Janesville test scores ‘inching up’
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Janesville School District state test results 2009-10 (WKCE)
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Karen Schulte
JANESVILLE — Janesville School District Administrator Karen Schulte is spending a good part of her vacation crunching test scores.
The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction this week released results from the Wisconsin Knowledge and Concepts Exam. Third-, fourth-, fifth-, sixth-, seventh-, eighth- and 10-grade students took the standardized tests in the fall.
The state uses test scores to make sure schools are making progress and to calculate some funding.
The district also uses the scores to track progress and to plan professional training, Schulte said. For example, principals might plan in-service training for teachers about how to teach economically disadvantaged students to read.
“I’ve been analyzing these numbers to death,” Schulte said. “All the principals take these numbers and dissect them.”
As a whole, Janesville students exceeded the target scores set by the state.
On the math test, 78.4 percent of students were proficient or advanced. That’s up from 77.9 percent in 2008, according to DPI data.
In reading, 82.9 percent of students were proficient or advanced. That’s up from 82.3 percent in 2008, according to the data.
Those improvements mesh with the school board’s goal of raising reading and math scores over a two-year period, Schulte said.
“We are in the first year of that,” she said. “So, it’s inching up. It’s not moving as quickly as I’d like, but it is moving forward.”
However, three schools failed to reach the target test scores at some grade levels.
-- At Jackson and Madison elementary schools, only 64 and 65 percent of students, respectively, were proficient or advanced in the reading test. The target score is 74 percent for all grades in reading.
-- Third-, fourth- and fifth-graders at Wilson Elementary did not meet the target scores in math or reading with one exception: 68 percent of fifth-graders were proficient or advanced in math. The target math score is 58 percent in all grades.
The tests of eight students at Wilson School were “invalidated” because a proctor helped students, the Gazette reported in December. Those invalidated tests explain in part the low scores at Wilson and the decline in scores at Wilson compared to last year, Schulte said.
In December, a DPI spokeswoman said the invalidated tests probably would not make a big difference in Wilson’s overall performance.
The three schools could face DPI sanctions for the low scores, but Schulte wouldn’t speculate about what those could be.
“I’m not going to say or predict what that means for those schools,” Schulte said. “In June, they (DPI) announce what schools didn’t meet adequate yearly progress.”
The DPI further separates each school’s and each grade’s scores into categories such as race, gender, disability or economic status.
Some groups of students might have failed to reach the target percentages of advanced or proficient scores in reading or math, but Schulte hasn’t finished studying all the numbers, she said Thursday.
She did find some success stories in some Janesville student categories, she said.
For example, black students made great strides in closing the achievement gap between themselves and white students at Craig and Parker high schools, Schulte said.
Black sophomores at Craig increased their adequate or proficient reading test scores from 63 percent in 2008 to 83 percent in 2009.
The same score for white students was 84 percent, Schulte said.
That small of a gap is a first for black students at Craig, she said.
At Parker, the gap shrunk to 6 percent, she said.
Schulte points to work the district has been doing to close that gap. The improvements started with classroom efforts when this year’s sophomores were freshmen, she said.
Improving the diversity of the teaching staff and crafting carefully focused professional development are two methods the district has used to increase test scores, she said.
“We have been working on those things for a couple years, and I think it’s finally not only paying off in the classroom, but it’s bearing out in the numbers,” Schulte said. “To me there’s a glimmer of hope.”
Apr 11, 2010 at 5:13 p.m.
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OK.
Apr 11, 2010 at 5:09 p.m.
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Yes, and she did take it seriously, she is only 8. I know it wasn't dirty or anything but a teachers private life should be just that, private. JMO
Apr 11, 2010 at 2:38 p.m.
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Out of the blue, without relevance or prompt?
Apr 11, 2010 at 2:25 p.m.
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No one asked her the question, she just told them.
Apr 11, 2010 at 9:23 a.m.
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justme46: I wouldn't take the incident so seriously. In the years that you and I went to school, it was common to hear a young student ask a teacher if she/he was married, how they met, etc. It was usually done innocently, on the "spur of the moment" and never discussed in any elaborate detail. The teacher probably felt it was better to answer the question then to tell a student "That's none of your business" or "That's something that's not to be discussed here," etc. I would put it all on the same level as when a teacher stops by the classroom with her newborn a few days just prior to returning from maternity leave. Kids like to see their teachers as human. Of course, this is my opinon only.
Apr 11, 2010 at 8:50 a.m.
