Illinois released the results of Common Core test results, and the proportion of students who met PARCC’s wildly unrealistic expectations declined from previous years.
“In a troubling picture of performance, the vast majority of Illinois students failed to reach the high academic bar on the new state PARCC exams, meaning they weren’t on track academically for the next grade level, let alone for college or careers.
“Preliminary statewide results from last spring’s testing, released for the first time Wednesday, reveal the extent to which students fell short of the key goal of the Common Core movement, to ultimately prepare students for higher education and the world of work.
“Between 26 and 36 percent of third-through-eighth-grade students “met expectations” or “exceeded expectations” on the PARCC math exams. In English language arts/literacy, the figure was 33 to 38 percent for third-through-eighth-graders.
“In high schools the picture was even more dismal, with 17 percent of students meeting or exceeding expectations in math while 31 percent did so in English language arts/literacy. In high school, districts had the choice to give the exams in various grades, depending on the level of courses students were taking in math and English. For example, districts could give ninth-graders the Algebra 1 PARCC exam.
“The Illinois State Board of Education’s data is not complete but includes students who took the exams online, which represents more than 75 percent of test takers. Results of students taking the exams with paper and pencil will be melded into final results later.
“The scores on the new exams are lower than any statewide test results since 2001, data shows, when the state launched the Prairie State Achievement Examination for high school juniors. The Illinois Standards Achievement Test for grade school students had debuted in 1999. The percentage of students meeting and exceeding expectations on those exams since 2001 never dipped below 50 percent statewide, even after the state made it tougher to pass the grade school tests.”
These are the dismal results that the test developers of PARCC and Smarter Balanced planned for and predicted.
Some educators recognized the tests for what they are: madness .
“For educators following the debate over testing and the new exams, the results were expected.
“We’ve been writing and meeting with ISBE officials for over two years to stop this madness. We’ve told them that our technology isn’t ready, our Common Core curriculum isn’t ready and the test will be hurting kids,” said Argo Community High School District 217 Superintendent Kevin O’Mara, who also is president of the Illinois High School District Organization.
“They didn’t listen then; I hope with a new ISBE chairman and a new ISBE state superintendent, they’ll finally rethink PARCC and get back to helping students learn.”
With a rabidly pro-charter Governor Rauner, students and educators can’t expect much relief. These are results that discredit public education and can be used by the privatizers to push their agenda.
As Mercedes Schneider has repeatedly declared, there is zero evidence that these tests are an accurate gauge of college or career readiness.
Mercedes writes:
“Chin up, Illinois. These lousy scores are only a half-full glass. Besides, there will be other PARCC states releasing terrible scores, and we can make it a senseless contest to see which of the few PARCC states is the worst.
“Of course, there is no evidence that PARCC and its Common Core host have any empirically-established, practical connection to any useful outcome. But practicality is beside the test-obsessed point. These scores must be useful because they’re just too awful to not accurately capture the marketed message about American public education.”
Are we to consider that a state test with 50% proficient is significantly less damaging to the kids than a Parcc test with 30% proficient? 40% less damaging ?
With all the information provided, how much longer will the testing frenzy last?
I suspect Gov. Rauner is happy with these results so that he can move ahead with his quest for more charter schools that are privately managed but publicly funded. This report falls right into the “disaster capitalism” philosophy where you make or take a crisis and convince the public that free market capitalism is the solution to the problem or crisis.
The PARCC testing that my students took last February and May was confusing and at least 2 grade levels ahead. The people responsible for this are evil, and I hope they like hot places. They are all headed there. It is flat out child abuse. The evil ones want to fire teachers based on these worthless scores. The evil ones can go ahead and just get rid of me, but leave my students alone. The teacher shortages have begun. No one has the right to abuse children and teachers like this. No one. Fewer and fewer young people will enter a profession which leaves them abused, poor, and feeling of no value to anyone.
I am not a psychometrician, but I bet I could set cut scores at a place where even the best-performing public schools have 90% of students not meeting expectations. What a con game!
It’s amazing the drop in proficiency between middle school and high school. Obviously our middle school teachers are more effective, but middle and high school teachers are clearly still ineffective. The scores are too low. You’re all fired.
LOL, but seriously. As expected – no doubt.
The grim, joyless ed reform “movement” grinds on. Now that you know “The Truth” you’re instructed to go make demands on your local public schools- “why aren’t these scores higher?” Just keep “demanding” that and you’ll get it. That’s the magic of high expectations.
I’ve been listening to the President’s speeches on education. He’s very upset that children don’t get art and music in public schools anymore. He admits they did in the past, but he seems baffled by where those “extras” might have gone.
He should go to a school board meeting. I know they’re not big fans of elected school boards in the Obama Administration but I think he’d find out his testing agenda is driving all these decisions. Repeating “it’s not either/or but is instead plus/and!” over and over probably isn’t realistic although it sounds very free-markety and business-like.
Ya Obama, where’s the art and music we can believe in.
There’s just no connection between what they say and what they do anymore- none.
