More Districts to Try New Standardized Testing System

This school year, six St. Louis-area school districts will begin using a new adaptive testing system to assess student performance in key subjects. Unlike the Missouri Assessment Program (MAP), which is administered at the end of the year, this new testing system will be administered several times throughout the year. In the St. Louis metropolitan area, Kirkwood, Jennings, Ferguson-Florissant, Hazelwood, Ladue, and Maplewood-Richmond Heights are now joining Affton, Lindbergh, Mehlville, Parkway, Pattonville, Ritenour, and Confluence Academies who, as part of the "Demonstration Project," implemented this system last year.

Last year, 20 districts statewide implemented this new system as part of the Demonstration Project. Public data on this initiative will be released soon on September 30. These districts are primarily seeking exemptions because administrators in those districts do not feel the MAP is an adequate tool to improve student performance. The test is administered to students at the end of the year, which means districts do not receive test results back until the fall of the following year.

The system adopted by these district tests students three times per year in English/language arts and math. Missouri could also consider pairing this model with a teacher rating system (like Tennessee's) to gauge how effective a teacher's class and curriculum are.

The fact that many districts believe that they could develop better testing than DESE speaks volumes. The MAP needs to be timelier, and it needs to be more informative for students, parents, and teachers. My colleague, James Shuls, lamented the lack of detail in a 2018 blog post.

Even with the shortcomings of the MAP test, Missouri ought to have a uniform statewide test that allows researchers, district officials, and policymakers to learn about different education strategies and trends. If a district implements a new strategy for teaching algebra, and it sees great improvement on the MAP, another district could mimic its practices.

There will be more clarity when statistics for the Demonstration Project are released in a month. If the results are encouraging, fully transitioning to this new testing system statewide might be worth considering.