BOE may get rid of Alabama Graduation Exam

Sounds like they are just changing the way it is administered, not getting rid of the whole test. I sure hope not.

quote:

State Schools Superintendent Joe Morton says the way things are now, teachers do not have enough time to cover everything on the grad exam before it is given in March.

12 years is not long enough to cover all the material? They must have really changed that test since I graduated from high school.

quote:

Originally posted by T S C:

12 years is not long enough to cover all the material? They must have really changed that test since I graduated from high school.

They first take the test in March of their sophomore year. They then have 8 more opportunities to take the test before graduation day. Honestly, if they can't pass it in 9 tries, do they really deserve the diploma?

My daughter is a senior this year. She passed all portions of the exam her sophomore year. Enough said.

One would think that Alabama (especially Alabama) would want to continue to raise the bar, not lower it.

quote:

Originally posted by T S C:

quote:

State Schools Superintendent Joe Morton says the way things are now, teachers do not have enough time to cover everything on the grad exam before it is given in March.

12 years is not long enough to cover all the material? They must have really changed that test since I graduated from high school.

Have you graduated after 2001? Then you took what was then a 8th grade level test. After that year they made it 11th grade level.

And they get six chances, not eight. A pre-test as a Sophomore, once as a Junior, three times their Senior year and once after.

One major flaw that I always thought was never properly addressed in the exit exam is that there is no test to see if people are ready for the exam. You get your 8th grade test for High School, The the pre-test in 10th, but by that time there is no time for remediation, so all the teachers can do is teach enough to pass, which results in people memorizing patterns rather than actually learning the info.

The contention in the change is that the way things are, it's encouraging students to drop out if they can't pick up the slack in basically a years time. It's a problem when the state admit's its 85% graduation average is high

Another link on the flaws of the exam

I don't care if they get 1 chance or 100. I don't care if the test is on the kindergarten level or the 11th grade level. The test is to find out if the students have learned the material taught from K-12. If they have not, then they do not deserve a diploma.

I graduated in 1993, my daughter will graduate in 2013 and she better pass the test on the first try just like I did.

You would have to be a gorilla to flunk that test.

The purpose of education is not to prepare students to take and pass a test. It is to prepare them to be productive citizens. If students haven't learned the material in 12, 15, 18 years of public education they should be immediately made congresspeople.

Here is an interesting article about a private school in Maine that is, well read it for yourselves.

I am not sure if it is still an available option.

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Maine School Becomes AHSGE Loophole to Bypass the Alabama Exit Exam

Lewiston, ME (PRWEB) December 2, 2004 -- The North Atlantic Regional High School in Maine has released a new web site guiding Alabama high school seniors around the consequences of failing the AHSGE exit exams. Maine has no required exit exam.

The administrator of the school, Steve Moitozo, says, When Exit Exams are used against the student, that is unfair. A student may have done everything required to graduate (perfect attendance, passed every course, done all the homework, have a passing GPA, earned all the credits, etc.), but if that same student cannot pass EVERY section of this one massive test, the student is denied a high school diploma. That is not fair, but it is the law in over 25 states."

But it is NOT the law in Maine. Moitozos high school in Maine is a state-authorized, fully accredited private school. Recently high school seniors victimized by high school exit exams have found this Maine high school, transferred their credits, and earned their diplomas. High School students own their credits -- all credits belong to the student -- and if the student wants to transfer the credits to a high school in Maine, they are free to do so. When the student has the necessary 17.5 credits, they are entitled to their high school diploma.

About North Atlantic Regional High School
Established in 1989 under Maine law for equivalent instruction," the North Atlantic Regional High School oversees the work of 2,200 students from all states, including Alabama. North Atlantic Regional High School graduates have been accepted into every type of college and university including Julliard, Harvard, Penn State, Johns Hopkins, West Point, University of Alabama, University of Mobile, and hundreds of others.

