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DEL.ICIO.USGwinnett’s Gateway
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
With the state’s largest school district opening for business today, I thought I’d post about Gwinnett County’s additional standardized test it requires students to pass: the Gateway.
Gwinnett school officials spent years developing tests for grades four, seven and high school, so they could assure their constitutents that a diploma from a Gwinnett County high school was meaningful. But the rest of the country quickly caught up to the idea of high-stakes testing, and before long all Georgia students were taking the curriculum test known as the CRCT in grades 2 through 8, in addition to the Iowa Test of Basic Skills for grades 3, 5 and 8. Georgia students in grades 3, 5 and 8 must now pass portions of the CRCT to get promoted.
Other controversies have dogged the Gateway. Parents have questioned whether the cut score is too low and the questions too confusing, making the test meaningless for most students. And they have said it adds too much stress on their kids. Officials have grappled with what to do with the small number of kids who don’t pass. Some taxpayers say the school district has wasted money on Gateway.
Is Gwinnett’s Gateway serving its purpose?
Comments
Commenting is now closed for this entry.
By TN
August 8, 2005 11:23 AM | Link to this
Any idea what the correlations are w/ passing the gateway tests, the EOCTs/CRCTs, and GHSGTs? Tell me they are studying this, otherwise, why even give it? If there is a high correlation of kids passing the GHSGTs and gateways then I guess you could say it’s working….otherwise, what’s the point? The EOCT is there for the same reason, supposedly, although the state denies any correlation between the 2 tests. I honestly have no idea how Gwinnett grades their tests, so I can’t comment on that, but if they grade like the EOCT (40% = 70%) then doubling up on tests like this is useless in my opinion. Why even bother?
By Jake
August 8, 2005 12:09 PM | Link to this
I think competent teachers would be better at identifying children that need a little extra help over a 180 day school year, than any standardized test. I also cannot understand the correlation between the stated goal of “pursuing excellence” and cut scores of 40%. Gwinnett’s gateway testing is a waste of time and money.
By Karen Armsby
August 9, 2005 08:29 AM | Link to this
I never understood why Gwinnett spent so much time and money to develop and administer the Gateway when the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, a national test, was already well established as a reputable measuring stick of student progress. Gateway appeared to be redundant at inception and appears even more redundant now with CRCT in place.
The more important question I have always asked is what did the educators do with the individual student’s results to help that student? The answer I recieved and was shocked to hear was “nothing.” These tests are used by administrators to get a statistical profile of individual grade levels, of individual schools, and the school system as a whole, but they do not use the test results to develop a remdiation plan for failing students or those who need help in specific subject areas.
In my humble opinion the students should not be required to take all of these standardized tests unless the results are used to help them individually to improve their academic progress.
By Jim Dumond
August 9, 2005 02:55 PM | Link to this
Wow,an open invitation to write about a test that cost taxpayers millions of dollars,failed to improve education, caused undue stress to students,nearly cost the teacher of the year in GCPS his job,caused parents to flee the state to protect their children from threats by school cops,that didn’t cause any students to be held back that wouldn’t have been anyway. One that provided a nice vacation to New England for a couple of GCPS police officer to investigate a stolen test that was leaked but didn’t affect the validity of the test.The test that caused several newspaper reporters to be re-assigned and then had half of the 4th grade portion scrapped due to redundancy between it and the states CRCT? Gee, I can’t think of a thing to say about it
By Patti Ghezzi
August 9, 2005 02:59 PM | Link to this
Well, Jim, I was wondering when you were going to show up!
By Jim Dumond
August 9, 2005 03:03 PM | Link to this
liked that one, huh?