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This may be off topic, but just yesterday my granddaughter, who is in 2nd grade, told me her teacher told the class how her boyfriend and her got to be a couple, he would write her notes in her inbox at school. Now, to me, this no information to give a child, is it? Maybe I am just old fashioned, but this has nothing to do with teaching or second grade. JMO
Apr 10, 2010 at 10:59 p.m.
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I totally agree with you inconvenienttruth. I remember as a child taking standardized tests changing my anwers because I was trying to even out the number of A's, B's, C's, D's on the bubble sheet we were given. I'm for eliminating standardized tests so we can have teachers teach instead of trying to teach to tests. That would enable teachers to have meaningful discussions that last a lifetime.
Apr 10, 2010 at 9:58 p.m.
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The best teachers I ever had knew how to engage a class in discussions and activities with them and each other. It might not have always been deep, and sometimes it even went a little off course, but it was meaningful. While lectures and structured lesson plans can be a suitable source of information for the eager student, it also allows the apathetic a chance to disengage, and ultimately nothing lasting or unique is gained by either.
Both methods of teaching may lend to results in standardized testing later on in that week or that term, but only one lends results throughout life.
Apr 10, 2010 at 9:39 p.m.
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to follow before someone points it out.
Apr 10, 2010 at 9:38 p.m.
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Sarah B - The reality is that the school district is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars training new staff over a three year period of time. Guess who benefits from all of the training? When these teachers leave after three years, other districts benefit without the cost of training the teachers. I would love to have the statistics of the number of teachers that are hired by Janesville and leave within the first five years of being hired! Also, why are so many people leaving the district office? I'm sure there's more names of follow!
Apr 10, 2010 at 3:50 p.m.
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SarahB, many teachers and other employees of this district have jumped ship recently and I'm sure more will follow. Many are even taking pay cuts to be in a district that has a more supportive school board and/or working conditions. Hopefully the new faces on the school board will make a change and not be bullied by those already on it. There are jobs out there especially for great teachers and administrators.
Apr 10, 2010 at 2:13 p.m.
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badger4life: Where will the teachers find other jobs? It seems as if most, if not all, districts are cutting back.
Apr 10, 2010 at 2:10 p.m.
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Ms. Schulte and badger4life: Shouldn't it be "inching upward," not "inching up"? I am not an educator, but I wonder which phrase is correct.
Apr 10, 2010 at 1:57 p.m.
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I worked in the school system for 5 years, at Edison and at Parker. I can understand disabled and kids not disabled being graded seperately, but I still think that no matter what your skin color, we are all the same! JMO
Apr 10, 2010 at 10:45 a.m.
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Maybe the school board will realize the number of hard working teachers this district has and maybe we'll read "Janesville Teachers' pay is inching up." Like Sam Adams mentioned, if they don't settle the contract soon, we will only lose some of the great teachers we have and won't be able to recruit top teachers.
Apr 10, 2010 at 10:28 a.m.
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to Justme46, since the passage of the ESEA, also referred to as the NCLBAct (No Child Left Behind), about eight years ago, the federal gov't has mandated that groups within a school /district population be disaggregated so that if any one (or more) groups (students are sorted by race, economic background, & ability/disability) is lagging in progress the school designs specific strategies to improve learning. I hear that special education students are held to the same standard as regular education students -- in other words even students with cognitive disabilities are supposed to be equally proficient in reading and math. . . As the years go by, the percentage of students who must be proficient increases until eventually our government requires 100% proficient. . . Hard to imagine, but I have watched teachers struggling to make this happen and volunteers giving hours of 1:1 support to students on a regular basis. The concern for the Black population is based on professional interest that EVERYONE succeeds in school as well as the federal mandates. No excuses or explanations allowed. Hope that helps. Most of our schools have a place for volunteer assistance. Maybe you could join in the fight to help every student succeed--without regard to their background or natural ability.
Apr 10, 2010 at 6:48 a.m.
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Testing, and a reliance on testing, has been proven to make teaching less effective. When will we be smart enough to see that the rich go to schools that do not focus on standardized tests but give their students a well-rounded education?
Apr 9, 2010 at 10:46 p.m.
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When is the board going to reward the teachers who are obviously working so hard to make this a better school district. The only way to keep these improvements is to "attract and retain the best teachers". These same teachers have been working for 10 months. Note to the board (especially the new members) time to get a contract or all the good teachers that can leave will.
Apr 9, 2010 at 8:38 p.m.
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I am glad there is a "glimmer of hope". But again, why do we pit black against white? If we do this, maybe we should pit black against hispanic and hispanic against cambodian? I am very confused here. What is with the segregation? I thought that was gone!! JMO
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