LETTER TO THE EDITOR ABOUT THE TAAS READING SCORES:
Editor
The Katy Times
Dear Editor:
The Katy Times and the Houston paper have recently provided two pieces of
information that are interesting when put together.
The
Houston Chronicle on Sunday, February 22 listed the Katy
ISD schools giving the percent of students passing the basic skills reading portion of the
TAAS test,
the percent of students who were not counted and tested (which constitutes the percent
"not
accountable"), the per cent of students at each school of low income, and the number of
students tested in the 3rd, 4th, and 5th, grades.
The Katy
Times article on Wednesday, February 25 identified
thirteen KISD elementary schools that will be receiving "cash awards for either high
levels of sustained performance or improved student performance on the TAAS under the
Texas Successful Schools Awards System."
Of interest to parents in these KISD schools, I should think, is
what appears to be a rather high percentage of students in each of these schools who were
either not tested or not counted and therefore were "not accountable" for passing, much
less mastering, the reading portion of the TAAS.
The Houston paper chose to indicate reading passing rates
because they felt that reading is a "fundamental indicator of student success."
Some interesting questions come to mind when these two articles
are juxtaposed.
Why are ANY students
not held
accountable for learning to read in our public schools?
Does the principal at your child's school not want to know how
EVERYONE is doing?
Does the principal care more about the school's image than your
child's most basic skill?
Footnotes to the
Chronicle article reveal that
students may be exempted at the whim of individual school principals for several reasons
which include:
If students have limited English proficiency,
if they are in
special education, or if they just moved to the District within the year.
Since students may take the test in Spanish in the third and
fourth grades, were students allowed to do so in Katy ISD?
The Chronicle
also reports a charge made by a state representative, a Democrat, that "he had heard
testimony that schools were boosting their special education count just before the TAAS
was administered."
As a school board member I have heard from KISD parents who
felt that their children (who were in special education) were kept from taking the TAAS
(even though the parents wanted them to take it) so that their "low scores would not
affect the school's total average."
Do the special education students magically increase in number
just prior to the administration of the TAAS test in the Katy school district?
Looking at one of the KISD schools that made the "exemplary" list
is an interesting exercise.
Pattison Elementary, which is in an area of 0% low income, had
a 100% passing rate in reading (That means that of the students counted and tested, 100%
scored at least a 70 on the test, not a 100) and received an "exemplary" rating.
At Pattison, where there are approximately 90% white students,
6% Asian students, 2% African American students, and 2% Hispanic students, an 8% mobility
factor and a 2.5% limited English proficiency factor, a 2+% absentee rate, approximately
10% of the students were not held accountable for passing the reading portion of the TAAS.
Remember that this is a school in an area of ZERO percent low
income.
Most of the students come from families whose income is in the top 5%
in America and where there is substantial parental support for their children's
educational endeavors.
Even if the students are of a minority or are in special education,
after four years of being taught to read, almost all of them should be able to score at
least 70 on a basic skills reading test!
Does the possibility exist that at least one out of every six
students at this "Blue Ribbon School" cannot read?
Do parents at this school know why so many students are being
exempted from this test?
Do individual parents know if their child was exempted in theses
accountability figures?
Is the motivation for exempting students from accountability the
fact that schools receive taxpayer dollars for their "exemplary" or "recognized" status?
That awarding of money has been going on for many years, and
as a school board member, I objected vehemently to the program and the way the award money
was spent by schools.
When the awards of previous years were in the tens of thousands of
dollars, many of the previous "winners" spent several thousand dollars to put a tacky and
quickly outdated sign on their school building to proclaim their "award of excellence"
instead of using the money to teach all those students who are unable to read--how to do
it!
Are financial rewards and the accompanying bragging rights good
reasons to eliminate from 16 to 31% of the students at all KISD elementary schools from
being held accountable?
If 22% of these 3rd and 5th grade KISD students are not held
accountable for being able to read, shouldn't every KISD parent receive a clear
explanation as to the reasoning (or lack thereof) that led to this decision?
Parents should also be aware that the TAAS test is changed each
year, that almost all the scores across the state go "up."
How did the KISD percentage increase compare to the state's
percentage increase?
This statistic showing the weighted difference would be more
informative for parents.
