to segregate data, but now that fingers have been pointed at certain groups, I'd like to know what they're going to do with that data," said Dr. Tammy Randolph, who has two children at Franklin Elementary.

This is the first year school officials have had enough data to compare how students who took the MAP as third- and fourth-graders in 1999 -- the year all four test subjects were first administered -- performed as seventh- and eighth-graders.

The results of such comparisons show that the number of students who were on track with state standards in elementary school significantly declines when they reach junior high.

For example, 34.1 percent of Cape Girardeau's 297 fourth-graders in 1999 scored proficient or higher on the math portion of the MAP. Five years later, as eighth-graders taking the math test, only 8.8 percent of those students scored proficient or higher.

School officials aren't sure what might have caused the drop, but they have plans to investigate.

"We'll find out our strengths and weakness and look for trends, then we'll make determinations about tweaking our curriculum," Fanger said.

Jackson

Jackson -- and school districts statewide -- also saw significant declines in students' math and science scores between elementary and junior high school.

Scores in communication arts and social studies, however, did not see such a decline between the elementary grades and junior high grades.

Those scores either remained consistent or saw some improvement, as was the case with 303 Jackson fourth-graders, 39.2 percent of whom scored proficient or above in social studies in 1999.

In 2003, that same group of students scored 59.8 percent proficient or higher on the eighth grade social studies test.

Districtwide, Jackson scored higher than the state average in every subject, at every grade level. That still wasn't enough for three schools -- the high school, junior high and middle schools --to make the adequate yearly progress goal.

The district as a whole did not make adequate yearly progress in communication arts.

Parent Reva Eichhorn said she isn't sure about how fair it is to separate the subgroup data.

"I think the fact that the district was higher in not just one but all subjects means they must be doing something right," said Eichhorn, who has children at both Jackson Middle School and R.O. Hawkins Junior High. "There's always going to be a lower end and a higher end, that's just common sense."

While Jackson's scores were high in comparison with state averages, there were some groups of students whose scores dropped from proficient to nearing proficient.

That was the case on the communication arts tests, where the proficient rate dropped from 44.9 percent in 2002 to 34.7 percent this year in third grade, and from 38.1 percent to 31.6 percent in seventh grade.

"Our scores are very strong, but when you see a dip and know it was the same teachers, using the same curriculum, it's puzzling why the scores are down," said Dr. Rita Fisher, assistant superintendent in Jackson.

The district is in the process of analyzing building-level data to pinpoint what might have happened with the communication arts scores and the seventh- and 11th-grade scores that did not make adequate yearly progress.

Scott City

Due to tight finances, the Scott City School District opted not to take the optional science and social studies portions of the MAP in 2003, but did participate in the communication arts and math tests.

"The test is similar but the rules have changed this year," said Diann Bradshaw, superintendent in Scott City. "But we're still using these scores as an evaluating tool."

As a district, preliminary data shows that Scott City did not make adequate yearly progress in communication arts. The district was below the state MAP index in every subject, on every grade level.

The only improvements over 2002 scores was in seventh grade communication arts, where the number of students scoring proficient or higher jumped from 27.8 percent to 32.2 percent. All other scores remained the same or declined.

Despite that, Scott City showed the largest percentage-point improvement in students scoring proficient or above in communication arts and math over the past five years when compared to Cape Girardeau and Jackson.

Both of those districts saw overall decreases in the percentage of students scoring proficient or higher since 1999.

"I have to attribute that to our students and teachers taking it more seriously," Bradshaw said.

cclark@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 128