State superintendent agrees
changes needed in math
instruction, assessment

By Editor Ken Harvey

The battle over the statewide math WASL exam became too personal for State Superintendent of Public Instruction (SPI) Terry Bergeson, but it was a battle that will ultimately lead to important reforms, she says.

“We had a major argument over mathematics, and it was an argument we had to have,” she says.

Bergeson says she loves some aspects of the WASL but agrees it needs fixing. And, in the end, she doesn’t care what the test is called.

“I don’t want to die as the WASL queen,” she says. “I’m not spending any more of my life fighting over the WASL. We have to keep the accountability, but it’s not about the test.”

The state superintendent says she had to “eat a lot of crow” over the past few months, but she agrees “the kids aren’t getting it, and we have to figure out how to reach the 35-40 percent of the students” who can’t achieve state standards in math.

Speaking at the SPI-sponsored Summer Institutes, Bergeson discussed some of the changes mandated or anticipated as they relate to math instruction and assessment following recent decisions by the State Legislature and the State Board of Education.

The Legislature postponed the graduation requirement that students pass the math WASL exam until after 2012 and mandated that OSPI look at other assessment alternatives besides the WASL as it now exists. Some legislators wanted a test based solely on calculations.

That would be contrary to the recommendations of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, which recommends an assessment be used that sounds a lot like the WASL – requiring students to figure out which calculations need to be made under the circumstances presented and to explain how and why they calculated their answers as they did.

For now, the WASL will continue as is. Students who don’t pass it will be required to continue taking appropriate math classes until they either pass the state test or graduate.

“You’re not going to see the WASL just go away,” Bergeson says. “But we are going to begin looking at changes, including end-of-course tests.”

Meanwhile, the Board of Education issued its Standards of Improvement Report with recommendations on how to rewrite the state’s math instructional standards.

“It really hurt my pride this year, but we have to get off our high horses. We’ve made it too confusing. I don’t agree with everything in the (State Board Of Education) report, but I do agree with a lot of it. Whatever you think about the test, if the teachers aren’t able to explain it, we have to do something.”

Among other things, the report calls for clarity, specificity and measurability in state standards.

Part of the problem with the state’s math instruction and assessment is that a national debate is currently raging over how math should be taught in public schools. Not all experts agree, Bergeson says.

A team of math educators attended a special institute this summer to consider possible changes in the state’s math standards, instructional practices and assessment.

Bergeson also notes that Singapore has been developing a cohesive math instruction curriculum for decades and is achieving world-recognized results. Many school systems around the world are beginning to adopt and/or adapt the Singapore curriculum. The state is reviewing that curriculum, as well.

“I wish four years ago I would have been the one to take on the fight” on how to improve the math test and math instruction, Bergeson says. She was just beginning to do so when former state Supt. Judith Billings decided to run for the SPI post against Bergeson. That required Bergeson to refocus some of her time and attention.

TEACHERS NEED TRAINING

Many teachers of math in the state are not math majors. Overall, there are 30,000-50,000 teachers in the state who need help improving their math instruction, Bergeson estimates.

“But it has to be good training. It can’t be junk,” she says – which leads to another problem.

There is not yet a good professional development program prepared for math instruction – even though the Legislature has mandated it and provided $39 million to fund it.

“We are building it as we go. We have to figure out what we’re going to do with it,” Bergeson says.

Math and science specialists are being hired by all of the state’s nine educational service districts to help provide the professional development. But it’s not just about teaching seminars, the state superintendent says.

“Everyone’s on a coaching toot right now,” she says. “But some things work and some things don’t.”

Hands-on, one-on-one mentoring in the classroom is one thing that does work, Bergeson says, adding that brand-new teachers, in particular, need support for “a couple of years” in order to be successful.

And professional development cannot be considered separately from possible curriculum and assessment changes, she says.

“There are at least five dimensions to this problem that we need to deal with, and we can’t deal with them all in two years. What we have to do is come up with a coherent plan for the next 10 years,” she says.

