Turns Out, TNReady Still Isn’t

The spectacular failure that is Tennessee’s statewide testing system for students (TNReady) just continues to fail. So much so that when districts announce that TNReady scores won’t be factored into student grades yet AGAIN, it’s not even a major news story.

Sure, the state pays in excess of $100 million for the test and yes, teachers are evaluated based on the results, but the test is a colossal waste of time year after year after year.

Here’s a recent announcement from Sumner County Schools about this year’s test scores:

Dear Parents,

Earlier this week, we were informed by the Tennessee Department of Education that the TNReady scores for third, fourth and fifth grade were incorrect for several elementary schools and were scored again by the state. The new scores were not returned before final report cards were sent home on Thursday. TNReady scores for grades 6–8 were received 3.5 school days before report cards were issued.State law requires TNReady testing to count a minimum of 15% of a student’s grade. School Board Policy 4.600 states that in the event of testing modifications by the state, such as a delay in scores being returned to the district, Sumner County Schools can waive the 15% TNReady grade. Due to this issue in testing, we will not include the TNReady score in your student’s final report card. Your student’s grade will be calculated by averaging the final grade from the first and second semester.In the fall, you will receive your child’s full TNReady scores

And here’s a notice from Metro Nashville Public Schools about TNReady:

I’m sure similar notices went out in other districts across the state.

So, the state spends millions on the test, schools spend hours prepping for it, students spend days taking the exams, and then — NOTHING. No score that is useful for grades, no return of data in a timely fashion.

In fact, TNReady has failed so often and in so many ways, the clown show is now just accepted as an annual rite of passage. We’ll give the test because the state can’t imagine NOT testing every year and then we’ll fully expect there to be one or several problems. A surprising TNReady year would be one in which there were no problems with administration AND the results came back on time.

It’s bad public policy when the bare minimum acceptable outcome IS the surprising outcome. Alas, that’s the case with TNReady.

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This Seems Bad

Is Tennessee on track for another TNReady mess? It sure seems that way.

Chalkbeat has more on the rushed timeline to get a new vendor in place for Fall 2019:

With just months to go before a company is supposed to take over Tennessee’s troubled assessment program, the state has yet to release its request for proposals, potentially putting its next vendor on course for another rushed timeline to testing.

The state’s education department had aimed to solicit proposals by December, receive bids by February, and make a decision by April. Now officials are looking at February to unveil the document that will outline Tennessee’s testing requirements after three straight years of headaches under two different companies.

NOT OPTIMAL

Incoming Education Commissioner Penny Schwinn — who was recruited by new Gov. Bill Lee partly for her experience with assessments in two other states — acknowledges that the timetable is not optimal.

“If I look at other states, including the two that I’ve overseen in Delaware and Texas, the traditional timeline is that a new vendor has a year to set up processes that are really strong and then you execute,” she told Chalkbeat.

“That being said,” she continued, “the responsibility that we have at the department is to follow whatever guidelines, legislation, and expectations are set for us. The expectation is that we have a new vendor in place for next school year, and we will do whatever we can to ensure that is as strong a transition as possible.”

Umm??

Seriously, Tennessee?

Are we going to do this to our kids again?

It sure looks that way.

Hackers. Dump Trucks. Lies. Rushed Timelines. Welcome to Tennessee, Penny Schwinn!

 

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Honest Feedback

WREG out of Memphis has a story about the amount of time Tennessee students spend taking TNReady tests. It’s a topic I’ve written about before and one that continues to be relevant in light of ongoing challenges with the administration of the test.

Here’s more about the time students spend taking tests:

By the time a high schooler gets finished, he or she would have tested over three weeks for 590 minutes, that’s almost 10 hours.

That’s longer than it takes for tests for graduate school, law school even med school.

“To put it into perspective, if you are going to law school, the admissions test to become a lawyer is just 210 minutes,” said Cranford.

Middle schoolers aren’t far behind with a total of more than nine hours of testing.

