Professionals are unsure about the validity of SAGE testing

A psychologist and senator are still unsure about the validity of the Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence test, administered to students this April and May.

Senator Aaron Osmond, R-Salt Lake City is concerned that the test won’t be as valid if students are opting out.

“What if in one district we have 30% of students opt out and in the next only 5%,” Osmond said. “How can we treat each district fairly on school grading and teacher assessments if more than one-third of their students are opting out? It isn’t really a valid and reliable instrument anymore.”

Some school districts have more students opting out than others, which causes the test results for the schools to be off.

“Are we really achieving what we want the test to achieve?” Osmond said. “The kids know that these tests don’t affect their grade and it doesn’t matter, so they don’t really take the test seriously.”

Psychologist Dr. Gary Thompson had a lot of concern about the validity of the test as well.

“I’m against inaccurate standardized testing,” Thompson said. “We are just taking the words of a private publishing company that says it measures academics, and there is no proof to that.”

He had asked American Institutes for research, the publisher of the test, for validity studies but Thompson said they never answered back with their validity tests

AIR created the test along with Utah committee members..

“Valid just means true, so when someone says a test is valid really what they are saying, are that the claims about the test is true and reasonably well supported,” said Jon Cohen, executive vice president of AIR.

He said the company goes through various lengths to create the questions as well as look at the data after the tests to determine validity.

“We look at the reliability of the test, that is how precise the estimates are for the test,” he said.

Locally Directed Education group talks SAGE

A group of concerned parents congregated at the Sandy Public Library tonight at 7:00 p.m. to listen to two speakers talk about Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence testing and parental rights.

“I am worried about the direction education is taking as a whole,” said Wendell Ashby, who coordinated the event. “We are seeing less and less teaching and more and more directives given from districts, states, federal entities, private corporations, legislatures and I don’t believe that is the best outcome for education.”

He said he became involved because he is a concerned parent and is worried where the education system is headed.

Ashby invited speakers Christel Swasey and Heather Gardner to speak.

Swasey spoke about why parents should opt their children out of SAGE testing. She focused on the data the government and different corporations such as American Institute for Research receives when a student takes the SAGE test.

Gardner focused on parental rights and education. She told the story of her children and the problems she faced with SAGE testing and trying to opt her kids out.

Her kids were opted out of SAGE testing, but the charter school they attended still tried to force her children to take a test in some form.

“I had written an opt out letter that I didn’t want my children participating in the SAGE or the portal of any of the tests,” Gardner said. “Then my sixth grader came home and told me that they had made her log on to the portal to practice the test.”

The charter school which Gardner’s kids were attending eventually sent a letter to her saying that the school couldn’t accommodate her requests.

Gardner deeply encouraged the audience to learn and know their parental rights. She wanted parents to know what actions they are able to take with their children and the education system.

Another member of Locally Directed Education and member of their homeschool group attended the event as well.

“I am locally involved, politically involved I am passionate about education,” said Alisha Jensen, member of Locally Directed Education “As parents we have to decide what the purpose of education is. I believe that our children should be protected and that parents have ultimate authority.”

Utah State Senator irritated about end-of-level written test

Utah state senator is mad the written portion of the Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence test was taken by students in February. The test was supposed to be an end-of-level test, taken at the end of the year.

“On the first of February, fifth graders were required to take end-of-level writing assessments,” said Senator Howard Stephenson. “That’s preposterous to say that February is end-of-level.”

Students in Utah took the writing portion of the SAGE test in February because graders needed time to hand-grade the test.

“Because it is hand-graded and it goes with the Language Arts grade they want the test scores to be out by the end of the year,” said Sarah Hancock, a fifth grade teacher at Garland Elementary School.

She said it was really stressful and frustrating for the students to take an end-of-year writing test half-way through the school year.

“no one felt like the kids were prepared,” Hancock said.

Stephenson also said the schools are using computer labs for end-of-level testing, which he thought should be used for student instruction instead.

The SAGE test is an adaptive test so it is administered on computers. The students also have to take practice tests on the computers as well.

“They go to the computer lab twice a week for a half an hour each,” Hancock said.

She said the practice tests sometimes have more than one right answer and students have to move things on the screen and place them in certain ways.

“The kids aren’t used to it at all, which is why we are trying to do all these practice tests,” Hancock said. “We spend at least two hours a week working on them.”

Senators want to re-evaluate SAGE testing

Two Utah Senators are re-evaluating the Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence test, which is a high-stakes, end-of-level test in Utah. The senators have started re-evaluating the test after calling for a suspension in February.

“We would like to rethink whether we should even have high-stake, end-of-level tests,”

said Senator Howard Stephenson, R-Salt Lake City. “We are focusing on teaching to the test and that’s not always what is best for students.”

Stephenson said he doesn’t like that teachers and schools are judged based on student’s performance on a single test.

“If I were the king of Utah I would want to get rid of the SAGE test today,” Stephenson said

The senators are having the state school board, state office of education and the Education Interim Committee look at the testing as a whole to try and create smaller assessments throughout the year rather than having a larger test at the end of the year to base everything off of.

