SLIDES: See Coverage of How PARCC States Scored Below
Headlines from coverage in other states have included, "Should N.J. worry about PARCC results? 'Yes and no,' testing expert says" (NJ.com) and "Most Illinois students fall short on new PARCC tests" (Chicago Tribune), among others of the "Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers" assessment.
"I posted yesterday a short piece by the eminent education researcher Gene V.Glass, who said that it would not take large numbers of opt outs to disrupt the testing machinery," said former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education and historian Ravitch last March. "Even 10%, he said, would invalidate the tests for its main uses."
Opponents to the PARCC test in Rhode Island, who had been vocal during the last school year, pointed to neighboring Massachusetts as being a state to watch, for how it moves forward — or not — with the standardized test.
“Watch Massachusetts. They are collecting signatures to get a question on the ballot to abandon Common Core. That may be the tipping point,” said Rhode Island parent and PARCC opponent Don Allen. “Massachusetts had the gold standards for education. If they get rid of Common Core, let's hope the rest of the nation will garner the courage to do the same. This is such a disservice to our teachers, our children and our future.”
While some states are wrestling with sub-par scores, some media outlets are taking the opportunity to point out that the results are necessary to turn around underperforming schools.
An editorial in the Baltimore Sun "embraced" the state's low scores.
"PARCC results reveal a sobering truth," wrote the editorial board on October 27. "Low scores are no reason to back away from PARCC. They are reason to embrace it."
“The Rhode Island Department of Education announced...that the Governing Board of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) voted Wednesday to use only one testing window and to reduce total testing time by 90 minutes in the coming school year (2015-16).”
Jean Lehane, a parent and organizer in Rhode Island of the group "Stop the Common Core" on Facebook, warned that school districts were trying to use “scare tactics” to make schools — and families — participate in PARCC, and not opt-out.
“From what I know, many of the higher scoring students opted out, so the scores could be lower. By the same token, we have a lot of special needs students that dropped out, so I'm not sure how that argument will play out,” said Lehane.
“The one thing that's interesting, is that we’re being pushed to have this 95% participation rate,” continued Lehane. “We’ve been told that if your school doesn't have that 95% rate you can lose your 'commended status' -- they said it was federal guideline.”
“What that’s telling us then is that this [commended] rating is essentially meaningless,” continued Lehane. “You’re going to penalize a school by taking away their [commended] status - for the Constitutional right for a student and family to opt out?”
Looking Ahead
What Rhode Islands results will show -- and how they compare to the other participating states -- remains to be seen.
“I was at a School Committee meeting last Thursday in Barrington about starting school later, for [student] health,” said parent and activist Joel Hellman. “The students who spoke didn't want to start school later. What they wanted was a reduction in stress. Too much homework, too many extracurriculars and too much testing."
“PARCC is being reduced to 29 hours. REDUCED! With prep and recovery time that is about 4 weeks of school,” said Hellman. “And with that test being bandied about as a graduation requirement how much stress is that? My sophomore daughter is taking US history this year - they no longer cover the Revolutionary War because there isn't enough time. Why? PARCC testing, and History isn't on the test."
Related Slideshow: National PARCC Test Results Fall 2015
As Rhode Island gets set to release its PARCC scores on Tuesday, November 17, here is a look at coverage of the results from the other participating states.
In the 2014-15 school year, 5 million students in 11 states and the District of Columbia took the PARCC annual assessments in grades 3-11, although not all participating states have students in all grades taking the test. Students in the following states took PARCC assessments in the 2014-15 school year: Arkansas, Colorado, District of Columbia, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Jersey, New Mexico, Ohio, and Rhode Island.
"2015 PARCC test results for high schoolers illustrate lack of rigor in old Arkansas Benchmark test," wrote the Arkansas Times, following the release of the high school scores on October 8.
On November 12, Arkansas News reported that "results showed that the percentage of students meeting academic expectations ranged from 35 percent on the seventh-grade English language arts test to 17 percent on the eighth-grade math test."
"Moreover, only 3rd grade met the 95 percent participation level that’s required. The participation rate dropped as the age group increases, dropping to 50 percent in 11th grade students.
But the scores cannot be compared to old tests because the new tests measure different concepts and skills and are the first to be aligned to the Colorado Academic Standards, said Interim Commissioner of Education Elliott Asp.
“These scores don’t provide an apples-to-apples comparison to old test scores,” Asp said. “The new tests measure different things – such as where students are in developing the critical-thinking and problem-solving skills outlined in the Colorado Academic Standards. We should all consider these scores as a new baseline from which we will measure the future success of Colorado students."