(Parents may still view the actual TAAS test that their child was
given to see for themselves how simple it is, but how many parents in our school district
bothered to do so?)
I also would like to bring to the public’s attention that in a
gubernatorial election year, one of the opposing candidates chastised the sitting governor
for “changing standards [on the TAAS] so some Texas schools could show dramatic
improvements this year.”
“This new evidence proves that instead of measuring true performance,
the [governor’s] administration lowered the standards and played politics with the numbers
to create the false appearance of dramatic improvement.”
The sitting governor responded with “He [my opponent] says
that school performance rates have been lowered, but he’s ignoring the fact that every
measure we have of a student’s performance has gone up.
No one is arguing that raw test scores have improved in every
area in Texas…and [my opponent’ by ignoring that, is denigrating the hard work and
accomplishments of teachers and students across Texas.”
If you think this exchange occurred between Governor Bush and
Garry Mauro, guess again.
The clashing public figures were Governor Ann Richards and her
then critic, George W. Bush in 1994.
It does not matter who is in power; what matters is the
lengths to which they will go in order to fool the public so they can stay in power, and
the obvious losers in such political antics are the children in our public schools.
KISD parents should use the Pattison scenario to question the
statistics for each award winning elementary school.
Demographic information at your child’s school, if not known,
is available in the AEIS report which should be available at no cost to all parents.
If your child’s school is not on the “exemplary” or
“recognized” list, principals of these other schools should be sending these same figures
out in their newsletter.
Check out your child’s school with this chart:
EXEMPLARY SCHOOL
%Passing
Reading
%Not Held Accountable for Reading Ability
Bear Creek
97%
19.13%
Cimarron
90%
17.98%
Fielder
93%
22.24%
Hayes
96%
16.20%
Katy
98%
30.18%
Memorial Parkway
94%
15.89%
Nottingham Country
97%
17.58%
West Memorial
94%
17.29%
RECOGNIZED SCHOOL
% Passing Reading
%Not Held Accountable for Reading Ability
Golbow
94%
22.91%
Hutsell
92%
30.36%
Wolfe
91%
26.42%
All of these schools will receive cash rewards under the TEA program to
distribute tax dollars for such percentages of “achievement.”
If this information has not captured parents’ attention, may I
point out (one more time) that at Wesley Elementary School in Houston ISD where students
are taught to read using ONLY a strong phonics program, where the demographics are 98%
African-American, and where the low income percentage is 79%, only 7.23% of the students
were NOT held accountable, AND 83% of them passed the reading portion of the TAAS!!!
Apparently the principal at Wesley Elementary realizes that to
have a true understanding of student ability, one must include most of the students
instead of excluding 18.04% of them.
When all factors are counted, are these inner-city children
with none of the advantages of KISD students except having a good school that uses
research based curriculum and methodology receiving a much finer education than that
currently being provided to KISD students?
Why are KISD children being short changed in such a manner?
Why is the school wasting years of children’s school careers
by not teaching them to read?
What are the consequences for these children who are now so
far behind and who are not being held accountable for reading proficiency?
Who should parents hold responsible for this situation?
They should start by directing questions to Governor George
Bush, his personally appointed partner, the Commissioner of Education, Mike Moses and our
elected State Board of Education representative, Jack Christie who allow school districts
to engage in this irresponsible behavior.
If they refuse to acknowledge their responsibility, then turn
to our local public servants, the superintendent and the Katy ISD school board.
The superintendent had an option to develop a KISD
accountability system for our school district a couple of years ago and to recommend such
a system to the school board, but by default, (i.e. lack of interest and by not being
pro-active) this bunch chose instead to use the TAAS.
Think of it; KISD could be TAAS FREE!!!! The school board is
charged by law to inform the public when matters are not going well, but year after year
they allow the administration to announce “wonderful TAAS scores!”
Why does the Board allow this specious claim to go
unchallenged?
There is a school board election in May, and while there are many
extremely important educational concerns, this reading issue with all of its ramifications
should be central.
When 22% of the students in Katy ISD are not included in the TAAS
appraisal, how can KISD honestly rate its students’ performance?
If one assumes that these 22% are unable to read through the
fifth grade, there IS a problem.
Mary McGarr
1997