A statewide assessment of grade schoolers taken this spring has suggested education has some room for improvement.
The Performance Evaluation for Alaska’s Schools (PEAKS) exam was administered for the first time to students
between third and 10th grade, testing for proficiency in mathematics, English language arts and science. Mirroring standards used in the widely-used National Assessment of Educational Progress, PEAKS provides a snapshot of student performance in relation to grade-level standards.
Overall, schools across the state did not achieve high marks. A handful of institutions’ students saw high proficiency levels, with only Skagway having 30 percent or fewer of its students to be below proficiency among schools in
Southeast.
Like those at other schools, Wrangell’s students were measured for English and mathematics skills, as well as for science. Third through fifth graders at Evergreen Elementary saw 72.7 percent measure “below proficient” in language arts, and 54.6 percent in mathematics. In fourth grade science, only 50 percent of students were below proficient.
At the higher levels, students at Stikine Middle School tested better in English, with 43.3 percent below proficiency. In math that figure was at 60.7 percent, while in science eighth grade students were 46.2 percent below the standard.
Ninth and tenth graders at Wrangell High School measured similarly in math, with 62.8 percent below expectations for their age group. In language arts, the group was 54.8 percent below proficiency. In science students stood out, with 81.2 percent meeting proficiency levels.
The scores were more or less comparable to other schools in the region. Students at Rae C. Stedman Elementary in Petersburg, for example, saw 46.7 percent below proficiency in English and 52.3 percent below in math. Likewise, taking an average of scores for seven Juneau elementary schools, 56.4 percent of students were below proficiency in English, and 57.9 percent below in their math skills.
Additional information on the PEAKS assessment, including sample questions, can be found on the Department of Education and Early Development website at https://education.alaska.gov/assessments/peaks. An informational map presenting student scores from the assessment was also put out by the Alaska Policy Forum last week, at http://alaskapolicyforum.org/AK_peaks/ Based in Anchorage, the conservative think tank thought it important to make the results available to the wider public.
APF senior policy researcher David Boyle likened PEAKS results to those assessed by the Alaska Measures of Progress (AMP) test administered in 2015, the first statewide assessment required under the Every Child Succeeds Act passed that year. Results that year indicated majorities of Alaskan students to be only partially meeting more rigorous standards adopted in 2012. The exam proved unpopular with school administrators and faculty, and after technical issues the AMP was scrapped without another administration.
Boyle felt the PEAKS exam would be an improvement over the state’s past tool for evaluation, the Standards Based Assessments. Students tend to perform better on the SBA, which could be masking shortcomings in the state’s educational institutions.
“In the past they’ve had the SBA, which has been very, very lenient in its grading systems,” he said.
One impetus for the newer standards had been poor performance among Alaska high school graduates compared to those
from other states, where around 20 percent applying for military service were unable to pass the written entrance exam, and around half were required to take some form of remedial courses when entering college.
While standardized testing is but one measure of students’ academic progress, Boyle suggested PEAKS and AMP both highlighted problems within the state’s public school system, with institutions not doing well for the amount of resources being invested into them.
“I think we need to do some out of the box things,” he said, referring to school alternatives like charters and more vocational programming. Boyle pointed to the relatively high proficiency levels of charter schools in the Anchorage area as examples, such as Aquarian and Eagle Academy, or Watershed in Fairbanks.
Requests for input on the article placed to the high school principal and district superintendent’s office were not responded to by Tuesday evening’s press time.
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