Hillary Clinton gave a speech slamming “Wall Street” the day after a Wall Street fundraiser. It’s like “Wall Street” is two words used to describe some entirely different thing than Wall Street- the real one- the center of the finance sector 🙂
Our school still has gym everyday, art twice a week, music twice a week and a media class for online safety and such…we live in district that has 75% of student live in low income homes…it is not Obama that is taking the art and music out of the classroom it is your school districts curriculum please place the blame where it belongs…not on the presidents lap!!
Also please educate yourself on common core standards vs your school districts curriculum – common core standards are not evil they are a list of skills that should be taught in each grade regardless of where you live – like learning to multiply and divide in 3rd grade no matter where you live…in some states children were not learning multiplication and division until 5th or 6th grade…
However the curriculum determines HOW these skills are taught and your school districts determine which curriculum is used at your school so if you are seeing really stupid questions on homework sheets, or stupid formulas being used to teach ‘new math’, don’t yell about common core…common core says they need to learn to add – the curriculum your school uses determines the HOW they are taught and provides the text books, worksheets and tests that are used.
As for the PARCC until i see the results for my daughter I am withholding judgement….I know the test was really hard, I know the benchmark was being set high…and I knew the fail rate would be awful…these kids have only been learning these ‘skills’ for a year or two in some states learning to think differently takes time – in 5 years or 10 years – then and only then could we really see how well students are doing!!
The tests and questions on them are so fatiguing in their inherent stupidity, that students will opt out in their motivation to try hard or give a damn. Failing half or more, any mildly sentient group will conclude, either we really made no effort to learn, or B, the test was unfair.
And you know what, many teachers are forced to use that data to reteach standards. It’s complete BULL.
Forgot the ? mark there. Sorry.
When I gave the PARCC test to a group of seventh grade students in my urban middle school last spring, they all managed to click through and finish it in 10 minutes. The passages were too long and too difficult so they just didn’t bother and filled in any answer. And to think, that a teacher’s job rating will be dependent on these tests that the students didn’t even try to read.
What’s worse is that a teacher can work with these 7th grade students and bring them up 2 or more grade levels and still end up on a Corrective Action Plan because the student didn’t jump to proficient based on these arbitrary cut scores.
I will interested to see how the breakdown of teacher evaluations are effected as a result of these results. I don’t see how 40% of teacher evaluations will be able to be based on PARCC scores because all teachers would be labeled as “ineffective”. Until an effective method to motivate students to put effort into these tests is established, I doubt that these results will increase by a significant amount.
I am SO sick of the media buying the “This test proves that students are ready for college and careers” garbage. I wish ONE reporter in the U.S. would actually research this claim and discover that there’s no evidence to support that claim. The media is also complicit in selling public schools to the highest bidder.
The media is now an arm of the corporate world they serve. Only when ‘anti-reform’ reaches a critical mass in market terms will the media become skeptical of reformers
Th
Threatened Out West,
You are right. There is no evidence that CCSS will make anyone college and career ready
As expected because that decision was made years before the test was created. It is all part of the plot.
“Part of the Plan” (Parody of Dan Fogelberg)
I have these moments, all steady and strong
I’m feeling so wholly self-righteous
The next thing I know, all the test scores are weak
And I’m starting to laugh, and I might just
The meanings get lost and the teachings get tossed
And they don’t know what they’re going to do next
They wait for the sun but it never quite comes
Some kind of message comes through to you
Some kind of message comes through
And it says to you
Test when you can
Fire when you have to
Close if you must that’s a part of the plan
Await O’s arrival
Just like in the Bible
And one day they’ll all understand
One day they’ll all understand
One day they’ll all understand
I VAMmed a teacher, who gave kids her soul
But she wasn’t ready to take it
She mounted a challenge so heavy and bold
And I am afraid I won’t break it
Your confidence shakes and you hide your mistakes
And you wish someone would buy your bull-sessions
Your claims miss their mark and the night gets so dark
And some kind of message comes through to you
Some kind of message shoots through
And it says to you
Test when you can
Fire when you have to
Close if you must that’s a part of the plan
Await Rahm’s arrival
Just like in the Bible
And one day they’ll all understand
One day they’ll all understand
One day they’ll all understand
“You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.” – Abraham Lincoln
The greed-is-good no matter who suffers neo-liberal reformers are desperately racing the clock to beat the time when most of the people can’t be fooled by them anymore, and they are losing ground fast.
The Opt Out numbers going from 60k to 220k in one year shows how fast and in desperation the deformers say they are going to shorten the tests but change nothing else in another attempt to fool enough fools to hold out longer as they chase their goal of wealth, wealth and more wealth no matter who suffers from what they do.
Yep, Lloyd. ALEC.
Here’s some news from MA
http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/09/17/why-mass-rich-because-smart/cvnVRtRguWgUMFZ34nGbBO/story.html?s_campaign=email_BG_TodaysHeadline&s_campaign=
I want my $400M back (IL)! What a rip off!
When will there be demographic break down of the data? That will be the most revealing information. The racial and ethnic data will be extremely informative.
Paul Buchheit, writing for Buzzflash at Truthout, reported the amount that just 10 companies combined, underpaid in 2014 Illinois state taxes, would cover the entire 2016 projected deficit of the Chicago Public School system. Buchheit singles out the policies of Rauner and Emanuel as contributing to the deficit.