BY Caroline Kornegay: Staff Writer

With the end of another grading period approaching, the debate continues about what school systems are doing with all the tests scores and what they really mean.

More and more emphasis has been put on test scores in recent years as a way to make sure students are learning what they need to know and to ensure that the money being pumped into public school systems is getting results.

Test scores can be an extremely useful tool. But they can also provide misleading, often arbitrary statistics.

In 1996, Moore County crafted an accountability formula that used scores on state mandated-tests, the system’s performance on the state ABCs, SAT scores and the dropout rate to measure how it stacked up against school systems throughout the state. The model came about as the result of a mediated settlement of a budget dispute between the county commissioners and the Board of Education.

The school board took the commissioners to court in an effort to get more money. The commissioners wanted some way to measure student achievement and how well the school system was performing, to justify increased expenditures on public education.

The accountability model was tossed out two years ago, in part because of its reliance on SAT scores. The school system, under former Superintendent Pat Russo, came under fire for the use of incentives — along with the fact that the money came from state funds intended for at-risk pupils — paid to students at one high school to improve SAT scores.

While the school board has discussed other options for measuring its performance, it has not implemented another formula.

That leaves test scores as the primary way to judge the system’s performance.

The Moore County school system keeps a close eye on the numbers. But interpreting them can be difficult.

Dr. Sally Ward , director for research, evaluation and grant development for the school system, tracks all of the scores for all of the students and deciphers the statistics into hard facts schools can use to see how effectively they are teaching.

Schoolchildren take a number of tests during the year at different intervals. In theory, the scores reflect how well they are learning. The collective thinking holds that the higher the scores, the more the child retains from the lesson. And the more children with high test scores, the better the schools in the system.

Students are tested about three to four days every year, beginning in kindergarten and continuing through eighth grade. Once students reach high school, they have exams in each subject, but there are only two state-required tests that they must pass before graduation — reading and math. That standard will change next year when ninth-graders are requir-ed to take five subject exams.

‘Course Adjustments’

Testing serves very specific purposes, Ward said. Unfor-tunately, not all scores are understood or used as they should be.

Exams are a way of determining if students are retaining what they need to learn during the year. Testing students in January helps check their progress.

“That’s to enable our teachers to get a mid-year feel,” Ward said. “We don’t want to wait until the end of the year to find out they didn’t get it.”

Ward keeps a large database that includes three years’ worth of test scores on every student in the county.

North Carolina uses a “growth model” when it comes to testing, Ward says, to keep track of how much progress students have made from the beginning to the end of the year.

That is a part of the state ABCs accountability program that shows whether schools are meeting or exceeding expected growth.

Students who came in with low test scores might still have low test scores at the end of the year, but there may have been progress in those 180 days.

Keeping such a close eye on the progress students make through testing is one way of identifying problems in the classroom, as well as possible patterns in certain schools or sections of the system.

“We want to problem-solve,” Ward said. “It helps us make course adjustments.”

Ward said standardized testing can be especially helpful to newer teachers as they tweak their lesson plans to make sure they are teaching as effectively as possible.

The data on test scores helps educators identify students who need additional help or additional types of instruction.

Pros and Cons

Testing is an issue that often pits different factions of educators against each other, with all sides claiming they want what’s best for the children.

Standardized, multiple-choice tests are the most common diagnostic tests to find out how much children are learning. All North Carolina schools must follow the state’s standard course of study. The state-mandated tests are intended to determine if students are learning that.

Testing is costly in a number of ways, according to Ward. There is a great deal of effort, time and money involved in testing and then breaking down the data, she said.

“You lose the bulk of the day when you test,” she said.

Critics argue that it’s stressful for the students and the teachers.

Another common criticism is that teachers are simply teaching to the test, which might not result in providing students with a well-rounded education in all subjects.

“You don’t want to close the gap by the top going down, but by the bottom coming up,” she said.

Students have end-of-grade exams in reading and math in third through eighth grades. Fourth- and seventh-graders are tested in writing, which is not multiple choice, but does have some standard pieces.

And testing begins in eighth grade for computer competency, a requirement for graduation.

Kindergartners, first- and second-graders have locally administered skills tests to check their progress with fundamentals.

“We also do some local testing at the system level to make sure things don’t slip through the cracks,” Ward said.

More Questions Than Answers

Dr. Susan Purser, superintendent of the Moore County school system, says test scores are for raising questions, not finding answers.

Purser said testing is helpful, but it can also be a hindrance.

“I feel like I’m talking out of both sides of my mouth sometimes,” she said.

There needs to be a body of knowledge that all students share and learn from, Purser said, but that shouldn’t hinder the involvement in other areas.

“I do believe it is of great importance to have a body of knowledge,” she said, but she added that such pressure on the numbers “has caused schools to narrow their focus.”

The federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) has increased that pressure. If students in a certain subgroup fail to meet the standard, that particular school fails to meet its Adequate Yearly Progress.

“It is grossly misused,” Purser said of the NCLB scores.

Ward is also concerned that the tests students are required to pass set the bar far too low for the system as a whole.

“I really worry that the federal statutes are not as good as we could be,” Ward said.

Test scores are easy-to-compare numbers. It’s easy to fall into the trap of simply looking at whether all the children measure up to an arbitrary standard or not on a given day at a given time, Purser said of the tests.

“Is it working?” she said. “That’s really the question to ask.”