Roughly three out of four Texas school districts received the once exclusive “exemplary” or “recognized” ratings on Friday as the state again used a controversial formula that attempts to predict how students will perform on future exams.
In 2004, just 19 school systems — or 1.5 percent - earned the state’s top exemplary rating. This year, 239 districts - or 19 percent - were given the distinction. The number of “academically unacceptable” schools, meanwhile, hasn’t changed much.
This is the second year that the complex statistical analysis, called the Texas Projection Measure, significantly bolstered public school standings. Two-thirds of all campuses, including 78 percent in HISD, are now rated recognized or better.
Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott said he stands by the ratings.
“It doesn’t artificially inflate an individual student’s score,” Scott said of the newer formula. “It is only an accountability rating indicator.”
He went on to dismiss criticism of the projection measure as “an election-year issue that’s being raised by a few people to cast doubt on this day, to cast doubt on the achievements of our students and teachers.”
The projection measure is an estimate of whether a student is likely to pass the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills in a future grade. It’s based on a student’s current and prior-year scores, as well as scores of other students at the students’ campus.
Political squabble
Former Houston Mayor Bill White, a Democrat seeking to unseat Scott’s boss, Gov. Rick Perry, in November’s gubernatorial election, said the ratings produced by the measure are inflated.
“We can all cheer school improvement, but the governor should be looking for real improvement, not ways to keep up politically convenient appearances,” White said in a written statement. “Only after public outcry would Perry give Texans actual results, results without statistical manipulation and inflation.”
Perry’s campaign issued a response: “Texas students are succeeding and our education is improving under Gov. Perry’s leadership. Bill White continues to tear down Texas by criticizing the positive results of a measure that is approved by the Legislature. He continues to distract from the fact that he has not come up with one new idea to keep our state moving forward or help our children succeed.”
Clear Creek ISD, a district that benefited from the projection measure, isn’t letting the controversy cast doubt on the 37,500-student district’s first “exemplary” rating.
“It kind of affirms what we’ve known: that this is a great district,” spokeswoman Elaina Polsen said. Six of the 35 measures used to compute Clear Creeks’ rating were raised because of the projection measure. Still, Clear Creek made strong gains, including raising its four-year high school completion rate to 97 percent, she said.
The Conroe, Pearland and Friendswood districts also earned the exemplary rating.
Districts and campuses across the state are rated based on Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills scores, as well as completion rates and dropout rates. Each of a district’s subgroups - which are based on distinctions such as race, ethnicity and poverty level - must hit the performance mark for the rating, though several types of exceptions are given.
This year, the passing rate to earn recognized increased 5 percentage points to 80 percent on each of the five subject-matter tests. Students are considered to have passed if they correctly answer between 44 percent and 70 percent of the questions, depending on the subject and grade level.
Robert Sanborn, president of the Houston-based Children at Risk research advocacy group, called the ratings “absolutely meaningless.”
“It’s like a Texas miracle,” Sanborn said. “It’s sort of this make-believe data to portray our schools in a better light, a light that doesn’t really help anyone. It certainly isn’t helping parents or students.”
Good news for HISD
Houston ISD, the state’s largest school district, saw its number of exemplary schools jump from 84 to 101, largely because of the projection measure, which helped improve ratings at about 125 schools. The number of unacceptable schools in HISD dropped from 12 to seven, including Lee, Jones, Kashmere and Sharptsown high schools, as well as Key Middle and Kelso and Frost elementaries.
Mike Thomas, HISD’s manager of performance and accountability, said he hopes the projection measure controversy doesn’t overshadow the district’s progress. TAKS passing rates continue to improve, he said.
“There was growth across the board,” Thomas said. “I hope they do get the recognition they deserve because there’s a lot of hard work going into the results we saw this year.”
About 108 HISD campuses met the “absolute” standards for their ratings, with no help from the projection measure or the other exception allowed.
Without the boost, HISD data shows the number of campuses earning the top two ratings would have increased by just four to 169.
Alief ISD officials are thrilled to have earned a recognized rating - and they’re quick to point out that they did it without the help of the projection measure.
“This has not happened ever before and we are very excited,” said Natalie Martinez, Alief’s director of accountability.
Alief ISD did, however, benefit from the more-established “required improvement” exception which allows campuses’ ratings to be increased if students show strong gains but still fall short of the rating standard.
Cypress-Fairbanks, Katy, Humble and Klein are among the other districts to earn the recognized rating.
Galena Park to appeal
Galena Park ISD was tagged with an acceptable district rating because one of its campuses - Normandy Crossing Elementary - received an unacceptable rating because of test cheating allegations. The district plans to appeal the rating.
“We are disappointed that the Texas Education Agency decided to penalize GPISD so harshly over the isolated actions of a handful of adults at one elementary school,” Superintendent Mark Henry stated.
Spring ISD also plans to appeal its acceptable rating, which district officials said is based on inaccurate data reported in 2008-09 on students who no longer attend school in the district.
Both Galveston and North Forest remained rated “unacceptable” as districts.
