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Published on 07/14/1999 All articles from this issue

STAR results: Test scores up overall at local elementary and high schools

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By Linda Taaffe / Town Crier Staff Writer

Los Altos

The Los Altos School District came out on top again this year. Test scores improved nearly two national percentile points districtwide in the with the average student score in the 88.7 percentile - or the top 12 percent of all students.

Dick Liewer, associate superintendent of curriculum, said 74 percent of the district's subtest scores improved or stayed the same, and more than 50 subtest areas showed increases greater than 2 percent. In total, all four testing areas showed increases districtwide, Liewer said.

"I'm really pleased with that," he said.

The average student score in math went up from last year's 89.4 percentile to the 90.5 percentile; the average score in written expression went from 87.4 to 89.4; and the average reading score rose from 85.9 to 87.2. Approximately 2,818 students in grades 2-8 from all of the district's eight schools took the tests.

Liewer said students showed the most improvement in the spelling subtest. Test results jumped 3 percentage points from last year with the average student ranking in the 85.4 percentile.

Students at Blach Junior High scored in the 93.5 percentile in the math subtest, ranking the highest among schools in Santa Clara, San Mateo, Santa Cruz, Monterey and Alameda counties and among the highest in Northern California, Liewer said. Students at Egan Intermediate scored in the 91 percentile in the math subtest, ranking fourth in the five counties.

In comparison, fourth grade math scores dropped at Almond, Bullis-Purissima, Loyola and Santa Rita schools, and fourth grade scores at Santa Rita declined in all four subject areas.

Liewer said these scores dropped less than 2 percentage points, an insignificant amount. He said the district's scores were still among the highest in the area.

Liewer said scores dropped more than 2 percentage points in two areas: Almond's grade 2 language scores went down from the 88th national percentile to the 83rd percentile; and Santa Rita's grade 6 spelling scores dropped from the 86th to the 81st percentile.

Liewer said students fared well in the new augmentation tests, scoring higher than most local districts with similar demographics.

"To see results between 70 and 80 percent is pretty astounding," Liewer said. He said that the state had not yet adopted textbooks to match its new math standards.

Fremont Union

Student scores at the Fremont Union High School District improved from one to five percentile ranks in each category of this year's Stanford 9 test.

The average student performed from the 53rd to the 81st percentile districtwide, said Maribeth Smith, associate superintendent of educational planning and development.

The test scores are based on the overall student results from each of the district's five high schools and include results from the district's approximately 11 percent limited-English proficient students.

"There was no drop in districtwide averages in any area," Smith said, referring to the Stanford 9 test. There were, however, some variations in individual school averages, she said.

The average reading and writing scores on the STAR augmentation ranged from 53 to 73 percent correct, Smith said. Grade 11 scores ranged from 39 to 64 percent correct in math, she said.

"I thought we did pretty well considering we didn't know what was coming," said Smith about the augmentation tests. She said the math scores were a little lower than some teachers had hoped. She said some of the math augmentation test covered material that students had not yet learned in school.

At Homestead High School, where about 200 Los Altos residents are enrolled, overall student scores in grades 9 and 11 went up in all areas, Smith said.

Students earned their highest scores in math, with the average student score from the 70th to the 77th percentile in grades 9, 10 and 11.

She said the reading and comprehensive scores in grades 10 looked unusually low, but said other districts fared similarly. The average student score in reading comprehension for grade 10 dropped from the 49th percentile last year to the 45th percentile this year.

Vocabulary scores dropped from the 62nd percentile last year to the 59th percentile this year, according to the STAR results.

"I think there's some quirk in the test," she said. "On the whole, I see reading comprehension scores higher districtwide."

Smith said the district hopes to use the results to target those students who scored under the 40th percentile in reading comprehension and provide them special assistance in the upcoming school year.

Mountain View - Los Altos Union

Local school districts fared well on the state's second annual standardized test, jumping as many as 2 percentage points overall.

The average area student scored above the 50th percentile in all subtest areas of the Stanford 9 standardized test, with the most gains in the mathematics subtest and the biggest decline in the language subtest, according to test results.

Students in the Los Altos School District earned the highest scores in math among schools in five Bay Area counties. The Mountain View-Los Altos Union High School District reported significant jumps in the social science and math subtests, and overall student scores in the Fremont Union High School District improved as much as 5 percentage points on some subtests.

Districts statewide showed an improvement over 1998 in almost every academic area and every grade level tested. Student scores on the Stanford 9 increased by an average of two to four points in all academic areas and at every grade level except for reading at grades 7, 9 and 11 and for history-social science at grades 9, 10 and 11. The biggest increases were in the lower grade levels and in mathematics, according to test results.

The Stanford 9 test is part of the state's Standardized Testing and Reporting program (STAR) that the State Board of Education launched last year to better align and measure academic programs in the state's public school system. The goal of the test is to create a baseline against which to measure future improvement and to determine if students are making progress.

The STAR program requires all students in California's public schools in grades 2-11, including students who speak limited English and some students enrolled in special education programs, be tested each spring in English with the Stanford 9. This is a nationally normed test of basic academic skills. The multiple-choice test covers reading, spelling, language and math as well as science and social science in grades 10-12. Test scores are determined by comparing individual scores to scores from a national sample, with the 50th percentile being average.

This year's testing program included additional test questions called the "STAR augmentation," which is linked to the state's recently adopted language arts and mathematical standards. The state recorded the results of the augmentation tests with the percentage of questions students answered correctly.

Districts also administered for the first time the Spanish Assessment of Basic Education to Spanish-speaking students who first enrolled in California public schools less than 12 months prior to testing.

Despite the test publisher's error in recording the results for limited-English proficient students, local administrators had a general picture last week of how students within their districts had performed. They did not expect the corrected results, scheduled to be completed this week, to significantly change district scores.

Student scores at the Mountain View-Los Altos Union High School District remained relatively flat overall.

The average grade 9 student scored in the 57th percentile in reading, compared to the 56th percentile in 1998; the 74th percentile in math, compared to the 75th percentile in 1998; the 68th percentile in language, compared to the 66th percentile in 1998; the 62nd percentile in science, the same as last year; and the 67th percentile in social science compared to the 66th percentile last year.

"I think we're faring pretty well in comparison with other schools with similar demographics and socioeconomics as the students in our schools. I think that's an important fact to keep in mind," said Brigitte Sarraf, associate superintendent of curriculum. "In comparison with the state (average), we're above."

Approximately 2,103 students from Mountain View, Los Altos, Alta Vista and Moffett high schools took the test. About 12 percent of those students were limited-English proficient.

Sarraf said students performed above the state average and comparably to other similar districts on the augmentation test.

Sarraf said student scores made some noticeable jumps on the math and social science subtests.

Grade 10 scores for science and social science at Mountain View High jumped 4 percentile points, with the average student scoring in the 69th percentile in science and the 64th percentile in social science.

The grade 10 math scores at Los Altos High improved 5 percentile points, with the average student scoring in the 70th percentile. At Mountain View High, the grade 10 math scores improved 3 percentile points, with the average student scoring in the 71st percentile.

Upcoming: The Town Crier will print the Mountain View School District's STAR test results after the state releases the corrected scores scheduled to be updated this month.

Test results from the Mountain View-Los Altos Union High School District will also appear in an upcoming schools section when complete posting of updated scores becomes available.