Assessing the exit exam - More students pass, but what does that mean?

By: DAVID FRIED - Staff Writer | Monday, August 23, 2004 10:19 AM PDT ∞

NORTH COUNTY ---- Educators smiled and parents and students breathed easier this past week as they learned that more than three-fourths of the state's sophomores passed last year's California High School Exit Exam, a high-stakes graduation test that most California students couldn't pass two years ago.

But some education officials say the higher passing rates may not mean that teens are more prepared for college or the workforce than they were in previous years. That's because the increase in passing students came in conjunction with a number of changes to the exit exam ---- changes that shortened the test and made parts of it easier to pass.

Up until this year, the test took three days to complete, and included more high-level math questions. But late last year, the state Board of Education voted to shorten the test by one day and replace some complicated math questions with simpler ones.

"We've seen significant increases in passing rates," said Dennis Johnston, director of assessment, accountability and research at the county Office of Education. "But at this point we simply don't know how much can be attributed to instruction in the classroom and how much to the changes themselves."

The exit exam tests students on ninth- and 10th-grade English skills, while the math section covers sixth- and seventh-grade curricula and the first year of algebra.

In general, educators embraced the changes, saying the exit exam should measure students' understanding of the most basic academic skills, not high-level ones.

But passing a test based on middle school standards does not mean students will be successful after high school, according to Keith Gayler, associate director of the Center on Education Policy. The center is an independent education research group in Washington.

"Clearly, that is not enough to ensure college or workforce readiness," said Gayler, author of the center's recently-issued report examining the pros and cons of high school exit exams throughout the county.

Simpler questions

When lawmakers first approved the exit exam in 2000, they planned to require all students in the class of 2004 to pass it in order to graduate. But nearly half of all students who took the first test in 2001 failed at least one section. And while scores improved somewhat in the following two years, the failure rates remained a daunting obstacle for educators.

The state's Board of Education voted unanimously to delay requiring the exit exam until 2006 and returned to the drawing tables to revise the test.

The test's authors reduced the number of questions testing more than one mathematical concept at a time, as well as eliminating less common graph forms. They also cut 15 multiple-choice questions and one essay from the language arts section.

The result, according to the state Department of Education, is a streamlined exam.

"We don't see it as easier," said Janet Chladek, who manages the department's exit exam office. "We see it as better designed to allow students to demonstrate their abilities and understanding of the fundamentals."

Overall, county educators have received the changes with open arms.

Ken Noonan, superintendent of the Oceanside Unified School District, said he believed the revisions simply reflected a concern that the exam unfairly tested students against a standard well above the minimum required for a diploma.

"A diploma is not something for the top 10 percent (of students)," he said. "It's something we hope everybody can get."

This year, 76 percent of Oceanside students passed the math and English sections of the exam, up 32 percent and 13 percent, respectively, over last year's numbers.

Gayler said making the test easier may have kept the state from scrapping the exit exam requirement altogether.

"Maybe they realized the bar was set too high, and that if 25 to 30 percent of students weren't getting diplomas in three years, the reform would have died," Gayler said.

Passing, but not proficient

The exit exam passing rates also do not mean more high school students are performing at or above grade level, according to other test results also released last week.

Although 74 percent of the state's sophomores passed the English portion of the exit exam, 35 percent of those same students did not post proficient scores on the English section of the 10th-grade California Standards Test, which is designed to measure students' mastery of skills required by the state.

Chladek cautioned against trying to draw any conclusions from those numbers.

"They're two very different tests with very different purposes," said Chladek.

The exit exam tests only the basic academic skills, whereas the standards tests measure students' achievement at the end of each year to see how well they absorbed the subject matter, she said.

And whereas students face personal repercussions for failing the exit exam, only schools are held responsible for low student performance on standards tests.

What do the test-takers think?

Students, meanwhile, have responded differently to the impending reality of having to pass the exam before they can don a cap and gown.

Megan Colwell, a junior at Mission Hills High School in San Marcos, said when she took the test last spring she found it neither too difficult nor too easy. Still, the 16-year-old said she wouldn't want to see it get any easier.

"In my opinion, you should know more than this in order to graduate, so I'm glad we have to take it."

However, Zachary Respess, a fellow junior at Mission Hill, said the test just added another level of stress to an already burdensome mountain of expectations and requirements.

"Granted, most of it (the questions on the test) was stuff you should know," said Respess, who thinks he probably passed. "But graduation should be based on how you do in school, not whether you pass some test."

Contact staff writer David Fried at (760) 631-6621 or dfried@nctimes.com.