PDE recently released the grade spans associated with different performance levels on the Keystone Exams should district choose to use the exams as final exams counting 1/3 of the course grade. The Keystone Exams will be graded on a 100 point scale and the breakdown is as follows:
o Below Basic: 0
o Basic: 50 – 69
o Proficient: 70 – 89
o Advanced: 90 – 100

The debate over the Keystone Exams and how they will be implemented is on! Districts basically have two options to choose from regarding the implementation of the Keystone Exams. Option 1: Use the Keystone Exam as the final exam (counting for at least 33.3% of the course grade) in the ten courses that will eventually have corresponding state-created Keystone Exams. Option 2: Use the Keystone Exams as stand-alone graduation exams that have no bearing on course grades but must be passed (at least six of them) independently in order to graduate. Using the Keystone Exams as course final exams would allow higher than average marking period grades to increase a low Keystone Exam scores and it would reduce the amount of total testing students experience. Unfortunately with the mandate that the Keystone Exam count for at least 33.3% of the course grades, some students would fail the entire course and not receive academic credit for the course if they received a very low Keystone Exam score. In this situation, not only would a student have to retake the Keystone Exam, but they would also have to retake the course to receive academic credit. Implementing the Keystones as a stand-alone graduation requirement requires students to score in the proficient or advanced range on the exams. By choosing this option, students’ scores on these exams could not be countered or impacted by good course grades.

Under the current regulations for the Keystone Exams, students who receive testing accomodations for the PSSA would also receive them for the Keystone Exams. The Keystone Exams are required for students in this year's 8th grade. Students in 8th grade would be required to complete four of the six Keystone Exams. This year's 7th grade would be required to complete five of the six exams and finally, students in this year's 6th grade would be required to complete all six. As for overall graduation rate, I expect it to decline slightly as some students will be unable to pass the Keystone Exams and unfortunately, unable to meet proficiency through the State's project-based assessment. However, the district will provide all possible remediation to assist students in passing the exams.

The Department of Education has informed school districts that if school districts would like to count the Keystone Exam for less than 1/3 of the total course grade, school districts would have to have the other assessments utilized in determining the course grade validated. The validation process is viewed by many to be difficult and costly. This will likely result in most school districts using the Keystone Exams as final exams, counting one-third or more of the entire course grade, or the utilization of the exams as stand-along graduation requirements.

Under the current regulations associated with the Keystone Exams, there is not an alternative diploma option. Students will have to pass either the Keystone Exams and/or a series of alternative project-based performance assessments. This project-based performance assessment will be created by the Commonwealth for students to demonstrate proficiency in those areas that are failed on the Keystone Exams.

Some students in the high school will begin taking Keystone Exam field tests next week. The field tests will be given in Algebra I, biology and literature. The data gained from the field tests will be used to help the Pennsylvania Department of Education develop future Keystone Exams and cut scores for future operational tests.

Keystone Exam Options

The State Board of Education approved options for the use of Keystone Exams that would allow school districts to use them without the exam scores counting as 1/3 of the course grade. School districts that choose to use the Keystone Exams alone as the graduation requirement and independent of course grades would not have to go through a local assessment validation process. Under this new flexibility, school districts have the option to separate the exams from the course grades.

Keystone Exams

Beginning with this year’s eighth grade class, students must pass a series of exams, called the Keystone Exams, to earn a Pennsylvania high school diploma. Pennsylvania has joined the growing number of states requiring that students pass subject-specific exams in order to graduate. The exams will be phased in over the next few years but once all of the exams have been developed, students will be responsible for passing six of the exams in order to graduate and receive a public high school diploma. This year’s seventh and eighth grade students will be required to pass four exams in order to graduate. Eventually, all students will have to pass two math exams, two language arts exams, one social studies exam and one science exam. These exams will serve as the course final exam in the subjects they are associated with. Students will take the exams beginning in eighth grade and will have additional opportunities to re-take the sections of the exams that they do not pass. If students cannot pass specific sections of the exams, they may be eligible to complete a project-based assessment demonstrating their proficiency in the content area of the sections that they could not pass. The district will be revising our high school courses over the next few years to ensure that the content assessed in the Keystone Exams is the content taught in the courses. The specific courses that will be aligned to Keystone Exam content will be: Algebra I, Geometry, Algebra II, English 11, English 12, American History, World History, Biology and Chemistry.

The movement to a standards-based report card is progressing. It has been decided that a numerical grade ranging from a 1 to a 4 will be utilized at the primary level (grades K-3) while a percentage-based grade will continue to be utilized in grades 4-12. It is our goal for the final report card product that the specific standards that composed the majority of the reading and math grades and the student attainment levels of those standards be listed below the reading and math grades.

