Officials from both Evanston school districts had a heated discussion Monday about how best to interpret their schools’ standardized testing data.

The annual joint meeting, which lasted three hours, also included talk on how to ease the transition between middle school, under Evanston/Skokie School District 65 jurisdiction, and high school, which is handled by District 202.

“Lots of things have changed in the last seven years since 2001, when No Child Left Behind was put into law,” said District 202 Superintendent Eric Witherspoon. “It’s put an awful lot of emphasis on standardized testing.”

No Child Left Behind, which was signed into law six years ago, is intended to equalize achievement levels across different racial and socioeconomic groups.

The boards came to no consensus on issues such as the value of test scores, how best to improve them, which tests best measured success and the desired amount of emphasis teachers should place on testing.

Both districts are among the top Illinois schools with similar demographics for the eighth grade Illinois Standard Achievement Test and the Prairie State Achievement Examination, given to juniors in high school.

District 65 Superintendent Hardy Murphy told the group at the beginning of the meeting not to put too much emphasis on test scores.

But District 65 Board Member Keith Terry said he was disappointed by the fact that test scores have basically remained steady over the past decade, especially for minority groups.

“Not pointing fingers, here’s the bottom line: In nine years, these numbers have been practically the same,” he said. “I’m embarrassed by this. What are we going to do to change this? It is a crisis.”

Murphy focused on a different aspect of the data, saying that radical measures do not need to be taken to improve the districts’ numbers.

“We have students achieving at ever-higher levels. We are currently doing something about it,” he said. “The wrong thing to do is to dismantle a system that took some time to put in place just to improve test scores … I think our staff is working together to try to assess this.”

Race figured importantly in Monday’s discussion. Currently, white students’ test scores are higher those of minority groups.

District 202 Board of Education President Martha Burns said that standardized testing performs a “gatekeeping” function for schools, and said that “kids of color need to have the same gatekeeping tools that white students have.”

Terry was more blunt about the issue.

“This experiment is failing African-American kids,” he said.

District 65 school board officials also expressed surprise that the Illinois Standards Achievement Test was by and large not taken into consideration by District 202 when placing students in accelerated or regular coursework.

District 65 Board Member Katie Bailey brought the issue to light when she asked if District 202 considered eighth-grade ISAT scores in its class placement of incoming students. Several District 202 Board members answered Bailey that they did not, but that they do consider the EXPLORE test, which students take in the same year.

The ISAT measures students’ proficiency at state-mandated achievement benchmarks. The EXPLORE test, which is modelled after the ACT college admission test, measures students’ readiness for college.

Bailey acknowledged that both tests were necessary to gauge different aspects of eighth-grade education, but said that ultimately the data for both tests highlighted the same problems.

“Both tests tell us there are some kids who need some support,” she said. “It’s about helping all these kids. What can we do together for these students that need extra support?”

The boards also discussed ways to support students as they transition from eighth grade to high school. District 202 consists only of Evanston Township High School, while District 65 is made up of 18 elementary, middle and specialty schools. The boards heard from a joint committee consisting of both Hardy and Witherspoon as well as two board members from each district. The committee was created to facilitate close cooperation between the two school districts.

The main task of this committee has been to “de-mystify” the transition process from the elementary and middle school levels to the high school level. The committee laid out a time line of the transition process and also proposed summer “bridge” opportunities that allow students to begin adapting earlier.

Students are encouraged to attend summer school at ETHS and take part in academic support programs, many of which require summer school participation.

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