SPECIAL REVIEW ASSESSMENT (SRA) UPDATE

April 15, 2009

 

Jay Doolan, Assistant Commissioner

Division of Educational Standards & Programs

 

Timothy Peters, Director

Office of State Assessments

 

The SRA Context: A Reminder

“In a global economy where the most valuable skill you can sell is your knowledge, a good education is no longer just a pathway to opportunity – it is a pre-requisite.  The countries that out-teach us today will out-compete us tomorrow.”

       President Barack Obama, February 24, 2009

The SRA Context: A Reminder

·         The SRA is for students who have not yet passed one or both content areas of the HSPA, the current state graduation proficiency test;

·         The SRA is state developed but locally administered and scored, over several weeks or months, consisting of Performance Assessment Tasks (PAT), in math and language arts literacy;

·         In recent years, 11,000-15,600 students have achieved their diploma via the SRA, most of them general ed students;

·         In some schools a majority of seniors graduate via the SRA;

·         March 19, 2008: the State Board adopted the department’s proposal to improve the SRA by strengthening the SRA administration process.

 

Progress Since March 2008

The Department –

·         Gathered more information about SRA students and SRA practice in the districts:

§  Collected data about 2007-2008 SRA usage;

§  Required districts with significant SRA usage rates (10% or higher) to submit detailed analyses of their SRA student populations;

§  Interviewed students and teachers about SRA process;

·         Established SRA Advisory Committee to consider department’s plans for improving the SRA;

·         Consulted testing vendors about scope of work and costs of changes to SRA administration and scoring;

·         Developed plans for 2009-2010.

 

 

SRA Data 2007-2008

       Total Students Using SRA to Fulfill Graduation Testing Requirement For One or Both Content Areas

Year                      N-Count

2008                     11,513

2007                     11,747

2006                     13,288

2005                     15,669

2004                     15,351

         

SRA 2007-2008 Rates by County

 

ˇ   County                   N-Count               Total = 11,513

ˇ   Essex                      1862

ˇ   Hudson                  1519

ˇ   Camden                 1097

ˇ   Union            1080

ˇ   Passaic                   928

ˇ   Middlesex              928

ˇ   Bergen                   611

ˇ   Ocean           586

ˇ   Mercer          532

ˇ   Burlington             504

ˇ   Monmouth             357

ˇ   Cumberland           344

ˇ   Morris           222

ˇ   Gloucester             213

ˇ   Atlantic                  213

ˇ   Somerset               190

ˇ   Sussex                   122

ˇ   Salem           101

ˇ   Warren                   95

ˇ   Hunterdon             69

ˇ   Cape May               43

SRA 2007-2008: Highest District Rates
(30% or more seniors using SRA to satisfy HSPA proficiency requirement)

 

ˇ   Orange                                      62.8%

ˇ   CREATE Charter (Hudson)                58.9%                

ˇ   Plainfield                                   59.6%                

ˇ   Irvington                                  58%

ˇ   Atlantic City                              57.5%                

ˇ   Trenton                                     54.8%                

ˇ   Academy Charter (Monmouth)                  54.5%       

ˇ   Emily Fisher Charter (Mercer)          51.3%       

ˇ   Pleasantville                                      51.6%

ˇ   Camden                                     50.1%       

ˇ   L.E.A.P. Academy Charter (Camden)         46.6%                

ˇ   Elizabeth                                   43.9%       

ˇ   Paterson                                   41%

ˇ   Willingboro                               39.5%       

ˇ   Newark                                     39%

ˇ   Bridgeton                                  37.6%                

ˇ   Jersey City                                34%

ˇ   East Orange                              31.8%       

 

Summary: SRA 2007-2008

·         Decrease in SRA usage by districts from 2007 to 2008;

·         SRA-based graduation rate was 11.5% in 2008, down slightly from 11.8% in 2007;

·         Overall, steady decrease in SRA usage since 2005;

·         Four counties (Camden, Essex, Hudson, Union) account for half of SRA usage statewide;

·         68% of  SRA profiles completed are in mathematics, 32% in LAL.

 

District SRA Survey 2008

·         High schools with SRA usage rates of 10% or more in 2008 were required to submit detailed information about their SRA student population:

·         105 schools met or exceeded the 10% threshold.

District SRA 2008 Surveys: What did they tell us?

Some students do fail SRA:

·         The 105 schools surveyed reported a total of 6620 students graduating in 2008 via the SRA;

·         They reported a total of 263 students who failed to graduate in 2008 due to failure to complete the SRA successfully;

·         SRA failure rate = 4%.

 

District SRA 2008 Surveys: What did they tell us?

A majority of SRA students are taking college preparatory courses:

Course                  % of SRA Students Taking/Have Taken

Biology                           91%

Algebra I               90%

Geometry              86%

Algebra II              71%

Chemistry             57%

Physics                           10%

CP12 English                  63%

Honors/AP English 9%

 

District SRA 2008 Surveys: What did they tell us?

 

Teaching

 

       Almost 20% of schools responding to survey acknowledged that they sometimes use long terms substitutes or inappropriately certified teachers.

 

District SRA 2008 Surveys: What did they tell us?

 

·         Students who fail the NJ ASK8 are likely to fail the HSPA;

·         We asked the 105 schools whether they had programs in place to use NJ ASK8 scores to identify at-risk students:

§  Yes, programs in place: 88 schools

§  Some programs in place: 5 schools

§  No programs in place: 12 schools

 

What does this mean?

·         Districts must use NJ ASK8 scores to plan personalized instructional support and intervention for all incoming ninth grade students who failed to attain proficiency on NJ ASK8.

 

·         District SRA 2008 Surveys: What did they tell us?

·         SRA Outlook for class of 2009, based on 105 surveys:

 

o   Number of schools expecting to graduate less than 10% through SRA in 2009:  42

 

o   Number of schools expecting to graduate more than 10% through SRA in 2009:  63

 

o   Number of students in class of 2009 currently participating in SRA process: 10,306

 

SRA Advisory Committee

·         Committee met five times between August 2008 and January 2009 for 4-6 hours each meeting;

·         Membership included representatives from districts, NJEA, NJPSA, ELC, and DOE;

·         Our thanks to Advisory Committee members.

 

 

SRA Advisory Committee: Major Recommendations

·         DOE selects, assigns, distributes SRA tasks for each administrative window;

·         Four three-week SRA administrative windows during school year;

·         Schools continue to score student SRA responses but DOE implements systematic audit process to ensure accurate scoring and to identify abuse of scoring standards;

·         Continued monitoring of districts that rely heavily on SRA to graduate seniors;

·         Collection of more data about student performance, course-taking patterns, access to highly qualified teachers, and other indicators.

 

DOE Plans for SRA 2009-2011

·         Stricter controls on administration of SRA performance tasks;

·         Use of testing vendor to ensure quality of SRA scoring, using trained NJ teachers – the department does not believe that an audit model will be adequate;

·         Continued collection and analysis of data about SRA student population;

·         Phase in of end of course competency tests to replace HSPA, with alternate assessment instruments for student who fail the competency assessments.

 

·         Longer Terms Strategies for Reducing SRA Population

·         Early childhood education

·         Formative assessment

·         Secondary School Redesign

·         Improvements in teaching and learning

·         Focus on personalization

·         Improving teacher quality in districts with significant achievement gaps

·         Continued commitment to multiple measures of student achievement

QUESTIONS?

Thank you!