What's On First: Washington High School Proficiency Exam (son-of-WASL) Publishes Rank Distribution

Many students got back a report card on the replacement for the hated WASL test.

They have finally added a distribution so that you can tell how your student did in relationship to other students because SOME PARENTS ACTUALLY WANT TO KNOW HOW THEIR STUDENTS RANK. Imagine that. They even now have WASL distributions (guess better late than never)

from http://www.k12.wa.us/assessment/StateTesting/TestStatistics.aspx

Testing Statistics (Frequency Distribution)

The intent of state testing is to determine a student’s skills and knowledge based our state learning standards in reading, writing, math and science. The score on each test (see sample score reports) is a snapshot of a student’s performance. Overall academic performance, not just a student’s state testing scores, should always be taken into account.

OSPI is providing the following “frequency distribution” report because families have expressed an interest in knowing where their child’s scores fall in comparison with other students from around the state.

How to read the report:

The first column is the scale score, which are the numbers you see on a student score report (e.g., a student scored a 400 on his reading exam)
The second column is the frequency, or number of students, who obtained a specific score (e.g., 720 students finished with a reading score of 366)
The third column represents the percent of students who obtained a specific score (e.g., 2.2 percent of students scored at 401 on the reading exam)
The fourth column represents the percentile ranking of where a student’s score fell overall (e.g., a student’s score of 463 on the reading exam placed him at the 96.9 percentile when compared to all students who took that test)
The yellow highlighted lines represent the cut scores between Levels 1 and 2, 2 and 3 and 3 and 4 (e.g., a student’s score of 386 is a Level 2 score)

Frequency Distribution Report

(guess 2012 isn't out yet)

Take for example, student X:

Reading: 525 Level 1=225-374 Level 2= 375-399 Level 3 = 400-426 Level 4 = 427-525

Writing: 20 Level 1 = 0-12 Level 2 = 13-16 Level 3 = 17-20 Level 4 = 21 to 24

Assuming that 2012 distribution is something like the 2011, then 525 is the same as the top possible score, only 1,234 or 1.7% of students scored that high, putting him/her in the top 1.7 or the 98 or 99th percentile which is better than just about everybody (which used to be good enough to get you into Harvard or Stanford in the 1970s, but evidently not anymore). Bear in mind, this was a student who couldn't make it past page 100 in Moby Dick, but then I couldn't find evidence of ANY student alive who did either and didn't lie about it.

Writing on the other hand was 20, which is is only at the 50th percentile, or smack in the middle of everybody. Now the fact that one score is at 50, and the other is at the top of the scale might call into question the validity of the whole thing since they are supposedly assessing different sides of the same verbal skills/ talent, and this student scored 40th percentile on the college level SAT (yes the real one) as an 8th grader, which is way, way above average for an 8th grader if he was average for a college student.

The other thing you need to know about the testing scam is that they generally scale the scores very very low in the beginning in order to show how badly your curriculum needs to be reformed by throwing lots of money at it. In fact, I was scoring tests for one state where scorers were told to give NOBODY a perfect 4, at least not without special permission, and final results showed less than 0.1% were allowed to have the equivalent of an A. Top 1% end up a Harvard and Stanford, but not good enough for a "4".

It inevitably ends with everybody passing after 10 years or so and deciding the whole test was stupid and needs to be junked and replaced with yet ANOTHER test which is going to be valid this time around. That is what happened to WASL which I pointed out bragged about how hard their 4th grade test math was - of course it was hard, any MIT grad who bothered to compare the test items with their actual grade level skills would find that most 4th grade items were at jr or high school, while most high school items were at jr high or 4th grade arithmetic.

Here is Grade 10 Reading

FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTION HSPE Spring 2010 Grade 10 Reading, Writing, and Science SCALE SCORES


Reading Scale Score	Frequency	Percent	Cumulative Percent (Percentile Rank)
225	1	.0	.0
252	2	.0	.0
273	17	.0	.0
287	6	.0	.0
296	14	.0	.1
304	24	.0	.1
311	39	.1	.1
316	65	.1	.2
322	65	.1	.3
326	102	.1	.4
331	116	.2	.6
335	148	.2	.8
339	162	.2	1.0
343	196	.3	1.3
346	224	.3	1.6
350	256	.3	1.9
353	288	.4	2.3
356	309	.4	2.7
360	334	.4	3.2
363	395	.5	3.7
366	406	.5	4.3
369	435	.6	4.8
372	525	.7	5.5
375	596	.8	6.3
378	644	.9	7.2
381	759	1.0	8.2
384	889	1.2	9.4
387	1043	1.4	10.8
390	1188	1.6	12.4
393	1364	1.8	14.2
397	1586	2.1	16.4
400	1818	2.4	18.8
404	2127	2.9	21.7
407	2547	3.4	25.1
411	2960	4.0	29.0
415	3537	4.7	33.8
420	4065	5.5	39.2
427	4542	6.1	45.3
430	5329	7.1	52.5
436	5774	7.7	60.2
443	6417	8.6	68.8
451	6616	8.9	77.7
461	6460	8.7	86.4
475	5415	7.3	93.6
497	3514	4.7	98.3
525	1234	1.7	100.0
Total	74553	100.0

Writing Scale Score	Frequency	Percent	Cumulative Percent (Percentile Rank)
4	135	.2	.2
5	33	.0	.2
6	141	.2	.4
7	59	.1	.5
8	243	.3	.8
9	139	.2	1.0
10	365	.5	1.5
11	337	.5	2.0
12	824	1.1	3.1
13	768	1.1	4.2
14	1504	2.1	6.2
15	1404	1.9	8.2
16	2760	3.8	11.9
17	2786	3.8	15.7
18	4954	6.8	22.5
19	5450	7.5	30.0
20	14166	19.4	49.4
21	8696	11.9	61.3
22	11156	15.3	76.6
23	7263	9.9	86.5
24	9841	13.5	100.0
Total	73024	100.0

This is how to ask for a copy of your student's test

Student Education Record Parent Request

Parents and guardians of students who were enrolled full time or part time in Washington public schools during state testing may view their child’s Washington Comprehensive Assessment Program (WCAP) test booklets; which includes the Measurements of Student Progress (MSP), High School Proficiency Exam (HSPE), End-of-Course exams (EOC), Washington Alternate Assessment System Portfolio and the Collection of Evidence (high school only). Test booklet reviews are not available to parents and guardians of full-time private school students and full-time home-schooled students.

Download the handout that explains how to request your child’s test booklet, what to expect after submitting a request, and under what circumstances the state will re-score a test.

Guidelines for review of WCAP Test Booklets (PDF)

2011-2012 School Year

Request form to view 2012 Winter EOC (PDF)

2010-2011 School Year

2009-2010 School Year

Request form to view 2010 Spring HSPE (PDF)
Request form to view 2010 August HSPE (PDF)

Student Education Record Parent Request

Download the handout that explains how to request your child’s test booklet, what to expect after submitting a request, and under what circumstances the state will re-score a test.