Schools’ goals reset for CATS testing

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January 9, 2009

By AMBER DILLEY The Glasgow Daily Times Fri Jan 09, 2009, 10:42 AM CST

GLASGOW — The use of concordance tables by the Kentucky Department of Education changed many schools’ 2008 Kentucky Core Content scores statewide, but the change has no effect on schools’ accountability judgments. The change will instead affect the 2009-10 testing cycle and beyond, according to KDE officials.

“The change in goals and baselines doesn’t affect their prior scores at all — if they met their goals for the 2007-08 cycle, they are still considered to have met their goals. If they didn’t meet their goals, they still are not meeting their goals,” said Lisa Gross, spokesperson for KDE.

KDE used concordance tables in determining schools’ 2007 and 2008 accountability indices due to dramatic changes in the KCC exam in 2006.

“To make the system statistically sound, scores from those years were run through the concordance process. This resulted in two index scores for schools — an adjusted index and a nonadjusted index,” Gross said. “The adjusted accountability index was used to determine if schools met their goals for the 2007-08 testing cycle.”

Some area educators were hoping the change in KCC scores due to the use of concordance tables would mean schools’ accountability judgments would change and that some would now be classified as having met goal.

Caverna Elementary was one out of three schools in the Caverna Independent School District that met goals. The other schools, Caverna Middle and High schools, were listed as progressing based on their 2008 KCC scores.

The middle school had a 2007-08 accountability index of 70. Its improvement goal was 81.4, which meant it did not meet goal, but was classified as progressing.

With the change in scores due to the concordance tables, the school’s 2007-08 accountability index became 74.3. Its improvement goal was changed to 73.2, which would lead people to think that the school is meeting goal.

A similar thing happened to the high school, which was also originally classified as progressing. The school had a 2007-08 combined accountability index of 70.2 and an improvement goal of 80.9. With the concordance tables, the school has a 2007-08 combined accountability index of 71.2 and an improvement goal of 70.0.

The district’s other school, Caverna Elementary, was originally classified as meeting goal and its classification did not change due to the use of the concordance table.

The elementary school’s 2007-08 combined accountability index was 85.1 and its improvement goal was 84. Its adjusted 2007-08 accountability index became 88.2 and its improvement goal 86.9.

“If classifications had changed at this point we would have had all of our schools and district meeting or exceeding goal,” said Sam Dick, superintendent, adding he was not upset by the news that school classifications would not be changing. “It is good to know that the impact will be felt in the next accountability cycle. So we will be patient and elaborate on our success later.”

Metcalfe County schools’ scores also changed due to the use of the concordance tables.

“All of our schools and district baseline scores increased based on the new goals established by KDE between now and 2014,” said Bennie Stephens, director of secondary education. “The district and all schools besides Metcalfe County High School now have met goal.”

“The goal for all of our schools and the district is to be at 100 by 2014. We now have some new goals to meet,” Stephens said.

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