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Tuesday, May 20, 2008
What happened with the CRCT?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Preliminary results on the state’s CRCT exams don’t look good.
About 60 percent of the eighth-graders passed the math test - an exam they all must pass to move on to high school. That means a lot more kids will attend summer school and retake the test in a few months.
That’s not the worst news. Only 20 to 30 percent of the state’s sixth- and seventh-graders passed the social studies CRCT.
What happened? State Superintendent of Schools Kathy Cox earlier said scores would drop because of harder tests to match the state’s tougher new curriculum. But the dismal social studies scores stumped many. Cox plans to put together a panel of teachers and other experts to figure out what happened.
What do you think of these preliminary results? Is it a problem with the test, the new standards or the way teachers have taught the new material?
NOTE: The education team plans to write another story about these results. I’d like to talk with some middle school math and social studies teachers and any parents whose children struggled on these tests. Drop me a line at ldiamond@ajc.com.
