{"id":15501,"date":"2025-02-25T17:25:35","date_gmt":"2025-02-25T18:25:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=15501"},"modified":"2025-02-25T19:06:41","modified_gmt":"2025-02-25T19:06:41","slug":"reversing-the-chaos-a-method-to-make-forward-exam-scores-comparable-to-the-past","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/?p=15501","title":{"rendered":"Reversing the Chaos: A Method to Make Forward Exam Scores Comparable to the Past"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/will-law.org\/reversing-the-chaos-a-method-to-make-forward-exam-scores-comparable-to-the-past\/<\/a><\/p>\n

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In August 2024, the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) made a controversial decision to change both the scale, cut points and terminology of the Forward Exam. This has made it harder for districts, parents, and the public to track student outcomes over time, posing a significant challenge in assessing progress on COVID-era learning loss. Despite this difficulty, it is still possible for school districts with student level data to approximate student achievement levels under the previous cut scores. This post shows districts how to do just that. For districts interested in learning more, WILL is open to discussing how this tool can be applied. Please contact WILL\u2019s Research Director, Dr. Will Flanders if interested.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Each year, DPI releases Percentile Rankings that map back to categories of performance on the Forward Exam. Percentile rankings explain where a student\u2019s test score ranks relative to their peers. A student in the 80<\/span>th<\/span> percentile in ELA, for example, did better than about 80% of their peers in that subject.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Mapping backwards is possible because DPI also releases information on what scale score for a student is needed to achieve each category of performance.\u00a0 Below is the example of ELA for the new 2024 ELA scores:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Using the percentile rankings in the table below, <\/span>we find that <\/span>in<\/span> order to<\/span> be p<\/span>laced<\/span> into the \u201capproaching\u201d category in ELA, a <\/span>third-grade<\/span> student must achieve at least a score of 1511 on the Exam<\/span>.\u00a0 <\/span>This score <\/span>would place <\/span>the <\/span>student in<\/span> roughly t<\/span>he<\/span> 18<\/span><\/span>th<\/span><\/span> percentile of <\/span>students statewide<\/span>.<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Below are the cut points that were used from 2016-2023 for ELA, as well as the percentile table for 2023. In addition to all the other changes, DPI changed the labels for the categories of achievement for 2024.\u00a0 \u201cDeveloping\u201d was previously known as \u201cBelow Basic.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cApproaching\u201d was known as \u201cBasic.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cMeeting\u201d was known as \u201cProficient\u201d while \u201cAdvanced stayed the same in both years.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Under the previous cut points, a score of 522 was required to reach the equivalent \u201cBasic\u201d level of that we examined in the example above.\u00a0 Using the percentile rankings for last year, this means that a student would be between the 26<\/span>th<\/span> and 27<\/span>th<\/span> percentile in proficiency in order to make it out of the lowest achievement category.\u00a0 This clarifies the sizable easing of testing that DPI engaged in with the new cut points\u2014shifting about 8% of students from the lowest category to the next category.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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For a school or district to approximate how they would have performed under the old metrics, they can generate a count of the number of students that fall within each percentile ranking that the old cut points required.\u00a0 The table below shows the scale score cut points for ELA under the 2024 scales if 2023 standards were applied.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Under the 2024 metrics, a student scoring 1560 would be in the \u201cMeeting\u201d category.\u00a0 But under the 2023 metrics, this student would have been in the \u201cApproaching\u201d category. Re-mapping the scale scores for every student will allow districts to approximate where their proficiency percentages (\u201cMeeting\u201d or above) would\u2019ve been had DPI not changed the metrics.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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The <\/span>included <\/span>Excel sheet<\/span><\/a> somewhat automates<\/span> this process<\/span>.\u00a0 <\/span>It<\/span> will allow schools and districts to enter the number of students they <\/span>have<\/span> w<\/span>ithin each scale score <\/span>range<\/span> on the most recent Forward <\/span>Exam and<\/span> will generate the levels of <\/span>proficiency<\/span> that <\/span>would\u2019ve<\/span> been expected under the old cut points<\/span>.\u00a0<\/span> Note that there is stand-in data to be replaced to <\/span>demonstrate<\/span> how the completed display chart might look:<\/span><\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Limitations<\/span><\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The biggest limitation here is in the utility of the percentile scale scores. These can shift slightly based on real changes in aggregate student performance.\u00a0 However, these shifts tend to be quite small.\u00a0 The table below shows the ELA scale score required to teach the 26<\/span>th<\/span> percentile over the past five years. The score remained the exact same through four of the years before shifting up slightly in 2023.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n

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Because of this limitation, mapping back to 2023 standards will only be useful for a couple of years.\u00a0 It is vital that legislation is passed to reverse the altered standards from DPI so that we can maintain a clear-eyed view of what is happening with student proficiency around the state.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

For more information or to get a walkthrough of the Excel sheet, please contact:<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\"Will<\/div>\n
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Will Flanders, PHD<\/h4>\n

Research Director<\/p>\n

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Flanders@will-law.org<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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The post Reversing the Chaos: A Method to Make Forward Exam Scores Comparable to the Past<\/a> appeared first on Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post originally appeared at https:\/\/will-law.org\/reversing-the-chaos-a-method-to-make-forward-exam-scores-comparable-to-the-past\/ In August 2024, the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":15503,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15501","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-will"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15501","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/84"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15501"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15501\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15511,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15501\/revisions\/15511"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15503"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15501"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15501"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wifamily.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15501"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}