Standardized test results are in, but changes make them less useful

Wisconsin’s standardized test scores show that students in Green Bay Area Public Schools continue to struggle with meeting academic standards in literacy, math, science and social studies.

But what the results of last school year’s Forward exams don’t show is whether some learning outcomes in Wisconsin are improving or not. That’s because the Department of Public Instruction last year changed how it evaluates student performance on the test.

The new benchmarks for reading and math make it almost impossible to compare data from the 2023-24 school year with previous results, and the department is warning against attempting to draw comparisons.

DPI officials are also stressing that they made the changes to get a better picture of how students are doing – not to boost flagging test scores.

“Standards have not been lowered,” DPI spokesperson Chris Bucher said. “We are reflecting actual student results using Wisconsin’s strong academic standards. I just want to make that clear.”

However, Alan Borsuk, a senior fellow at Marquette University Law School who has researched and written about public education in Wisconsin for decades, says that standards have, in fact, been lowered.

“It’s easier to become defined as proficient now for a Wisconsin student taking the state test,” Borsuk said. “So, I would call that lowering the bar.”

According to Borsuk, the new standards essentially undo changes made to testing standards in 2012 by then-state Superintendent Tony Evers, who is now governor. Evers raised the testing bar in the hopes it would encourage higher academic excellence.

Instead, it made performance appear worse because high scores were tough to reach. Even without the ability to compare math and reading scores to previous years, individual districts can still be compared to statewide scores. In each of the four categories – English language arts, mathematics, science and social studies – the proportion of Green Bay Area Public Schools students failing to meet grade-level expectations was roughly 16 percentage points higher than statewide rates.

Going forward, Borsuk says the new standards pose difficulties for policymakers and researchers tasked with addressing those low scores.

“I think people should be very concerned about the levels of achievement of Wisconsin students overall, and this is going to make understanding that picture much harder.”