While scores for the Standards of Learning tests were released last week, the age-old question of how well these tests function as educational assessments comes into play.
“SOLs are designed to give us a broad view of students’ performance over time and they’re effective for that,” said Christopher Gareis, a professor in the School of Education at William & Mary. “But it’s important to recognize no test is perfectly valid or reliable.”
In the mid-1990s, Virginia developed the SOLs after the fourth grade reading scores in the state declined drastically on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Additionally, the state found a decline in SAT scores which led to the decision to create a more rigorous academic and instructional standards in public schools.
As a result, in 1997 the state developed new standards of learning which were held accountable by the SOL testing system.
Charles Pyle, Virginia Department of Education spokesman, said before any questions go onto these tests,there is a diverse committee of teachers that reviews them to see if they will accurately reflect what educators should teaching in the classroom. Following this, the questions are then put in the assessments as field tests where they don’t appear on the score.
Since the program began, there has been new research and perspectives on whether or not standardized testing can accurately measure every student’s knowledge.
But the tests, and the process itself, has also evolved to recognize that.
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The Virginia Department of Education now uses the data from students tests, especially those in elementary school, to measure the progress of a student from year to year. Previously, the state had been only looking at whether or not students simply met the minimum standards.
“While we have always reported on the different groups of students, we are now factoring those [different groups] into accreditation and capturing the growth and recognizing the progress that is being made,” Pyle said. “Even if students are not quite there, that’s a fairness issue because we know there is a correlation between performance and poverty.”
Pyle said VDOE is interested in narrowing achievement gaps, meaning addressing certain pockets of students who haven’t met the standards, and they felt accreditation should reflect that.
Both York County and Williamsburg-James City County public schools exceeded the state’s average passing rates, but those that had the lowest number of passing tests were African American students while Asian and white students consistently had higher rates of passing.
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“It’s a truism of education,” Gareis said. “Not all students have the same opportunities outside of school to support their learning in school.”
In Virginia, accreditation is measured on a number of levels from student engagement, achievement gaps and achievement of all students, according to the Virginia Department of Education’s website. Those standards are set in order to hold schools accountable for the quality of education provided to students.
Gareis said the SOL tests do achieve the function they serve, but the state has started moving toward performance-based assessments in addition to the conventional forms.
Performance-based assessments generally involve a student having to produce something, like an essay or a tangible object. Gareis said this helps examine a student’s higher order thinking skills.
Pyle said that type of testing in addition to the conventional tests help to accurately measure what the VDOE calls the “Five Cs”: critical thinking, creativity, communication, collaboration and citizenship. These are described in Virginia’s profile of a graduate.
“What’s important is that one type of assessment is not necessarily better than another by itself,” Gareis said. “So SOLs are good at objectively assessing a broad base of knowledge, but to measure performance and complex thinking, you need both.”