ALTERNATIVES TO WASL

The Legislature mandated that OSPI study the possibility of offering separate end-of-course assessments that would be accepted in lieu of one big, make-it-or-break-it WASL test.

Twelve states have teamed up to develop an end-of-course Algebra II test, with data analysis modules. “I would love to see that become our college readiness test,” the state superintendent says.

Students passing the test would be guaranteed to be accepted into credit-bearing college courses, if she has it her way. That will be a subject for discussion in the governor’s new P-20 Council, which is picking up where the Washington Learns commission left off in developing a seamless cradle-to-career education system in the state.

After fine-tuning the Algebra II end-of-course test, Bergeson would like to work backwards to develop end-of-course tests for Algebra I and other courses all the way down to fifth grade.

Also, a brand-new, three-part math course is being developed to help high school students “who missed some of the building blocks” to achieve state standards. Passing that end-of-course test would be, almost by definition, equivalent to passing the WASL, Bergeson says.

 “It’s going to be scary for a little while, but we’re going to come out of it in a better place,” she says.

QUESTIONS BIGGER THAN WASL, K-12

Bergeson also believes that less attention needs to be focused on the WASL and more on “cradle to career” education.

Gov. Christine Gregoire formed the Washington Learns commission to help create a seamless educational system from preschool through the K-12 system and higher education.

“Conceptually it was very good,” says Bergeson, “We need to raise expectations for students, preparing every student for success in college and 21^st century work – a standard far more ambitious than passing a 10^th-grade test.”

But the players involved in the Washington Learns effort came away “very divided” on specifics, she says. That’s why the governor has now created the P-20 Council to work out the details. Created by executive order, the high-power P-20 Council will include the Governor, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, the director of the Department of Early Learning, the chair of the State Board of Education, the chair of the Professional Educator Standards Board, the chair of the Higher Education Coordinating Board, the chair of the Workforce Training and Education Coordinating Board, the chair of the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, and the chair of the Council of (University) Presidents.

Preschool, K-12 and higher education “are three different worlds, and we are the only part of the system that has any accountability,” Bergeson says.

While the focus has been on the supposed failures of public schools, the K-12 scores on the WASL and on national standardized tests have been improving dramatically, she notes. Neither early childhood educators nor higher education representatives can make the same claim.

“We have total proof that we’ve made huge gains,” Bergeson says. “We have tripled or quadrupled the gains in our system – far better than any other system in the state.”

Indeed, there is no common assessment tool for preschoolers, and yet hundreds of millions of dollars are to be funneled into early childhood education. Seeing the challenges OSPI has faced with the WASL, prekindergarten representatives do not particularly want a mandated assessment.

“Early learning is now the silver bullet for a lot of people,” says Bergeson. “But will the preschool programs we’re spending millions and millions of dollars on have any effect?” Without a common assessment tool, there will be no way to know.

What we do know is that kindergarten teachers say 55 percent of the children who enter kindergarten are not ready to handle their school’s curriculum. Bergeson wants a statewide test to be administered to students at the beginning of kindergarten.

Meanwhile, there is also no common college entrance assessment in the state. Every college and university chooses or creates its own assessment to determine if entering students are ready for college-level courses or must first take remedial courses.

Most high school graduates are still being required to take remedial courses at college before registering for courses that actually count toward college graduation.

“Part of the insanity (of creating a cohesive, effective K-12 math curriculum) is not knowing what the goal is,” says Bergeson. Having multiple college entrance exams creates a “moving target” for K-12 educators.

Bergeson hopes the new P-20 Council “won’t let the colleges off the hook” without determining a common entrance exam.

Meanwhile, she admits she is also concerned that despite state and federal education reforms, researchers are claiming “we have fewer people getting ready for college than 20 years ago. It’s not dramatically down, but it’s not going up, which really concerns me,” Bergeson says.

Perhaps suffering from some battle fatigue, the state superintendent says she is not sure she will run for re-election. But she does hope the state’s education system will be on firmer footing whenever she steps down.