More on PARCC and Its Cut Scores
On September 11, 2015, I wrote a post entitled, “PARCC Cut Scores to Differ by State?”
In that post, I noted that PARCC was reluctant to publicize its cut scores. Reporter Catherine Gewertz of EdWeek first noted the absence of the full set of PARCC cut scores in her September 10, 2015, post. However, she later updated her post because PARCC decided to produce the missing cut scores. From Gewertz’s update:
UPDATE: PARCC decided Thursday afternoon to release the rest of the cut scores. Updated “mock” score reports on its website, which had earlier had placeholder numbers for cut scores, now show the actual cut scores the board approved, according to PARCC assessment chief Jeff Nellhaus. They are: 700 to score at Level 2, 725 to score at Level 3, and, as previously reported, 750 to score at Level 4. The cut point for Level 5 will vary somewhat by grade and subject, but will be around 803, Nellhaus said during a webinar for the Education Writers Association.
Thus, it reads like the PARCC cut scores are a done deal. However, when I read the PARCC website page also dated September 10, 2015, entitled, “Setting Cut Scores”, I noticed this bit of information at the end of the page:
With the conclusion of performance level setting last week, the work of these 200 or so educators will go to the PARCC states, whose state education commissioners/superintendents will make the final call on what level or work shows each level of performance. That, in turn, sets the stage for the release of the first-ever PARCC score results this fall.
So, the work of the PARCC committee setting PARCC cut scores is to “go back to the PARCC states.” And it is with the PARCC states’ superintendents that the “final call” will be made. Therefore, it is logical to conclude that the PARCC cut-score-setting is not a done deal.
Furthermore, the information above does not indicate that these superintendents will arrive at a single set of cut scores to be utilized in all of their states.
I concluded that the superintendents could be acting independently and could arrive at their own determinations of cut scores for their states. When noting the collective work of PARCC states, the PARCC MOU uses the term “the Consortium,” which is not the term used above.
On September 12, 2015, David Connerty-Marin, who Gewertz identified in More on PARCC and Its Cut Scores | deutsch29: