K-PREP Data Sourcebook Update
Our K-PREP Data Sourcebook is now updated to include district level white minus black math proficiency rate gaps for all school levels, elementary, middle and high schools.
Breathitt County School District headed for state takeover?
The goings-on in Breathitt County’s school system sound like something out of a horribly unbelievable soap opera. Except, this story is no fabrication. Former superintendent Arch Turner was recently sentenced to two years in prison and a $250,000 fine for vote buying in a serious case that eventually involved the FBI. Charges were also filed…
Video: Auditor talks about transparency coalition, Bluegrass Institute
Kentucky’s Auditor of Public Accounts, Adam Edelen, discussed the various groups and stakeholders that supported his office’s recent special taxing district transparency and accountability project. The Bluegrass Institute supported the project and is mentioned in the press conference.
The ‘GAP-ing’ hole in ‘Unbridled Learning’
Without question, a gaping hole exists in Kentucky’s new school accountability program, known as “Unbridled Learning.” That deficiency – failure of Unbridled Learning to properly identify and account for sometimes enormous achievement gaps between white and black students in the state’s new Kentucky Performance Rating for Educational Progress (K-PREP) test results. Bluegrass Institute president Jim…
K-PREP Data Sourcebook now on line
I have assembled the many blogs I created after the release of the new K-PREP scores into one convenient and indexed reference document. You can find the K-PREP Data Sourcebook by clicking here. As I generate more data, I plan to update this reference in the future.
Auditor’s office helps move transparency in the right direction
This week, Kentucky Auditor Adam Edelen made great strides toward promoting transparency in Kentucky. From the press release: Auditor Adam Edelen today unveiled a public database and accompanying report that shine new light on special districts, a $2.7 billion layer of government in the Commonwealth that has operated in the shadows for decades. The auditor’s…
K-PREP gaps in high schools
We close out our first look at achievement gaps from Kentucky’s new K-PREP assessments with a discussion about the high school level data. First, it is important to understand that, unlike the K-PREP tests for elementary and middle schools, high school K-PREP reading and math data does not come from Kentucky’s own, state-developed tests. Instead,…
K-PREP gaps in middle schools
One of the biggest concerns about the new K-PREP program is a loss of the level of protection afforded to minorities under the now waived No Child Left Behind school accountability program. While the new Unbridled Learning accountability program does include an element that looks at achievement gaps, it does so by lumping all minorities…
K-PREP and Unbridled Learning school testing and evaluation are here, but what does this mean? # 10
K-PREP science at all school levels As we discussed in an earlier blog about the new Kentucky Performance Rating for Educational Progress (K-PREP) tests in social studies, we also find disturbing evidence that the new K-PREP science assessments for elementary and middle schools are nothing more than warmed over CATS Kentucky Core Content Tests (KCCT).…
K-PREP and Unbridled Learning school testing and evaluation are here, but what does this mean? # 9
K-PREP high school science As with the other high school tests, K-PREP science scores for our high school students also do not come from a state-developed test. Instead, the high school science score is derived from performance on a new end-of-course exam in high school biology developed by the ACT, Inc., as part of the…