School waits for state decision
Local school officials have been given the raw data from last year’s STAAR testing and other determining factors, but they are still waiting for the Texas Education Agency to announce the formula that will be used to determine the district and campus scores for the federal school report card.
Normally, the letter grade system that is based on test scores for grade 3-8 and End of Course test scores, graduation rates, and College and Career Readiness are announced in August or September of each year.
“This year, TEA has not yet released the ratings or scores for school because of a lawsuit filed last summer about the method they were planning to use to calculate grades for the accountability system,” said Leigh Lowe, director of student services for the district. “Several districts joined the lawsuit, and that will have to be settled first before ratings will be issued.”
Albany ISD is not one of the districts that joined the lawsuit.
Lowe said that she recently sent out the raw data about test scoring for each grade level as required by law.
“This is the same type of report thatwehavebeenrequired to send out in the past, but there isn’t a rating with it yet,” she explained.“Idon’tknowifmany parents will look at it because it issomanypagesofinformation, and TEA hasn’t given us any formulas to determine what it all means because the lawsuit hasn’t been settled.”
She said that TEAstill plans to issue letter grades for districts and individual campuses unless that is changed by the outcome of the lawsuit.
Lowe said that elementary ratings are determined solely on STAAR test results, but secondary campuses ratings are determined by testing, graduation rates, and Career, College, Military Readiness (CCMR) scores.
One proposed change in the ratings that had been proposed is that a district can only score as high as its lowest scoring campus.
“There is just so much confusion and misconception about accountabilityandwhattesting results will mean because of several tentative changes and not knowing how the data will be used for a rating,” Lowe said.
In the case of local test scores, Lowe said that the school officials are not disappointed in the raw data.
“Overall, the test scores look good,” she said. “Of course, therearealwaysareasthat need improving.”
She noted that the secondary campus is bracing for their eventual rating, but not because of test scores.
“Test scores and growth look good at the elementary, and the testing data is good at the high school, but it will be the CCMR data that will be the problem there,” she said. “There are 13 indicators used for CCMR, such as TSI, ACT and SAT scores, graduation rates, and completion of industry-based endorsements.”
She said that the district enacted the endorsement plans as required, but the data is reported from previous graduating classes.
“This report will be based on 2022 graduates and how many industrybased endorsements or certifications students completed,”shesaid.“That was a much lower number two years ago, which will hurt us. About 90 percent of our seniors this year have will graduate with the requirements, but we can’t go back and do anything to improve scores from 2022.”
Part of the reason districts entered the lawsuit was due to the impact low CCMR ratings could have.
Lowe said districts started the endorsement programs in 2017, but that was disrupted by the COVID pandemic. Also, smaller districts struggled to implement new programs and have teachers obtain certification to teach new classes.
“Wearemuchimproved in those areas now, but it will all depend on what effect the lawsuit has on theratingsystemthatTEA originally proposed for this year,” Lowe said.
