Maryland State Assessments (MSAs) and the

achievement gap
This article first appeared in the DC-Gifted-Education-Examiner column at http://www.examiner.com/x-
29782-DC-Gifted-Education-Examiner on March 17, 2010.

Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) spokesperson Dana Tofig has been quoted in the
media as saying MSAs “… have proven to be pretty unreliable measures.” This reality hasn’t
precluded MCPS
and the state from
claiming, in
independent
presentations, that
the achievement gap
is narrowing.

Leslie Wilson,
Assistant State
Superintendent,
Division of
Accountability and
Assessment, in a
presentation dated
July 21, 2009,
asserts the gap has
narrowed in
Maryland. In a
presentation dated a
few days earlier, MCPS asserts that the “MSA Grade 3 Reading Gap Shrinks 22 Percentage
Points,” and the “MSA Grade 3 Math Gap Shrinks 16 Percentage Points.” In about seven years,
the achievement gap, as measured by the MSAs, has shrunk by double digits.

Cause for celebration? Not so fast. After all, MCPS did assert the MSAs are “… pretty unreliable
measures.”

There are reasonable indications that the MSAs are indeed “… pretty unreliable measures,” not
the least of which is a recent column by this author. If indeed there is a substantial narrowing of
the achievement gap, it is reasonable to expect other tests to reflect this laudable achievement.

For example, MCPS administers the TerraNova (TN/2) test to second graders. To be precise,
“since 2000, MCPS has administered the CTBS to students in Grade 2 on a yearly basis to
provide comprehensive measurement of basic skill achievement in five areas: reading, language,
mathematics, language mechanics, and mathematics computation. During the 2005–2006 school
year, MCPS [did] replace the TerraNova Comprehensive Tests of Basic Skills (CTBS) in Grade
2 with the TerraNova Second Edition (TN/2).” As the system further acknowledged in 2006,
“both the CTBS and TN/2 are nationally norm referenced tests that compare performance of
MCPS Grade 2 students with all Grade 2 students in the nation (the norm group). However, the
TN/2 uses a more recent and inclusive student sample to establish norm group performance
(CTB/McGraw-Hill, 2002).” The system interprets TN/2 performance in terms of normal curve
equivalent (NCE) scores and reports scores in terms of percentages of students scoring above the
national average (50th NCE).

In 2006, 47% of African-American students scored at the 50th NCE or higher in reading. By
2009, it had risen to 52%. Whites, in comparison, went from 77.8% to 82.2%, in the same
period. The rise in scores being of similar magnitude, one can assert that the claims of the
achievement gap in reading being substantially reduced are probably greatly exaggerated.

There are a number of lessons to be learned through this exercise. Not the least among them is
the need to look at a rigorous analysis of more than one indicator before concluding anything.

The second conclusion is that the MSAs, as MCPS asserted, “… have proven to be pretty
unreliable measures.” It is time the Maryland State Department of Education took a harder look
at the MSA test and determined if it effectively serves the intended purpose.

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