“And the thing that really made me reach out to you was looking back at the third grade.”

The English Language Arts portion alone runs three hours and 36 minutes for third graders.

Cranford said, “That`s ridiculous.”

The total testing time for third graders is more than seven hours.

“If I was a parent of a third grader I would, and I saw these times, I think I would be gathering up a group of parents and contacting Nashville.”

While the total time spent testing is of concern, what compounds that frustration is that in the last three years, TNReady has experienced huge problems in two of those years. Last year, there were also issues with returning scores and with factoring the scores into teacher evaluations.

In light of these problems, the Department of Education’s response to the WREG story is particularly interesting. Here’s what they had to say about the value and importance of TNReady:

In large part because of TNReady, we are providing more honest feedback to families about their child’s performance, and our students are learning and growing to meet these high expectations. (See more here.) TNReady is a test that looks for students’ critical thinking and problem solving skills and is fully aligned to what our teachers are teaching. 

Let’s examine that claim more closely. My daughter was in fourth grade during the first disastrous administration of TNReady online. Because the State of Tennessee and then-vendor Measurement, Inc. could not effectively administer that test, there was NO feedback.  Assuming the test was an accurate reflection of what was to have been taught that year (a big assumption), there’s no way to know how my daughter or other students met those standards — the results didn’t come back. The state failed.

Of course, after that first year, Tennessee fired Measurement, Inc. That matter is now in court.

The next year, the test returned to pencil and paper and seemed to go mostly fine, except when it came to getting results back in a timely manner. Oh, and then there were problems with factoring the results in to teacher evaluation.

Then, this year, our test was hit by hackers and dump trucks and a bunch of students were given the wrong test. Now, there’s legislation that holds students harmless and also prevents any “adverse action” based on the test.

No serious person believes the results from this year’s test hold any real meaning. Of course, that means Candice McQueen puts a lot of faith in those results.

To be clear: In two of the last three years, there is no feedback at all — not honest, not dishonest, just nothing. Parents: When you get TNReady scores back this year, they will tell you nothing. Except that your child completed the test (maybe) and was (finally) able to submit an answer.

Oh, and there’s still no testing transparency. We can’t see the questions and answers, so we can’t be sure the tests are  “fully aligned to what our teachers are teaching.” 

Here’s some honest feedback: TNReady hasn’t worked. It didn’t work in year one. There were real problems in year two. This year’s administration was a debacle. In fact, going back to even the year before we started TNReady, there was a fiasco with quick scores.

More honesty: Over the past four years, with two different types of tests and multiple testing vendors, testing simply hasn’t worked in Tennessee. The one constant has been Candice McQueen. As a parent, I’ve had enough.

As if all of this weren’t enough, our state’s Education Commissioner and Governor appear to believe Tennesseans are too stupid to notice their bait and switch tactic regarding testing vendors. Alternatively, they may just believe no one cares.

The state’s Assessment Task Force keeps meeting. The Department of Education puts out more pie charts. The testing continues.

The TN DOE spokesperson closed the story by saying, “Now we need to focus on ensuring that administration of the test is seamless.”

Honestly?

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TNReady: Time for a Trade?

TC Weber thinks the TNDOE needs to trade in TNReady and the rest of the current testing regime for a new model:

The Tennessee Department of Education has faced a similar dilemma for the last few years. Every spring, without fail, there is some issue with the tests and they have to send them to the garage to be fixed. I think it’s safe to say that this year the equivalent of the transmission falling out. Parents, teachers, and even legislators have been telling the TNDOE that things are getting to the point that it’s getting cost prohibitive to fix and that we really need to start exploring a new policy. But unfortunately, the message doesn’t seem to be getting to the TNDOE. They just keep reaching for the checkbook, making a temporary fix, and then praying nothing else goes wrong.

It’s a good read and TC proposes some solid solutions, like using some of the new flexibility granted by ESSA to move toward a truly new model of testing.

Read it all here.

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