They are armed with a study, performed by a nationally recognized math expert, that says the low scores warrant scrutinizing the exam.

But attributing the scores to a flawed test may be too simple an equation to explain the scores as well as why, after six years of school accountability and eighth-grade math testing in Delaware:

• Vast racial gaps persist, like that in the Brandywine schools, where 82 percent of white students pass the test compared with only 37 percent of black students.

• There is no statewide math curriculum like the statewide science curriculum that cost millions of dollars to develop.

• Many districts have basically the same proficiency rates as the first year of testing.

Around the state, hundreds of eighth-graders score so low on math tests that they are kept back from ninth grade, and after a second year of eighth-grade math, they still fail the test.

"The issue is, do we have this right? Because lives are at stake," said Sandy Shalk, Smyrna's curriculum director.

Shalk was on the original committee that developed the scoring for the eighth-grade test and is now urging the state Department of Education to re-examine it. Even superintendents with greater success than Smyrna are demanding the state do more to help with math.

"It's just unconscionable to be having that many kids fail your test in math," Milford Superintendent Robert Smith said. "That's a crisis. How can you not look at that and say, 'My God. We've got to put everybody's effort into solving this.' "

The test furor is so loud it's reached Gov. Ruth Ann Minner, who is forming a task force to address the eighth-grade math test, as well as a range of testing issues.

More studies contentious

The superintendents' study is not the only one on eighth-grade math. Several are surfacing. And if they say anything to students, parents and taxpayers, it is that testing doesn't guarantee better schools and is a highly complex endeavor.

Take the technical issue of cut scores, which superintendents have pleaded to have changed. Cut scores are the statistical points in scoring that, in Delaware, decide where students fall on a scale of one to five. A one on the test is well below standard, a five is distinguished. To meet the state standard, a student must get a three. That requires 38 of the 78 possible points, or 49 percent.

Douglas Grouws, the research professor at the University of Missouri who studied the test scores for the superintendents, suggested the cut scores may be improperly set and causing too many students to be misclassified as below the standard.

But State Secretary of Education Valerie Woodruff and her state testing experts said that Grouws applied incorrect mathematical tools to assess cut scores. Grouws said he doesn't "claim to be a statistician," nor did he see the test itself.

Much of the superintendents' pleading about cut scores is with one eye on the No Child Left Behind school ratings. Despite improvements, which don't count under the federal law, schools here have not fared well. But in a meeting with the superintendents, Woodruff and her staff explained that new cut scores could boomerang.

They require a federal review that could boost the academic targets the superintendents must meet under the federal law. That is because math scores have gradually improved, and the federal formula for setting targets rests in part on testing norms.

Grouws still supports reviewing the eighth-grade test. He said more Delaware kids score proficient on the National Assessment of Educational Progress, the federal test given in all states, than on their own state test, another sore point with the superintendents.

"In my mind this is a serious difference in results, and it's in everybody's interest to find out why," he said. But Delaware's eighth-graders rank only 30th nationwide on the national assessment.

Searching for strategies

Cut scores and national assessments, though, are irrelevant if the furor widens to include questions about why more eighth-graders are not proficient in math. Superintendents and teachers may find themselves in the hot seat for failings that have persisted for years.

Since 1998, the percentage of eighth-graders meeting the math standard in Smyrna schools, for example, has risen barely four points to 34.

At the same time, it's one of only two Delaware districts with a passing score from No Child Left Behind, the federal school accountability law. "I wish I had the answer," said Superintendent Deborah Wicks. "We're searching every day for the answer."

Christina's proficiency rate is up only two points. Improvements in the Seaford, Woodbridge and Capital districts are also in the single digits. Those are a statistical drag on the state's proficiency rate.

Wicks, president of the superintendent's association, concedes that there are many issues around eighth-grade math but insists that something is wrong with the test. "If I didn't believe that I wouldn't be pushing this," she said. "And the other superintendents agree with me."

A survey of the 16 districts that have eighth-graders shows that some have made great gains in their proficiency rates. Superintendents find strategies that work, such as recruiting highly qualified teachers and lengthening the time spent in math classes.

Others point to professional development strategies among teachers, which they say have helped their teaching corps adjust to the problem-solving type of math the state standards and the 21st century demand.

Racial divide

One area bound to be scrutinized if the math test debate widens is the achievement gap. In some districts, proficiency rates on the eighth-grade math test for minority youngsters are more than 40 points behind those of white students.

Claibourne D. Smith, a retired DuPont scientist and one of two black people on the state Board of Education, has been focusing on the issue for years. "Unfortunately, this system is unwilling or unable to respond to these problems," he said. "You can't give them a pass on the issue either, for the simple reason that that ought to be unacceptable to not only parents but to the state."

One issue he points to is the shortage of highly qualified math teachers, those who have college degrees in math or math education. Well-educated, well-trained teachers are able to reach all children, across racial and income lines, but the poorest students often get the least effective teachers, Smith said.

In a study yet to be published, Pamela Stazesky, associate director of the Education Research and Development Center at the University of Delaware, found students who in fifth grade scored a one on the state math tests were, in eighth grade, often in the classes of the least effective teachers.

In Appoquinimink, Superintendent Tony Marchio attributes his success in raising minority math scores to prioritization. "It has to come from the top," he said.

Instructional changes to raise test scores are under way. Milford superintendent Robert Smith is cutting his middle school math classes in half and going to 90-minute classes, which he said he'll have to pay for with money from his district's reserve fund.

Jon Manon, another researcher and math education specialist at UD, said class size and the time devoted to math are huge issues. "And I think you're going to find big disparities around the state," he said.

Manon was on the committee that set the math cut scores. He is also on the middle school math focus group, a panel of math experts and educators that Woodruff set up last year to pinpoint why scores are so low and how to raise them.

Superintendents are also pointing to the state's science curriculum as the model for a statewide math curriculum they say they would like. And they want the state to help more in teacher recruiting and professional development.

There's another lesson to be drawn from test scores, too.

As the experts warn, they are about outcomes, not what goes on in class beforehand. Stazesky's study is designed to find that out. She's looking at how highly effective, moderate and less effective teachers affect eighth-grade math test scores, and she's finding that highly effective teachers are best at influencing eighth-grade scores of students who, in fifth grade, scored a two or three.

That, she hypothesizes, means some children may need better instructional strategies in the lower grades.

Reach Michele Fuetsch at 324-2386 or mfuetsch@delawareonline.com.

Copyright ©2004, The News Journal.