A Theory

While Governor Haslam thinks everything is just fine with TNReady, a Coffee County student offers a theory for why the results have been less than great in initial rounds of testing.

Coffee County High School student George Gannon offers this insight:

Flash-back to the first year of TNReady- 2016. The company that created the tests could not actually handle the online traffic of thousands of people taking their exam at once. It eventually crashed the server  and caused the third grade through eighth grade tests to be switched to paper. But then they couldn’t get those tests out fast enough, so the test ended up not being administered at all. This was a statewide problem that was so laughably bad, that even the state government looked at the “moron-athon” of a testing experience they had just paid $108 million dollars for and  said “Wow. This is a train wreck.”; this eventually led to the termination of their contract with Measurement Inc. (the testing company). What was happening on the high school end though?

We took the test. We took it that first year under the impression that our scores would be weighted with our final average. Well, that did not happen. Personally, I didn’t even get my scores back until the next year. Maybe it was just a first-year rollout problem? No. Even after switching testing companies, it was the same deal last year. I just got my scores back and as far as I’m aware, they’re not weighted into my final grade. Humorously enough, there is even evidence  recently of tests being scored completely wrong.

What I think happened last year, though, is that we all knew something would mess up. We knew from how the year prior went that the scores would be delayed. Therefore, I think what happened statewide with the carpet bomb of bad test scores was not a lack of knowledge, but instead a lack of concern and determination. Take these thoughts for examples of what was going through our heads:

“Who cares if I fail this test? It’s not like it’s gonna’ be a grade. It wasn’t last year!”

“There is no incentive to scoring well. Just passing is all right, because in the event they actually grade these, I’ll still pass.”

Also, students who took the tests were automatically exempt from their semester exams, so many of them probably thought, “I just have to take it; I don’t have to do well.”

So, in case you are wondering if all the TNReady mishaps have an impact on students, the student perspective says YES.

And here’s the deal. The impact on students impacts the test results — those results are used to (partially) evaluate teachers and to assign schools as Reward or Priority schools. The A-F grading scale for schools will be based on these results. The state’s inability to oversee an effectively administered test and/or get the results back in a timely fashion is disrupting learning and skewing results.

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport


 

Wrong Answer

In the never ending saga that is testing in Tennessee, the latest chapter spins a familiar but frustrating tale. It seems the state’s testing vendor incorrectly scored thousands of TNReady tests, impacting student score reports and teacher evaluation scores based on those student scores.

Jennifer Pignolet and Jason Gonzales have more:

About 9,400 TNReady tests across the state were scored incorrectly, according to the Tennessee Department of Education.

The scoring issue impacted about 70 schools in 33 districts. Just over 1,000 of the incorrectly scored tests were in Shelby County Schools, according to an email from Superintendent Dorsey Hopson to his board on Friday.

Approximately 1,700 of the total incorrect tests scores, once corrected, changed what scoring category that test fell into, possibly affecting whether a student passed the test.

The error also impacted value-added scores for up to 230 teachers. A separate problem could impact TVAAS scores for as many as 900 teachers.

The scope of the error means scores in nearly 25% of the state’s school districts will need to be corrected. The Department of Education says the testing vendor, Questar, is re-scoring the tests.

UPDATE — Here’s a list of districts impacted:

  • Achievement School District
  • Anderson County
  • Benton County
  • Bradley County
  • Bristol City
  • Carter County
  • Cocke County
  • Collierville City
  • Crockett County
  • Davidson County
  • Elizabethton City
  • Giles County
  • Hamilton County
  • Hardin County
  • Henry County
  • Huntingdon Special School District
  • Jackson-Madison County
  • Knox County
  • Lewis County
  • Lincoln County
  • Marshall County
  • Maryville City
  • Monroe County
  • Montgomery County
  • Obion County
  • Putnam County
  • Roane County
  • Rutherford County
  • Shelby County
  • Smith County
  • Sumner County
  • Union City
  • Weakley County

The State of Tennessee has spent millions of dollars on a new testing regime supposedly better able to assess student mastery of state standards. So far, all most students, teachers, and parents have seen is problems.

The first set of problems happened on day one of the initial online administration of the test in 2016. Then, a series of missed deadlines led to the state firing then-vendor Measurement, Inc. That’s the same company that hired test scorers via ads on Craigslist.

Of course, this is the same Department of Education that has repeatedly had issues with test score data.

If only there had been warning signs or calls to take the time to phase-in TNReady so that it best serves students and educators.

You know, something like:

TNReady is measuring different skills in a different format than TCAP. It’s BOTH a different type of test AND a test on different standards. Any value-added comparison between the two tests is statistically suspect, at best. In the first year, such a comparison is invalid and unreliable. As more years of data become available, it may be possible to make some correlation between past TCAP results and TNReady scores.

Or, if the state is determined to use growth scores (and wants to use them with accuracy), they will wait several years and build completely new growth models based on TNReady alone. At least three years of data would be needed in order to build such a model.

That’s from an article I wrote in March of 2015 about TNReady data and the challenges of adapting to a new test using our current accountability system.

That was BEFORE the 2016 TNReady mess. It was before the state had a problem getting data back this year.

How many warning signs will be ignored? How important is the test that it must be administered at all costs and the mistakes must be excused away because “accountability” demands it?

How can you hold students and teachers and schools accountable when no one is holding the Department of Education accountable? How long will legislators tolerate a testing regime that creates nightmares for our students and headaches for our teachers while yielding little in terms of educational value?

At least one school board has complained about the state’s handling of TNReady data this year. I suspect more will follow in the wake of this latest mistake.

So far, TNReady has sent one clear message: Accountability is a one way street in Tennessee and students, teachers, and districts are on the wrong end.

 

For more on education politics and policy in Tennessee, follow @TNEdReport