The Standards-Based Report Card Committee has met twice over the past few weeks to discuss the reporting categories related to reading that will appear on future standards-based report cards. The National Reading Panel has identified phonemic awareness, phonics, vocabulary development, fluency and comprehension as the most important reading skills. These skills are found in the PA Academic Standards for Reading, Writing, Speaking & Listening in Standards 1.1, 1.2 & 1.3. The committee is continuing to work on narrowing down the reporting categories within reading to six categories. Once this is accomplished, the committee will focus its efforts on the math reporting categories.

A great article on the topic of grading scales, specifically the difference between a 100 point percentage-based system and a four-point system, is "The Case Against the Zero," by Douglas Reeves. This article can be found on the Internet or in the December 2004 edition (Volume 86, No. 4) of Phi Delta Kappan.

Report Cards and Grades Part 1

The Susquehanna Community School District is investigating the move to standards-based reports cards at the elementary school and implementing a four-point grading scale at all grade levels. The move to a standards-based report card at the elementary level will allow teachers to better communicate how students are attaining the Pennsylvania Academic Standards in Reading, Writing, Speaking & Listening and Mathematics. Standards-based report cards will not look very different from the current report cards in grades K-3, but they will be noticeably different from the current report cards in grades 4-6. The use of letters and percentages as grades will change to a four-point grading scale with the implementation of standards-based report cards. In this type of grading scale the numbers correspond to the PSSA performance levels, where a “4” equals “advanced” work down to a “1” that identifies “below basic” performance. At the high school level, the change will be completely associated with course numerical grades. The four-point scale, which is utilized by many high schools and the entire college/university system, would replace the current percentage-based grading scale at the high school. The four-point scale is more equitable than the current percentage-based grading scale. In the current system, a failing grade could be anywhere between a zero (0) and a 69. However, in the four-point scale, all failing grades receive a “0,” while D’s receive a “1,” C’s equate to a “2,” B’s correspond to a “3,” and A’s are denoted by a “4.” The four-point scale has exactly the same amount between each grading scale, while the current percentage based system has only 31 of 100 points in the passing range.

Report Cards and Grades Part 2

The movement to a standards-based report card for the elementary school will not be easy. Identifying which academic standards to report will take much consideration on the part of teachers and administrators. A grade-reporting template will also have to be developed to accommodate the use of performance standard descriptors. As for the four-point scale replacing the percentage-based system at the high school, this will also be a “work in progress.” The new system, if adopted, may have to be “phased in” in grades 9-12 due to the fact that GPAs for students in those grades are already being calculated with the percentage-based system. Both of these potential changes are intended to help the district communicate student performance in a more efficient and effective manner.

Governor Rendell has recently proposed a plan to resolve the pending PSERS crisis. His proposal has two distinct elements. First, the fiscal liabilities faced by PSERS would be re- amortized over 30 years. Second, instead of the massive increases in state and school district contributions over the next three years that are currently projected, the state would require a more gradual increase in contributions. With Rendell's proposal, the state and school districts would face an increase of only 1% of payroll (equal to a 21% increase in the PSERS contribution rate) for the 2010-2011 fiscal year compared to the 3.44% payroll increase (equal to a 72% increase in the PSERS contribution rate) that was already set by PSERS for the 2010-2011 fiscal year. After 2010-2011, school districts and the state would face an annual increase in contributions of no more than 3% under Rendell's pl
an.

More details of the pension reform bill (HB 2135) have been made available through the January 8, 2010 edition of PSBA's School Leader News. Under the new reform bill, the pension system would have a new class of employees who would belong to both a defined benefit system and a defined contribution system. Under the defined benefit component of the proposed hybrid pension system, new employees would contribute 3.25% of their salary, have a multiplier of 1% and go through a 10 year vesting period. With the defined contribution component, employees would have to contribute a minimum of 3% of their salary to an Individual Annuity Savings Account, but could contribute a higher percentage. School districts would have to contribute 2% of the employees salary to this side of the hybrid system. Overall, in this new hybrid system, new employees would contribute a minimum of 6.25% of their salary compared to the mandated 7.5% being contributed by current employees.

The state legislators for our legislative districts are Representative Sandra Major and Senator Lisa Baker. Representative Major can be contacted through her website at http://repmajor.com and Senator Baker can be contacted through her website at http://senatorbaker.com .

PSBA (Pennsylvania School Boards Association) has had its pension proposal introduced into both houses of the PA General Assembly. The PSBA proposal to fix the "pension crisis" in Pennsylvania involves changing the pension benefits and pension structure for all new school employees hired after June 30, 2010. The defined pension benefits for these new employees would be lower than those for current school employees but the new employees would have the ability to make contributions to a defined contribution program. The proposal allows new school employees to have the benefits of both a defined contribution system and a defined benefit system while reducing the financial burden on school district and state taxpayers.

The school district would not be able to cover a 28%+ increase in the PSERS rate without a massive increase real estate taxes. The PSERS Rate for the 2010-2011 school year has been set at 8.22%. When compared to this year's rate of 4.78%, the 2010-2011 rate reflects a 71.9% increase.