The Alaska School Board has approved tough new grading standards for the Alaska Measures of Progress standardized tests.<\/p>\n
The tests, issued to students in grades 3 to 10, replace the state\u2019s older testing system, but when results reach parents later this fall, they may bring a shock \u2014 the state projects only about one-third of students will be rated proficient.<\/p>\n
Those projections were released in August and were contingent upon the school board approving a grading scale that teachers recommended. Meeting on Friday, the school board followed the teachers\u2019 recommendation.<\/p>\n
In a public comment period before the final vote, superintendents across the state pleaded by teleconfrence to vote against the change.<\/p>\n
Deena Paramo of the Matanuska-Susitna Borough School District said the state needs to tone back its standardized testing. Others offering public testimony echoed that sentiment.<\/p>\n
Of the board\u2019s seven voting members, three voted yes, three were absent, and one voted no. The board needed a majority of present members to approve the scores.<\/p>\n
School and individual scores were expected to be released Monday, but staff at the Department of Education said the release was unexpectedly delayed.<\/p>\n
The tougher test mirrors others instituted across the country in an effort to make standardized tests more accurately reflect real-world achievement.<\/p>\n
The state\u2019s previous testing system found most students proficient even as half of incoming University of Alaska freshmen required remedial classes and one-fifth of Alaskans taking the ASVAB military test failed to meet minimum standards.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Alaska School Board has approved tough new grading standards for the Alaska Measures of Progress standardized tests. The tests, issued to students in grades 3 to 10, replace the state\u2019s older testing system, but when results reach parents later this fall, they may bring a shock \u2014 the state projects only about one-third of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[230],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-3332","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-state-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3332","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3332"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3332\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3332"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=3332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}