Strengthening Achievement:
The Bangor School Department Assessment System
Bangor students continue to achieve at high levels 
The Bangor School Department has a long history of using assessment
data for the improvement of academic achievement, and our students have
been the direct beneficiaries of our efforts. Long before state and
federal mandates, Bangor teachers used data for instructional purposes,
constantly improving their instructional program, and consequently the
achievement of all students. Bangor students continue to outperform
their peers at both the state and national level on numerous measures,
and they are showing marked gains in our own locally designed
assessments. With a matriculation rate of 90% or greater for
Bangor High School graduating seniors and
recognition as a National School of Excellence, it is clear that our
fundamental philosophy of driving instruction through the use of data
continues to pay dividends.
The Bangor School Department Assessment System is a three-tiered
assessment system. This document provides a brief overview of that
system and of student achievement data at each level of assessment:
national, state and local assessments. This information is invaluable
in giving us a better understanding of how well our various assessments
measure the performance of our students and strength of our programs,
and will continue to be used for both district level and school-based
planning purposes.
The
2008-2009 school year marks a change in Bangor's use of a
nationally-normed measure of student achievement as the Terra Nova 3rd
Edition replaces the Metropolitan Achievement Test (MAT) which no
longer is supported by its original publisher. The MAT had been part of
the assessment
landscape in Bangor since 1979, providing a
baseline of student achievement in grades two through ten. Data
generated from the administration of the Terra Nova in early spring
will continue to be used extensively in the development of
individualized
instructional plans, as well as for program evaluation, curriculum
planning, and continuous improvement planning through the School Core
Competency (S.C.C.) Process.
While
the Terra Nova will provide valuable data, no test achieves alignment
with our curriculum in all areas; however, a review of Terra Nova
contenct revealed strong matches to what students learn at all grade
levels. As we gather baseline Terra Nova data, we are eager to gauge
the perfornmance of our students against their national peers at grades
2 through 10 in the areas of reading, language, mathematics, science,
and social studies.
State Assessment: The MEA
The
Maine Educational Assessment (MEA) underwent significant
revisions in 1998 and 2007. Administered to students in grades 4, 8
and 11 until 1997, the
test was redesigned to be aligned with the Maine Learning Results
(MLR) in the following content areas: English Language Arts
(reading and writing), Mathematics, Science and Technology, Social
Studies, Health and Visual and Performing Arts. In 2007, the MLR was
again redesigned and became known as the Perameters for Essential
Instruction. During the period from 1997-2007 and in response to the
passage and reauthorization of the federal No Child Left Behind law,
MEA testing has expanded to all grades 3-8, and Maine has opted for the
SAT as its correlated state achievement test in grade 11.
Interestingly, more changes are on the horizon as the Maine Department
of Education has elected to join New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and
Vermont in a regional testing group known as the New England Common
Assessment Program (NECAP). Thus, MEA testing will be replaced by NECAP
testing beginning in the fall 2009, a noteworthy change from the MEA
practice of assessing students in the spring.
The MEA consists of selected response questions (i.e. multiple
choice) and constructed response test items. Given its non-normative
nature, the assessment does not allow for the reporting of school
district comparisons. Rather, the test is to be used to compare students
against a standard of performance set by the MLR. The result is a scale
from X01 to X80 divided into four equal performance bands: Exceeds Standards, Meets
Standards, Partially Meets Standards and Does Not Meet Standards.
| Performance Levels as Defined by the Department of Education: |
Performance Levels
|
*Scaled Score Range
|
| Exceeds the Standards |
X61 - X80 |
| Meets the Standards |
X41 - X60 |
| Partially Meets the Standards |
X21 - X40 |
| Does Not Meet the Standards |
X01 - X20 |
*Scaled score ranges vary slightly according to grade and subject matter. The
X in the scaled score range corresponds to the grade that your child is
in. For example: 441-460 would be the Meets the Standards range for
fourth grade and 541-560 would be the Meets the Standards range for
fifth grade.
Local Assessments
For many years, the Bangor School Department has been developing and
implementing our own local assessments of student achievement to drive instruction. The
grades one, two and three literacy assessments are wonderful examples
of the quality work done by teachers and administrators across the
system in the way of measuring student performance. Additionally, we
have developed common units in English / language arts at grades 4-12, a grammar assessment at the middle school level, a
district-wide writing prompt for students in grades two through seven,
and math “Must-Knows” assessments at grades 3, 5 and 7. Because we have
become more sophisticated with our assessment development over the
years, classroom teachers and school planning teams are increasingly dependent upon our local
data for the purpose of making decisions about instruction and programming.
