WHY THE TEA DEVELOPED THE TEXAS PROJECTION MEASURE:
By HOLLY K. HACKER /
The Dallas Morning News
hhacker@dallasnews.com
(This link doesn't work because newspapers get heat for writing such articles, and so they take them down.)
This year North Texas, like the rest of the state, produced a bumper crop of top-rated public schools. But those schools didn't always earn top TAKS scores to match.
More than a third of local campuses rated "exemplary" fell short of the official standard � a 90 percent pass rate on all TAKS tests. But these schools benefited from a new rule that says it's OK if kids fail the test, so long as they're predicted to pass in a future year.
The Morning News looked in-depth at six local schools to show how the new "Texas Projection Measure" helped some campuses. In each case, the rule helped schools move up a notch, from "recognized" to "exemplary."
The state's school accountability ratings, released Friday, come with two sets of numbers: the actual TAKS pass rate, and the adjusted pass rate that includes students who failed but, according to a complex statistical formula, will most likely pass in a year or two or three.
In some cases, there's a sizable gap between the two numbers. For instance, at Withers Elementary School in Dallas, 80 percent of fourth-graders passed the writing test. That's good enough to rate "recognized," but not "exemplary."
But the state's formula predicts the remaining 20 percent of those kids will pass the writing test in seventh grade, the next time it's given. Now Withers can claim a 100 percent pass rate on the writing TAKS.
Withers got the same break on the reading TAKS. (The North Dallas school didn't need it for math or science, because more than 90 percent of students passed those tests.) So the state awarded Withers the "exemplary" rating.
Why did the state add the rule? Education officials say they wanted to recognize schools that make progress with struggling students who still fall short academically. Those students often come from poor families, are learning English or have other challenges.
The state requires all students, plus four groups of students (white, black, Hispanic and poor) to meet the TAKS passing standards.
Bottom line: The state is trying to recognize that teachers in many Dallas public schools have a tougher job than their peers in the affluent Park Cities. Critics, meanwhile, say the new projection measure dilutes the ratings.
When a school boasts of its exemplary rating, did the kids really ace the TAKS? Now it's harder to know without digging into a bunch of data.
CHARTING THE TAKS RATING BOOST
Here's a look at six North Texas schools that boosted their state rating to the highest category � exemplary � because of a new rule that overlooks failing TAKS scores of students who are predicted to pass in the future. A TAKS passing rate of 90 percent is required for exemplary status.
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To see your school's results, visit the Texas Education Agency's Web site, www.tea.state.tx.us.
SOURCE: Texas Education Agency