Illinois State Board of Education Releases PARCC Results

Submitted by Hinsdale Township High School District 86.

Hinsdale, IL - Hinsdale Township High School District 86 today announced that the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE) has publicly released the PARCC assessment scores from the spring 2015 test administration.

PARCC, as it is commonly known, stands for the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, and is the new assessment tool required by the state of Illinois.

The test was administered to select high school students based on course enrollment and to all elementary school students in grades three through eight. The District 86 students who participated in PARCC testing were enrolled in English 1 and Algebra 1 courses during the 2014-15 academic year.

District 86 students performed very well when compared to the state and national averages, which includes student scores from 11 states and the District of Columbia. In the area of English, all freshmen and a small number of sophomores in District 86 took the English 1 test last school year, performing with an average English Language Arts/Literacy score of 762 as compared to the 736 in Illinois and 739 nationally. The percentage of District 86 students meeting or exceeding standards in English was 66 percent compared to the Illinois average of 36 percent.

Fewer students were tested in math than in English. Whereas all freshman students took the English PARCC assessment only 33 percent of the freshman class at Hinsdale Central and 51 percent at Hinsdale South took the Algebra 1 test last year. The majority of the remaining students enrolled in courses with more advanced math content, such as Geometry or Algebra 2 Trigonometry Honors.

Those students were not given PARCC tests. The results, therefore, represent a specific subgroup of math students. These students’ math performance also outpaced that of their counterparts in the state with 33.7 percent of them meeting or exceeding standards as compared to 17 percent in Illinois. District 86 students earned an average score of 740 on the PARCC math assessment while the state average was 724 and the national average was 734.

“We are in a time of flux when it comes to testing,” said Superintendent Dr. Bruce Law, “and the future of assessments in Illinois is uncertain. It would take too narrow a view of the complexity of schooling to use one data point to judge the effectiveness of our instructional program, but we do view these data as another data point for evaluating how we are doing and for making adjustments to instruction in our pursuit of continuously improving the education we provide our students. Although we are preliminarily and generally pleased by our scores for the first year of such a rigorous test, we understand that it is just one test score.”

Assistant Superintendent for Academics Pam Bylsma also commented on the results, “The new testing plan holds districts accountable for providing their students with more rigorous curriculum that is designed to expose them to authentic learning challenges, to develop their critical thinking and communication skills and to help them see connections between curricular disciplines.

To prepare for this transformation in how we assess our students, District 86 teachers have enhanced our curriculum and instructional practices over the past several years to reflect this revised set of learning standards. We are pleased with how our students performed during this inaugural year of collecting baseline data, which will assist us in continuing to improve our instructional programming.”

Proficiency was measured on four levels in the previous assessment system. Two were considered proficient and two were not. Under PARCC, there are five levels of measurement with level three meaning a student is approaching standards and has demonstrated proficiency on some standards but not every standard at the time the test was administered.

In addition, PARCC standards are internationally benchmarked. Previous tests were benchmarked against state standards, and according to ISBE Superintendent Dr. Tony Smith, this change has created a perception of lower test scores when in fact they are simply different. The PARCC assessments measure a broad range of knowledge and skills, such as problem-solving and critical thinking, that are essential for success.

The test also measures writing at all grade levels, a valuable indicator of college and career readiness and a skill that was only assessed intermittently and for certain grade levels on previous state tests.

According to ISBE, PARCC scores can be viewed on the following website:www.illinoisreportcard.com, although a recent check indicates that they have not yet appeared. Ms. Bylsma will provide a comprehensive academic report to the District 86 Board of Education in January. Individual student results will be delivered after winter break.

To help students and families understand the scores, Ms. Bylsma has put extensive information on PARCC, including a score interpretation guide, located here on the District website.