Breaking News! The PARCC Cut Scores Have Been Set but Still No Results Released by LDOE
The PARCC cut scores for each level of performance have now been released by the PARCC consortium and other states are already starting the process of informing parents about how their children scored on the PARCC tests. The lowest passing score for Louisiana students is suppored to be level 3 performance which the PARCC consortium has decided will be represented by a score of 725 out of a possile 850 points.
Please click on this link to see how the Illinois Department of Education plans to inform each parent about the performance of his/her child the new PARCC tests similar to the PARCC tests given in Louisiana this Spring.
Notice that on this particular 5th grade math test the possible scale scores range from 650 to 850. In many cases these scale scores bear little relationship to the percentage of questions the student answered correctly. For example, suppose a student got frustrated or ill and did not answer any of the questions. He just gave his name or ID on his test form and could not answer any of the questions. My understanding is that this student would still get a score of 650. Suppose that another student answered 25 questions correctly out of 75 questions on the test. If the raw cut score for level 2 performance is 26 out of 75, then that student would be awarded a score between 650 and 700 and still be rated at level #1. That's the same as the student who answered none of the questions correctly. Does this make any sense to you?
This is just one example of how obscure and non-sensical the grading on these PARCC tests can be.
Most parents and teachers understand the concept of a raw score.The raw score for a particular child is the percentage of questions that the student got right. For example, a raw score of 33.3% on the test above means that the student got 25 out of Louisiana Educator: Breaking News! The PARCC Cut Scores Have Been Set but Still No Results Released by LDOE: