All Chicago recently celebrated the news that school test scores rose dramatically this year, continuing an upward trend and reaching the highest level since Mayor Richard Daley took over the public schools in 1995.
Specifically, more than 43 percent of our elementary schoolchildren are now testing at or above national norms in reading while almost 47 percent reached national norms in math. By comparison, in 1996, elementary reading scores were at 26.5 percent and math was at 31 percent.
This year’s 8th grade scores in both reading and math exceeded the national average for the first time in memory, and high school reading scores also rose.
By any measure, our schoolchildren are performing at a much higher academic level than at any time in the last decade.
So it was particularly disappointing to see the Tribune’s “Social-promotions gate swings open; Chicago teachers pass 14,000 pupils who flunked tests” (Page 1, June 2), asserting our promotion standards are down and our promotion policy is weakened. Neither is true.
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The article suggests that because fewer students are retained, standards must be dropping. Let me make something absolutely clear. We are retaining fewer students today for one reason only: Performance is going up, and rising test scores prove it.
In fact, we have reduced the number of students in the lowest quartile from 35 percent across all grades to just 25 percent today. Clearly, while there is still much more to be done, our students are doing better, and that’s why fewer are being retained.
The article also wrongly implies that I “will” raise standards, when the fact is I already did last fall. Since then we have further adjusted our standards and promotion policy in response to new, more accurate year 2000 national norms, instead of the old norms, which were from 1988.
The article mischaracterizes changes in our promotion policy from previous years that were designed to make it more thoughtful, fair and progressive. Rather than a single cutoff point for promotions, the Chicago Public Schools now divides students into three categories:
– Those who meet or exceed the highest standards and are automatically promoted.
– Those who fall into a middle range, meeting minimum standards, and who are promoted only after attending summer school.
– Those who fail to meet even minimum standards and are not promoted unless they attend summer school and meet minimum standards after being retested.
For those who are not automatically promoted, Chicago Public Schools also started giving weight to five other factors: grades, school tests, attendance, conduct and homework.
This change in policy, enacted two years ago, is consistent with recommendations of many leading educators and testing experts as well as the U.S. Department of Education, who all agree that for students in the middle range, other factors should be considered along with testing.
The article wrongly claims 14,000 children who “failed the tests” were allowed to move up anyway. In fact, these children all met minimum standards for promotion, but we also felt they could benefit from summer school.
My biggest problem with the article is the inappropriate and misleading headline, which says these 14,000 children “flunked tests.” Nobody “flunks” the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills; there is no such thing as a passing or failing grade. This is simply a system for measuring students against national averages, and this kind of inflammatory language unfairly stigmatizes children.
The bottom line is our promotion policy continues to be a national model. More important, it’s working: Test scores are rising, promotion standards are tougher and more students are meeting these higher standards. Every year, we will re-evaluate and enhance our promotion policy to ensure that it is not only the fairest and most progressive policy it can be, but the toughest as well, so that it continues to challenge and lift our children.