"In the new high school PARCC results released today, 27 percent of DC Public Schools (DCPS) students are proficient and on track for college and career in 10th grade English, while 12 percent of DCPS students are proficient and on track for college and career in Geometry," said DC School Department on October 27.
"In a troubling picture of performance, the vast majority of Illinois students failed to reach the high academic bar on the new state PARCC exams, meaning they weren't on track academically for the next grade level, let alone for college or careers.
Preliminary statewide results from last spring's testing, released for the first time Wednesday, reveal the extent to which students fell short of the key goal of the Common Core movement, to ultimately prepare students for higher education and the world of work."
"These was the first and perhaps last year for the tests, which were developed by the Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers. Months before the scores came out, Louisiana lawmakers decided the state would not use the complete partnership exam in 2016.
The exams tested students on national Common Core education standards, which Louisiana adopted years ago. They were entirely different from the old LEAP and iLEAP that Louisiana used, and were considered much harder. The results released Thursday are the first thorough school-by-school and system-by-system look at how students scored.
Common Core opponents have said low scores would show the national standards aren't working. But [Superintendent John] White has said low Louisiana scores are exactly why the state needs higher standards, although like other proponents, he no longer uses the politically controversial term "Common Core."
An editorial in the Baltimore Sun "embraced" the state's low scores.
"PARCC results reveal a sobering truth," wrote the editorial board on October 27. "Low scores are no reason to back away from PARCC. They are reason to embrace it."
"The Maryland State Department of Education released the first results from the state's new, Common Core-aligned standardized tests showing that less than half of Maryland students got passing grades on 10th grade English, Algebra I and Algebra II.
It would be tempting to look at those figures and join the chorus of those arguing that the exams, known as PARCC, are too hard, too time consuming and too distracting from the actual business of teaching and learning in the classroom. But the truth is, they tell us something we need to know, something that has been obscured by years of steadily rising scores on our old tests and seemingly perennial top rankings for Maryland's schools. Disturbing percentages of Maryland's high school graduates are unprepared for college or careers, and that unwelcome distinction falls much more heavily on African-Americans, Hispanics, special education students and English language learners."
Much of the discussion in Massachusetts Education circles, and especially in Worcester, this past year has been centered about the value of the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) tests. Worcester’s tests results were released with all the districts today.
Statewide, 60 percent met the standard in English and 52 percent in math. In Worcester only 41 percent met the standard in English and a woeful 29 percent for math. In Auburn, 57 percent met the standard for math and 67 percent for English.
"Nearly half of Mississippi high school students' proficiency levels dip on multi-state test," wrote GulfLive on November 5.
"Nearly half of Mississippi high school students met or exceeded expectations in English last year, while about 27 percent did so in algebra I, according to test results released Thursday.
Those are the first findings from Mississippi's only administration of a multi-state test meant to measure achievement under new academic standards.
The results are a big drop from the 2014 state tests, when 83 percent passed the previous Mississippi-only algebra test, with 76 percent rating proficient or advanced. In English, 72 percent of students passed in 2014, with 56 percent were rated proficient or advanced.
The drop was expected, though. State Superintendent Carey Wright said standards on Mississippi's old tests were too low."
"New Jersey students who spent multiple days last spring taking the new PARCC exams will not be getting their individual scores until next month.
But the state got its first clue Tuesday on how students did on the controversial test when education officials released New Jersey's statewide results in a lengthy presentation in West Trenton.
The data showed fewer than half of New Jersey students scored high enough in math or English to meet the expectations for their grade levels.
As expected, state officials cautioned PARCC -- short for the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers exams -- is new and should not be compared to previous standardized tests in New Jersey, which showed a higher percentage of students were proficient for their grade level."
"PARCC test scores for New Mexico high school students released," wrote KRQE News on October 16. "The initial results show New Mexico High Schoolers are not where they need to be in math or English."
"In algebra two, only about 17 percent of students in the state are proficient. Fewer than one percent exceeded standards.
As for English and language arts, about 45 percent of high school juniors met or exceeded expectations. Only 27 percent of freshman met that mark.
Education Secretary Hanna Skandera says the results can’t be compared to past standardized tests because the tests are completely different."
"A little more than one third of Ohio students met the higher academic standards on the new Common Core tests this year, early results from the PARCC testing coalition show.
Data shared with the state school board moments ago shows that between 35 and 40 percent of kids in most elementary and middle school grades "met expectations" or scored higher on their English and math exams, as set by officials of the 12 states still in PARCC.
The results are higher - more than 50 percent - on some of the high school exams, which were taken this year by a small number of advanced 9th graders."
