Republican lawmakers seek to reset the state’s testing standards to those of the 2019-2020 school year after the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) introduced new performance level standards last year, a decision that Wisconsin State Superintendent Jill Underly has repeatedly defended.
The bill would undo changes the DPI made last year to how student achievement is measured on state tests. The co-authors on the bill — Sen. John Jagler, R-Watertown, Rep. Robert Wittke, R-Caledonia, and Rep. Todd Novak, R-Dodgeville — said it will improve academic standards in Wisconsin.
Under the proposed bill, the DPI would have to use the same cut scores — minimum scores needed to qualify for certain categories — score ranges and category descriptions used on report cards published in the 2019-20 school year.
Jagler said in an email statement to The Daily Cardinal Monday he believes there should be a process around testing and report cards to prevent “a single person from making changes in secrecy.”
“We need to reinstate our high academic standards and strive for excellence on behalf of the students and families we serve,” Jagler said. “These changes were made behind closed doors in advance and revealed only when the test scores were announced. Not surprisingly, the massive uptick in artificial performance gains was confusing at best and misleading at worst. We also lost, because of these changes, the ability to compare performance from previous years.”
Changes to state testing benchmarks spark outcry
Students in Wisconsin take standardized tests every year. Third graders through eighth graders take the Forward test, and high school students take the ACT and PreACT Secure. These assessments are “designed to provide information about what students know in core academic areas and whether they can apply what they know,” according to the DPI.
Last year, the DPI made two changes to the cut scores of Wisconsin test-takers.
First, updated terms were assigned to describe student achievement: “advanced,” “meeting,” “approaching” and “developing.” Previously, the DPI used “below basic,” “basic,” “proficient” and “advanced.”
These new terms were introduced in early June 2024 after the DPI received feedback with 800 responses to a survey sent to educators, administrators, parents, families and education groups. Underly said the updated terms are “not only clearer, it also recognizes the endless potential each of our students has as learners.”
The second change to the students' “cut scores” came after a standard-setting meeting held in June. According to the DPI, about 88 educators attended the meeting, with representatives from each of Wisconsin’s CESAs, the five largest school districts, private schools in the school choice program and rural, suburban and urban school districts.
Following the meeting, the group submitted a recommendation to Underly which was approved by the DPI later in June. These new cut scores switched the state from a three-digit number to a four-digit number score for the math and English language arts (ELA) test. and changed the test scores needed to place in each performance level.
Under these new standards, the 2023-24 test results showed the Wisconsin public school student proficiency rate was 48% in ELA and 49% in math. The previous year, public school student proficiency rates in ELA and math were at 38.9% and 37.4%, respectively.
These changes resulted in the test no longer being aligned with the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). Prior to the recent changes made by the DPI, Wisconsin’s performance level expectations were among the highest in the nation.
These changes have received criticism from Gov. Tony Evers and Republican lawmakers, including Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester.
“I just think there should have been some information and dialogue happening with all sorts of people before that decision,” Evers said at a press conference in January. “It’s hard to compare year-to-year if one year you’re doing something completely different. I think it could have been handled better.”
In response to the changes, Vos said at a press conference earlier this month that Underly “wants to make it harder for parents to understand when their school is succeeding or failing.”
“She wants to make it easier for failing schools to somehow seem like they’re succeeding,” Vos said.
Underly has defended these changes, arguing that tying Wisconsin’s standards to NAEP’s created a “misalignment” in how student success was measured.
Republican proposal seeks to turn back the clock on state testing benchmarks
Republicans’ new proposal would cause Wisconsin to revert to evaluating educational assessments using the cut scores, score ranges and qualitative terms that DPI used for report cards published for the 2019-2020 school year. The bill would also require DPI to align the Forward exam cut scores, score ranges and pupil performance categories to the cut scores, score ranges and pupil performance categories to those set by the NAEP.
For the PreACT and ACT with Writing in English, Reading and Mathematics, the bill would require the DPI to use the same cut scores, score ranges and pupil performance categories of the 2021-22 school year as well as require the terms “below basic,” “basic,” “proficient” and “advanced” to be used for pupil performance categories on these assessments.
The Republican co-authors of the bill noted that 94% of schools in Wisconsin fell in the “Meet Expectations or Higher” category, according to the school and district accountability report cards released in November.
“There is no doubt we have many great schools in Wisconsin but when every school is given a ‘C’ or better it makes it impossible to have an honest discussion of where we need improvement,” Jagler wrote in an email to legislative colleagues.
Underly said in a Facebook post Jan. 21 that she believes the right answer is for educators to work together with lawmakers to create the best system for the future instead of looking at the past.
“It is disappointing, but not surprising, that some politicians believe they know better than our educators,” Underly said. “At a time when historic numbers of teachers are leaving our state or [the] classroom altogether, they should be investing in education, not picking political fights on false premises.”
Underly is running for a second term as Wisconsin state superintendent and will face two challengers, Brittany Kinser and Jeff Wright, in the Feb. 18 primary. Both candidates have said they support the bill.
