I will have more to say about this at some point, but for now I thought you might just be interested in seeing the 2008 MEAP and MME results for the county. [These links are from the WISD, and I'm not sure why charter schools are not listed.] No surprise that the results mostly track closely to numbers that assess poverty, like free and reduced price lunch.
1. Background information on what was assessed. Note that you will also find the links to past years right there.
2. 2008 MEAP results
3. 2008 MME results
Although the results came out a few weeks ago, I couldn't find them on the AAPS web site (there is, however, a detailed analysis of 2005-2006). Nor could I find them on the Saline Schools web site. The Ypsilanti schools web site links directly to the state (and that is a good solution, I think, because the state updates the data every year and so it is immediately available). I stopped looking when it became clear a lot of school systems have not updated their web sites (yet).
Or you can go to greatschools.net, here is the Michigan MEAP link. (And at greatschools.net you can also look up information about the free lunch program, race/ethnicity, student/teacher ration, and more.)
Information, news, and ideas about Ann Arbor, Washtenaw County, and Michigan schools; thoughts about education; and occasionally other stuff too.
MME=Michigan Merit Exam
ReplyDeleteApparently, MEAP is overhauling their reading tests as they've apparently been found to be kind of horrible, with different assessors giving wildly different scores for the same essays, etc.
ReplyDeletesorry... i meant writing tests, not reading.
ReplyDeleteYes, the frequency of the writing tests is being revised, and I believe the tests themselves as well. There's more than one reason for this.
ReplyDeleteThe writing portions of the MEAP scored by human beings, and so there is more variation in the scoring--and therefore more dissatisfaction. In addition, because human beings score the tests, this part of the test is much more expensive to administer. [Snide comment: there go more Michigan jobs.]
I heard a teacher suggest that because the writing scorers use a very specific rubric, kids who write well but perhaps slightly unconventionally have not been scoring as well. And of course the "game" at the national level is to keep your scores up to keep up with the No Child Left Behind Act.
All of which begs the question of WHAT we are trying to measure, and WHY we are trying to measure it. Doesn't it somehow seem wrong that the only "accurate" measure of something comes from a computer score?
Yes, I've scored essays, although not Michigans's students'. You have to score very fast and and the handwriting is hard to read imaged to computer screen. It's a stressful job; you rely on your intuition or global sense and if you are not "Englishly gifted" you are shot. The trend (at least with Person) is towards software programs scoring the essays. They do this for one of the two MCAT essays, believe it or not.
ReplyDelete