Philadelphia state test scores are months late. Now state officials want to change the cut scores.
Did you know search engines like Google are changing the way you see news? Keep Chalkbeat’s valuable education coverage at the top of your feeds by clicking here and checking the box next to our name. Pennsylvania state officials have proposed changing how they score students’ performance on state math and reading tests, making it easier for students to be considered “advanced.” The proposal , which Pennsylvania Department of Education officials shared with the state’s Board of Education Thursday, would have implications for how the state measures student achievement and schools’ success, and would apply to tests students took months ago. It comes after months of uncertainty over delayed test results in Philadelphia, where families and teachers have repeatedly asked officials to release the scores they usually get in August. State officials acknowledged the department’s cut score review contributed to the wait. “This delayed reporting. It’s not great timing,” Brian Campbell, director of the Department of Education’s bureau of curriculum, assessment, and instruction, told board members Thursday. But he said the state was overdue in updating score thresholds set more than a decade ago, and this would create “a new baseline.” Students take state tests every spring to evaluate whether