In September the two senators will have a meeting with the state school board, the board of regents and Legislative Education Committee where they will all sit down together and re-evaluate.

“We formed a committee to evaluate what we are doing with SAGE testing, why we are doing it and if it really is achieving what our goal was,” said Senator Aaron Osmond, R-Salt Lake City.

He also said they spend a lot of money on testing infrastructure, so they want to be sure the money is worth it.

The SAGE test is worth about $47.3 million, and has a five year contract.

This year will only be the second year the test has been in place.

“If you put something in place you have to be careful and make sure that you don’t just rip it out two years later and say you screwed up,” Osmond said. “You have to be conscious about how you transition and move to something else.”

Concerned mothers speak to public about SAGE

Two speakers will be sharing their insights about high-stakes standardized testing on Thursday at 7:00 p.m. in Sandy, Utah. The speakers, Christel Swasey and Heather Gardner, parent activists, will be speaking to a group called Locally Directed Education.

Swasey said she will be focusing on encouraging other parents and students to opt out of the Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence test.

“My number one reason that I am opting my children out of SAGE and encouraging other people also to do the same is the State Longitudinal Database System,” Swasey said.

The SLDS is a program that is linked to a schools’ student information system in order for districts and schools to access assessments, attendance, grades and courses.

She said when children take the SAGE test, their data is submitted into this system for the government to see.

“We are not properly protected in our children’s privacy rights. That is the number one reason I don’t do SAGE,” Swasey said.

She will also speak about how the SAGE test is based from Common Core standards and the adaptive testing of the SAGE test.

Gardner is going to share her story about SAGE testing at the event.

“We basically got kicked out of our charter school for opting out of testing,” Gardner said. “We worked on getting legislation passed so that kids can opt out of any state administered test.”

Gardner is going to focus on parent’s rights in both the state and federal government.

Senator Aaron Osmond recently released a bill regarding parental rights with standardized testing.

“Many parents have expressed concerns to me that first of all, the privacy of the student is not protected,” Osmond said. “Second, is the questions themselves are not consistent with the values in the state of Utah.”

Osmond said he wanted to give concerned parents the option of opting their child out of a state-mandated test.

State board committee discusses senate bill

The state board committee met with Senator Aaron Osmond on Thursday evening in Salt Lake City to discuss students opting out of state-mandated tests.

In the meeting they discussed Osmond’s senate bill 204, which outlines parental rights in public education.

Senate bill 204 states: “at the request of a student’s parent or guardian, a Local Education Agency shall excuse a student from taking an assessment that is federally mandated, is mandated by the state under this title; or requires the use of a state assessment system; or software that is provided or paid by the state.”

State board and committee member Linda Hansen said there were two big changes made to the bill.

“Before, they could just opt out of summative stage but now they can opt out of formative, interim and summative stage,” Hansen said.

The summative test, Hansen references, is the Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence test taken at the very end of the year. The interim test is an optional SAGE test, but given in the middle of the year, if the school district decides to administer the test. Formative testing is any kind of test.

If a teacher asks a student a question in class, it would be an example of formative testing, Hansen said.

Another change that was made allows parents to opt out with a 24-hour notice. Before the parent had to give a five day notice.

“I think that parents need to understand that it is an advantage to them to find out how their children are doing,” Hansen said. “If they opt out, the parents don’t know how their children are doing.”

The school board committee has the ability to look at the senate bills and decide how they are going to implement it in the district.

“All that they did with their rule about my bill was to give guidance to the district about what they need to do, how to implement it and what the actual steps for opting out will be,” Osmond said.

SAGE test is converted to American Sign Language for the first time

Utah’s deaf schools will be experiencing parts of the Student Assessment of Growth and Excellence test in American Sign Language for the first time this May.

The state of Utah spent $7.2 million to convert the SAGE test into ASL.

Michelle Tanner, associate superintendent of the deaf, originally thought the test would have had ASL videos when the SAGE test came out last year.

“When that didn’t come we requested it this year,” Tanner said. “I was not aware that it was coming for spring testing.”

Only the listening passages of the test will be converted into ASL.

"I am grateful that the listening passages will be interpreted,” she said. “That is not everything, but it is a good start and that will be helpful, if it works and the ASL is accurate.”

Tanner said they will still be hiring interpreters for other portions of the test.

“We also have to schedule a lot of interpreters to make sure this is accessible for our students,” Tanner said. “So it is pricey and requires time to schedule.”

Teresa Owino, a high school teacher who teaches about 14 deaf students from Jean Massieu School for the Deaf, has to work on getting tutors for her students as well.

“This year the test is supposed to have the ASL interpretation videos for the SAGE test, but since we cannot fully rely on that to happen, we have arranged for interpreters to be present for all testing,” Owino said.

They have seen a practice video to see if the video will work.

“One practice test we looked at did indeed have the video up and running,” Owino said. “We will see how it goes once we get to the real test in May.”