To find out more about bypassing the AHSGE for a fully accredited high school diploma, visit the schools web site at http://www.narhs.org ; More specifically, http://www.narhs.org/ExitExams/

Steve Moitozo, Administrator
North Atlantic Regional High School
25 Adams Ave.
Lewiston, ME 04240

School Office 207-753-1522
Exit Exam 207-777-4777
Email Info@narhs.org

LINK

From what I understand this test will be replaced with the ACT which is required for the students to get into college. They will take some pre ACT tests in 8th/9th and then take the actual ACT tests in upper grades. I don't have the actual sheet I was given in front of me with the information on it but I do know it is being replaced in Lauderdale County by the ACT.

I have a problem with standardized tests being used to pass/fail students. Unless the state can do a better job of standardizing the curricula off all the schools in the state, it is truly possible for a student to do well in school and to learn enough to go to college, or to function in society, but to still flunk the standardized exit exam. So much of testing has to do with how the questions are asked, and why the questions are being asked.

When my sons were in elementary school, standardized tests were given to everyone in the school, even the kindergarten kids. This was a private school, so the scores (in my opinion) were mostly used to show to prospective parents, and to compare the school to other schools in the area. The tests were given in March.

More than once, I saw the administrator of that school try to hold kids back based completely on those standardized test results. (I think it was the Stanford Achievement Test). Parents would invariably argue two very good points in these cases. 1. But my child was making As and Bs! How can he fail now? and 2. If my child was failing, why didn't someone tell me before the last month of school?

Of course the answer was that the child was not failing the school curriculum for his grade level, and no one told the parent there was a problem because there was NOT a problem.

One parent astutely asked, "If this test is determining who passes and fails, can my child just take it in August and if he passes, skip to the next grade?" By using the standardized achievement test this way, the school was disrespecting its own curriculum.

I just think that the first purpose of the exit exam is not to help the students. If you pass the courses at a public high school, that ought to be enough. If the graduation rates are not good, then address that problem.

Or at least make sure the curriculum matches the exit exam so that teachers aren't having to throw out their lesson plans to 'cover' the test. It's almost like they are dealing with two sets of information.

If the test REALLY measured how well someone learned the required material, that would be great. Is there a study guide? And by the way, is there a list of things the kids are supposed to know? I'd like to see if I know ANY of it.

Students will have at least five chances to take the AHSGE: Once as a sophomores (as a "pre-test"), once as juniors and three times as seniors. The State Department of Education determine the test dates. The test will be administered by subject area over a five day period and is not a timed test. Most students should be completed within 90 minutes on each subject test.

Yes, that's kind of the point I was making before. The Sophomore/Junior exam is usually at the end of the year, so if there's a part someone is lacking they only have a year to get it straight, and after that most students just try to memorize enough to pass after that.

One thing that should be looked at is how many don't pass it until their senior year. What makes everyone so sure that the ones who did pass are not neglected that year to get more people to pass? And even then the graduation numbers are not as high as reported. An even better stat will be how the ones who passed do in the first year of college to see if they are actually prepared or not.

Let me just say that I have had a child that came through the Laud.Co school system who was an A/B student and could not pass the Social Studies part of the exit exam. She received tutoring and still could not pass but yet she studied and made A/B's in Social Studies and history. By the time the last test rolled around, she was so frustrated and upset with all the pressure about getting to walk/graduate that she could not pass. There were 13 students in her senior class. I was told by one of the superintendents that walking with your class is not the most important thing but to me when you are the only one out of 13, yes it is important. My child had to go through 25+ hours of online tutoring for the GED exam so she could take and pass the GED exam. They substituted the score of all areas of GED (she passed) for the Social Studies part of Exit Exam. The point I am trying to make is that we went through a lot of unnecessary stress for the wrong reasons! Not everyone can pass standardized tests under pressure

--class of 2005
i passed english, history, and science on my first try in 10th grade

i struggled with math, ended up having to take it three times.

i sure i felt better the day i found out i passed the test (shortly before graduation) than i did on my actual graduation.

i also managed to score a 23 on my ACT in 10th grade..

i have no problem with standardized tests, but if i had not of passed that last time i took graduation math exam-- i would not have graduated.

quote:

Originally posted by tinkerbell:
My daughter is a senior this year. She passed all portions of the exam her sophomore year. Enough said.

