Springfield Public Schools has unveiled new data that shows many students in the system have work to do in reaching proficiency in core subjects, while also reaffirming a clear divide in achievement among students with economic barriers and those without.
Earlier this year, SPS invested $2.1 million in a testing system designed to spot areas of strengths and weakness for students ahead of standardized tests. The latest round of Missouri Assessment Program test scores shows the state’s public school students still lag behind pre-pandemic levels in their mastery of core subjects. Locally, SPS students grade-level scores declined in the spring of 2021.
On Tuesday, the SPS school board looked at the initial data collected from their own screening system after all the district's K-12 students were tested at the start of the school year.
Galileo, the screening system developed by educational technology company Imagine Learning, is designed to help teachers identify learning gaps and strengths over the course of three testing sessions during the year. Data collected from the testing sessions will help teachers inform classroom instruction, said Crystal Magers, executive director of academics at SPS. While the system is not a state-standardized test, Imagine Learning touts the system as both a predictor of how students will perform on them— and a means of improving performance on them.
But first, you need baseline data, which the district now has.
The first round of testing involved 40,964 assessments of students across numerous subjects, including some courses (statistics, calculus, college algebra and others) not tied to state learning standards. For those, the district developed in-house benchmarks to measure proficiency. For all of the test results, Magers and Nicole Holt, deputy superintendent of academics for Springfield Public Schools, asked the board to look at this as a snapshot at the start of a process to use Galileo to ID areas of improvement. (View the presentation here.)
“Tonight establishes the baseline, at looking at where our students are at this moment in time, and then in the middle of the year we’ll be able to see if we’ve been able to grow students or provide the resources that students need,” Grenita Lathan, SPS superintendent, said.
Initial snapshot of data shows where students stand at start of school year
The presentation included overviews of how all K-12 performed on grade-level English language arts and math assessments, as well as data on several specific subjects. Across the district, 38 percent of students were proficient or better in math, while 62 percent scored at basic or below basic levels. Nearly 45 percent of all tested students ranked proficient or better in English language arts, while 55 percent scored at basic or below basic.
Board member Scott Crise, after looking at data showing that just under 28 percent of students who were proficient or better at Algebra 1, asked how it was possible for students to advance to Algebra 2, which had an identically low success rate at the start of the year. Magers and Holt said the tests assess everything a student will learn throughout the year, meaning some of the questions on the test will be the first time they saw anything like that.
“This is where a student would be at the beginning of the year, so we wouldn’t expect that a student would know all of the standards at the beginning of the year,” Magers said. “They virtually have had no instruction yet. So when we present middle-of-the-year data, you’ll be able to see more specific data that’s comparable, and I think that will help you understand the difference.”
Holt said teachers she has talked to since the first round was administered have appreciated the specificity of the data they’ve received. One criticism she has heard is that, often, the initial test used one question to measure a standard.
“As we get to middle of the year, it will be interesting to see how that data looks different as the expectation for their knowledge grows and more questions by standard are asked,” Holt said.
Early data echoes persistent gaps for students with economic barriers
While the data was described as a snapshot at the start of an effort to use Galileo to ID areas of improvement, it showed discrepancies in success rates among students with economic barriers to learning. Nearly 54 percent of all 24,231 SPS students qualify for free or reduced lunch, according to preliminary data released Tuesday night.
Only about 42 percent of reduced-price lunch recipients and 30.2 percent of free lunch recipients were proficient or better in English language arts, compared to 59.7 percent of students who do not qualify for economic assistance. In math, the story is similar. About 36.2 percent of reduced-price lunch recipients and 25.2 percent of free lunch recipients were proficient or better, compared to 51.1 percent of students who don’t meet free and reduced lunch requirements.
The gap mirrors statewide MAP data released in August, which shows that only 27 percent of students who qualify for free and reduced lunch earned proficient or advanced scores on all tested content, compared to 51 percent of students who didn’t qualify for the program.
District-level MAP data from the 2021-2022 school year will be released by the state in December. With that, plus results from middle-of-year Galileo testing, Holt and Magers said there will be plenty of data to dive into in an effort to improve student achievement.
At the classroom level, Galileo offers reports showing how each student fared in different areas of mastery, like identifying different forms of poetry or explaining themes and morals in a story. Holt said teachers will be able to see where to help specific students or the class as a whole if a large number of students are struggling with the same subject matter. District leaders will work with educators at all schools across SPS to use the information from Galileo to get students to grade-level proficiency.
“When you have more information, you have a responsibility to change your plan with the data,” Holt said.
