High-poverty schools battle odds, history
By Jennifer Hiller
Advertiser Education Writer
If the latest results of the Stanford Achievement Test are any indication, the state's high-poverty schools have a long way to go to buck a history of low scores and slow progress and successfully face high-stakes testing next spring and the pressures of a new federal law.
High-poverty schools, with a few exceptions, fail to show consistent progress: • Only two high-poverty schools in the state — Kaluwela Elementary and Solomon Elementary — have made AYP four years in a row. • Two high-poverty schools — Linapuna Elementary and Washington Middle — have met their goals three years in a row. • The number of students scoring average or above average on the Stanford Achievement Test, the standardized test given to students each spring, hovers in the 30 percent to 50 percent range at most high-poverty schools. • A handful of schools have moved 70 percent of their students into the average or above average category. Right now, the state's goal is to have at least 75 percent of a school's population scoring that well.
Of the schools that have been categorized as high poverty for at least two years, 14 last year managed to meet their academic and attendance goals; 102 did not.
Few Hawai'i schools meet goals
It's a pattern that has been repeated for years under Adequate Yearly Progress, a measure the Department of Education uses to calculate whether schools are advancing in reading and math standardized test scores.
Even tougher standards loom under No Child Left Behind. The federal education law, which began at the start of this school year, requires that schools make steady and continual progress on student test scores.
But Hawai'i education officials say the history of the state's standardized testing indicates that this annual improvement will be difficult or impossible for many schools.
"Most schools don't make AYP," said Lavern Adaniya, specialist in the DOE's special program management section. "There are a few schools that have been successful in breaking the trend."
The scores also indicate that high-poverty schools have trouble mastering reading and math skills at the same time. Schools tend to do well in one or the other, but not both.
Under No Child Left Behind, schools must start showing progress in both reading and math every year. Comparatively, Hawai'i schools could pass AYP if they hit three of four measures: math, reading, attendance and a fourth measure that the schools select.
Sanctions for not making the steady progress required by No Child Left Behind include the districts paying for private tutoring, the reconstitution of a school or the siphoning of students to other, better-performing campuses. Eventually, schools could lose federal funding.
To meet federal requirements, Hawai'i will submit a new definition of Adequate Yearly Progress to the U.S. Department of Education in January. It will go through a peer review there.
The most recent AYP reports are based on the Stanford Achievement Test that students took in April 2002.
AYP reports traditionally have only been calculated for high-poverty campuses. Because poverty is considered a major risk factor for children, the No Child Left Behind Act targets schools where at least 45 percent of the student body receive free or reduced-price lunches, a common measure of poverty. The schools receive federal money to improve learning and, in turn, are expected to demonstrate annual progress in academics.
Schools can come on and off the high-poverty list from year to year depending on the makeup of their student body.
But starting with this school year, all schools — not just those that fall into the high-poverty category — will have to make progress each year in reading and math.
The scores from spring 2002 will serve as a baseline for all of those schools that have never had to look at an AYP report.
Under No Child Left Behind, all students have to be proficient in reading and math by 2014.
The DOE will release the complete results of the 2002 Stanford Achievement Test in mid-January, along with the results of the first-ever Hawai'i Content and Performance Standards II Statewide Assessment.
For the first time, test data will show how students at each school score across ethnic groups (using census categories of white, black, Native American, Hispanic, Asian-Pacific Islander), and how students who are high poverty, special education or of limited English proficiency are scoring against the general population. This is meant to ensure that schools are improving the academic performance of all of their students and not shielding one group's low test scores by averaging them with the whole school.
While the DOE has provided this type of data to schools that requested it, Selvin Chin-Chance, test development and administration specialist, said this is the first time the state has tried to do so for all 283 schools.
"It's our first attempt at this," Chin-Chance said. "We're really learning here."
Scores originally were set to be released by now, but Chin-Chance said the department was slowed by some schools taking the test late in the year, having the Board of Education approve its system for determining which students are above or below proficiency and some confusion over whether students were being counted in the proper categories: race, high poverty, ESL and special education.
In 2002, schools tested in April and May. The DOE hopes to speed up the process by having schools test in March and April so the data reaches the scoring company earlier.
Reach Jennifer Hiller at jhiller@honoluluadvertiser.com or 525-8084.