Not sure where you guys are getting this Sophomore pre-test info, but I'm with tinkerbell - both of my kids passed everything in the 10th grade. My oldest daughter actually passed the math portion in the 9th grade, because she took accelerated algebra and was allowed to take the math exam that March.

And this is under current standards - my oldest graduated in 2008, and my youngest is a high school junior this year, meaning that she passed all 5 parts just last year as a 10th grader.

Daily Home Newspaper

Schools go extra mile to help students pass exit exam

By Antrenise Cole
01-27-2008

Area school systems are taking extra steps to ensure students, especially high school juniors and seniors, are able to pass the Alabama High School Graduation Exam.

The exam is first given during the spring semester of students’ sophomore year. But Sylacauga Schools Superintendent Jane Cobia said for her school system, preparation begins as early as age 4 with the pre-kindergarten program the system offers.

Cobia said for the middle school, Nichols-Lawson, special emphasis is placed on reading and math. She said the school has math remediation labs and reading classes that every student takes every year.

“For the high school, we have in place a remediation lab that students go to daily,” Cobia said. “They do remediation on graduation exam standards. Tutoring is offered four days a week. Our C-Stars program provides credit recovery for students who need to retake classes. ACCESS can be done anytime before or after school.

“The Alabama High School Graduation Exam gives us a comparative just as the ACT and SAT does for college entrance,” Cobia said.

Cheryl Dobson, math/testing coordinator for Sylacauga schools, said for the seniors at Sylacauga High, 92 percent passed reading, 94 percent passed language, 94 percent passed science, 97 percent passed math and 92 percent passed the social science section of the graduation exam.

“We usually have a very high percent of students pass the graduation exam because the teachers do such a good job targeting the subjects tested,” she said. “For the students who don’t pass the test, I think it’s kind of a wake-up call that they need to master the skills.”

Dobson said she thinks the graduation exam is a realistic measure of students’ abilities because the skills on the test match the state’s course of study.

Janet Combee, director of instruction and assessment for the Talladega County School System, said 72 percent of the seniors passed all parts of the graduation exam. The students who haven’t passed the test have one more opportunity to take the test in March before graduation.

“I think it’s difficult for the students who don’t pass the exam because they don’t get a diploma,” she said. “By not having that diploma, they may have problems getting a job, which results in having a lower income.”

Combee said Talladega County schools have several programs to help students pass the graduation exam. She said the schools have credit recovery programs; dropout prevention and intervention counselors; tutoring that’s offered before, during and after school; and targeted work that focuses on algebra one.

An extra period was added to the school schedule to include an activity period. During that time, students can study graduation remediation programs on the Internet to help them prepare for the graduation exam.

For Pell City schools, testing coordinator Cynthia Williamson said a preparation course for remediation is offered, but the normal curriculum students take helps prepare them for the test, as well.

“I think the graduation exam is a good measure of a student’s ability,” she said. “I think some students get nervous. Some students just don’t test well. I think not passing the test affects students in different ways. For some, it makes them work harder. For other students, it hurts their self-esteem because they try so hard to pass.”

Talladega city schools Superintendent Joanne Horton said the Board of Education has recently approved a one-hour school delay on the second Tuesday of each month for Talladega High School and Zora Ellis Jr. High School.

“The one-hour delay will give teachers more time to study the exam results,” she said. “They will be able to find strategies for improving teaching methods for students who have not passed all parts of the graduation exam.”

Talladega High principal Darren Douthitt said remediation classes during school and tutoring on Saturdays are offered to students who need help with passing the graduation exam.

“Right now we’re helping students with their individual goals,” he said. “They’re analyzing their individual results to see what they need to work on. We have six different opportunities for remediation. We have remediation booklets to Internet remediation.”

Douthitt said school officials are planning to meet with parents to discuss what needs to be done to ensure students pass the exam.

Douthitt said this will be the first year Talladega High School seniors who don’t pass the graduation exam will be restricted from participating in graduation exercises in May.

Source: LINK