By Barbara Brown

North Branch students are holding their own when it comes to standardized testing.

Assistant Superintendent Rodney Reisnouer presented a report on results of the Minnesota Basic Skills Test and the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments during the June North Branch school board meeting.

Despite budget concerns and the fact that the district is ranked in the lower 10 percent of all state districts for funding, Reisnouer told the school board that teacher and student efforts were evident in the test results.

Reisnouer said is was easy to misunderstand some of the results and that he wanted to explain them to the board.

North Branch schools test results often exceed those of state and national averages, Reisnouer said, and the most recent battery of tests offered the same results.

Math test results for eighth-graders hovered around 80 percent as did eighth grade reading. Grade 10 written composition was above 90 percent.

The district still has not had a student withheld from graduation solely because of failing standardized testing. Reisnouer said students who had been held out of graduation had not completed enough credits.

Reisnouer said that fact is a tribute to the counselors and teachers at the high school that they continue to work with students, especially on finalizing standardized testing and credits.

The Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments evaluate student progress toward achievement of high standards.ÝThe tests do not chart student progress, but rather are given in the same grade every time to chart the progress of the school and district.

They generate information for school improvement and school accountability.

Preliminary results were expected July 7 and the final results should come in late August.

Results of the third, fifth and seventh grades reading and math tests, and the results of tenth grade reading and 11th grade math will give the yearly progress for the schools and district relating to the No Child Left Behind Act, Reisnouer told the board.

However, no individual site will fall under the needs improvement/failing school because of demographics.

For example, in fifth grade testing, the names of students are submitted to a third party test supplier which then labels individual tests so that each 20 percent of the class receives the same test.

For instance, in the grade five math test the state scale score was 1539, while NBMS scored 1518.

This looks bad until the raw scores are checked. Out of 68 questions the state score was 48.4 answered correctly. The NBMS score was 47.8, which is less than one question difference.

Grade three primary school reading scale scores were 30 points higher than state scores, he pointed out. While that score may seem very high, it actually also equals one question difference in true scores.

The test score information is not expected to change curriculum, Reisnouer said. The students are steadily improving their scores and consistently showing their academic abilities.

Another difficulty is that the MCA is still based on the old Profile of Learning, and will not be based on the new Minnesota Academic Standards until 2006.

The district implemented the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP) assessment at the primary school and will begin at the intermediate sites next year.Ý

The tests were developed by the Northwest Evaluation Association, a non-profit organization based in Portland, Ore., and are computerized, adaptive assessments that show student growth in reading, language usage and math skills.

The scores depend on how many questions are answered correctly and the difficulty of each question.

Those tests are based on the Minnesota Academic Standards and will help teachers place new students in appropriate instructional settings and monitor growth in student achievement.Ý

They also provide immediate feedback and provide parents with better information about their childís growth in achievement and may be approved as the state test in the future, Reisnouer said.

The tests are already used across the country.

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