Monitoring Student Progress in Mathematics and Science
All states require standardized tests to be administered to students in elementary, middle, and high school. Under the NCLB Act of 2002, all states were required to administer assessments in mathematics and reading annually during Grades 3 to 8 and at least once during Grades 10 to 12. Beginning with the 2007–2008 school year, testing also was required in science at least once during Grades 3 to 5, 6 to 9, and 10 to 11. Given the adoption of the Common Core State Standards in 43 states by 2015, several state-led consortia have developed assessments in mathematics and English language arts that aim to measure whether students are on track to be successful in college and their careers through material aligned with the Common Core State Standards. States may choose their own assessments. No comparable state-led consortia have developed science assessments based on the Next Generation Science Standards.
Under NCLB, all states and schools were required to demonstrate Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) toward the goal of all students meeting state-set proficiency levels. The stakes were high for schools; those that did not show AYP through standardized tests faced interventions. For students, there were rarely high stakes tests in elementary or middle school. However, in 2013, students in 24 states were required to pass a high school exit examination in order to obtain a standard diploma.41
As of December 2015, under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), while accountability remains the focus, these one-size-fits-all federal interventions are being replaced by intervention systems developed by individual states. Under ESSA, states are provided the flexibility to set their own student performance targets and measures of achievement. Funding incentives are provided to those states demonstrating the highest level of initiative and innovation.
In the United States, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) is the largest nationally representative and continuing assessment of what US students know and can do in various subject areas. Grade 4 and Grade 8 assessments in mathematics and reading are administered every other year, as required by the Elementary and Secondary Education Reauthorization Act of 2001. Assessments in science at Grades 4, 8, and 12 (as well as in mathematics and reading at Grade 12) are conducted approximately every four years.
Other standardized testing that takes place throughout the United States includes the SAT (originally called the Scholastic Aptitude Test), the ACT (originally called American College Testing), and the Advanced Placement (AP) tests, all of which are commercial tests developed and administered by private organizations, taken primarily by upper secondary school students, and used in the admission process for postsecondary education. However, admission to institutions of postsecondary education is not solely dependent on test scores; rather, most schools’ admissions offices look at a number of factors, including students’ class rank, grade point average (GPA), and extracurricular activities. Some postsecondary institutions, including most two year community colleges, do not require these test scores for admission.42,43,44
Several grading systems are used in US education, and there is no nationally mandated system. The most commonly used grading system entails the assignment of “letter grades,” in which letters represent the possible range of achievement categories (e.g., “A” representing the top category and “F” representing the bottom category). Decisions regarding which grading system to use are generally left up to individual institutions or individual faculty members.45 High schools generally compute a calculated average of the letter grades earned in school using a scale from 0 to 4.0, or 0 to 5.0. This is called a grade point average, or GPA. Grade reports typically are issued each quarter or approximately every nine weeks. Semester grades and yearly grades also are given in many districts. Usually, only final grades appear on a middle school or high school transcript, representing students’ overall performance in courses for the entire school year.
The monitoring of individual students’ long term progress is generally shared by students, parents, and schools, except in cases in which students are identified as having special needs that require Individualized Education Programs (IEPs). In this case, schools are responsible for providing regular educational progress reports to parents.46