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Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Standardized testing scores the public never sees

Standardized testing scores the public never sees:


Standardized testing scores the public never sees


testsD.C. public school students take a lot of standardized tests, but, it turns out,  the scores are never released. You may think they are because city officials do turn out some numbers, but they aren’t actual scores — and the District is not the only place this happens. Here to explain is Matthew Di Carlo, senior fellow at the non-profit Albert Shanker Institute, located in Washington, D.C. This post appeared on the institute’s blog.
By Matthew Di Carlo
We’ve entered the time of year during which states and districts release their testing results. It’s fair to say that the two districts that get the most attention for their results are New York City and the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS), due in no small part to the fact that both enacted significant, high-profile policy changes over the past 5-10 years.
The manner in which both districts present annual test results is often misleading. Many of the issues, such as misinterpreting changes in proficiency rates as “test score

The perfect summer read — about reading
I don’t usually recommend books, but while on vacation, I smiled all the way through 117 pages of a novella about the unadulterated joy of reading. “The Uncommon Reader,” by English dramatist Alan Bennett, first published in 2007, is an … Continue reading →