Children in Pima County public schools scored at or below national averages on a standardized test taken during the spring semester.
Statewide, the snapshot looks the same. Scores were below the national average in language in grades 3-12 and lower than that average in math and reading at some grade levels.
Stanford Achievement Test, Ninth Edition, test scores were released June 30th by the Arizona Department of Education. The three-hour multiple-choice exam this year replaced the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills, a standardized test given statewide in each of the previous eight years.
Educators chose the Stanford 9 test because it better matched state academic standards, said Kelly Powell, the state department's director of research and evaluation.
The below-average test scores disappointed the state's top education leader.
"I know our children can do better," said state Superintendent of Public Instruction Lisa Graham Keegan. "This is not the sole indicator of student achievement, but it is important and should be taken seriously."
Most local educators agreed the test, which is described as tougher than the Iowa Tests of Basic Skills, is a better gauge of student ability in reading, math, and language.
Terry Downey, assistant superintendent of Catalina Foothills Unified School District, said the Stanford 9 test is more accurate for today's students because it's newer. The ninth edition underwent pilot testing two years ago and was formally administered for the first time this year.
"This is probably a better judge of what our students know and are able to do", Downey said.
But it's too early to correlate the test scores with curriculum in Tucson school districts, said Scott Mundell, assistant superintendent of Marana Unified School District.
"What happens, as soon as they bring out a new test, we start to match our curriculum to it," Mundell said. "We didn't have time to do that."
Mundell said the Iowa Tests never completely matched his district's curriculum.
Depending on the subject, the Stanford 9 roughly matches from 25 percent to 80 percent of the state's academic standards according to a preliminary study, Powell said.
He said those figures are higher than the Iowa Tests, which matched about 26 percent of the state's academic standards.
Last year, Pima County's average Iowa Tests scores hovered at the 50th percentile. But educators warn that Iowa Tests and Stanford 9 scores are not mirrors of each other. Above average test scores on the Iowa Tests could translate into slightly below average scores on the Stanford 9, officials said.
Powell said the Stanford 9's norms are more reliable because the company gave its pilot test to about 20,000 students nationwide in 1995. That group was chosen to reflect the race, gender, socioeconomic status and location of students across the nation.
The company that makes the Iowa Tests last gave a norm test in 1988 and in recent years the authors mathematically updated the norms, Powell said.
Still, the Stanford 9 and the Iowa Tests are comparable, said Monty Neill, associate director of Fair Test - a watchdog group of the testing industry. Both tests are among the five most commonly used nationwide.
"If you're trying to pick a test, most states and districts try to find the one that fits closest to the curriculum or state standards," Neill said. "It makes sense to do that. Unfortunately, all of those tests will not measure much of what a good curriculum ought to be."
Arizona was one of the first states to buy the Stanford 9 test from the Harcourt Brace company. Six other states and Guam also dropped the Iowa Tests and adopted the Stanford 9 for the 1996-97 school year.
"I feel comfortable that other states have adopted it," said the state department's Powell.
But Linda Loomis, Amphitheater Unified School District's director of instructional development, said the new test may have thrown some children off track.
"The language part of the test was different from the ITBS - there is more emphasis on punctuation and capitalization," Loomis said. "The test pulls it out."
Children in the district are taught those skills in the context of writing assignments. Scores may not accurately reflect their true spelling or punctuation ability because they are not used to isolating the skill, Loomis said.
Statewide 506,285 children took the test - or 85.9 percent of all children enrolled in grades 3-12. Children enrolled in special education and those with English language deficiencies were exempted.
In Tucson Unified School District - the county's largest - 4,642 of 39,850 children were exempted. In Amphitheater, 1,106 of 11,505 children in grades 3-12 were exempted. And in Sunnyside Unified School District, 1,041 of 10,433 children in grades 3-12 were exempted.
In Sunnyside, about 10 percent of the children in grades 3-12 took the standardized test in Spanish. The Spanish test, the Aprenda, is equivalent to the Stanford 9 but the test scores are not included in the district averages, said Steve Schrankel, the district's director of research and evaluation.
Overall, children who took the standardized test in Spanish scored higher than those who took the Stanford 9, Schrankel said. For example, fifth-grade reading scores on the Stanford 9 were in the 33 percentile, while children who took the Aprenda scored in the 49 percentile.
"That pleases us mightily," he said.
Officials intend to analyze the data to determine why Spanish-speaking students scored higher, he said.
David Krueger, planning and assessment director for TUSD, said he was pleased with his district's high school scores.
"That's important because it's our graduates," he said.
Moreover, Krueger said, he favors the Stanford 9 because it is linked to national standards developed by academic groups across the country, which districts use to develop curriculum.
He described those standards as "more aligned, they are more reflective of the skills and competencies" of students.
Classroom teachers wrote the questions for the Stanford 9 while university professors constructed items on the Iowa Tests.
Copies of the scores may be obtained from the state Department of Education, 602-542-5387.
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