By Corey Conley
For The Standard

The Sumner County Board of Education began acting on a state mandate that could affect the grades of thousands of district students. As part of a wave of education-focused legislation levied by the new Republican-controlled state government, the General Assembly passed a bill that requires Tennessee schools to incorporate Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment scores into the spring semester grades for every student from third to eighth grade. Now, the board of education must adopt that as a policy by the end of the 2010-2011 school year.

    According to Assistant Director of Schools for Instruction, Judy Wheeler, the move by the state has not been a very popular one. TCAP tests were not designed to be used as part of a normal grading scheme, which the law states can range from 15 to 25% of a student’s total semester grade.

    “There is a great deal of apprehension about this policy. Group achievement scores are not intended for individual student use in an area as strong as up to a quarter of a student’s grade for a semester,” contended Wheeler.    

“For those of us who have been trained in psychometrics over the years, that is something we’re always advised to not do, to make serious decisions about children based on a single test score.”

    The law was intended to encourage students and parents to take the tests more seriously and encourage attendance, but according to Wheeler the law has caused “serious concern” among the state’s education community.

    According to the Assistant Director, there is some expectation that the law might be rescinded or postponed sometime this year. Until then, the board still has to move forward and adopt the policy.

    Wheeler said that many districts wrote their policy so that if a student misses the tests, their grade for that portion is a zero.

She took issue with that approach.

    “There are many valid reasons that a student can miss testing. All those kinds of issues need to be addressed at either the legislative level, at the state board level, or the Tennessee Department of Education level for there to be an alternative when there is a legitimate reason for a student to be out of school during TCAP week.”

    Some board members also expressed misgivings about the law.

    “I’ll vote for this on first reading, but I’ll never vote for this as a policy for our school system,” said board member Glen Gregory.

    Beth Cox admitted the proposed policy was “not a perfect system” that they are “still trying to work through the kinks,” but emphasized that the law requires the adoption of a policy.

    The policy passed unanimously on first reading.