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Superintendent recommends dropping STAR test; district to rely on SGA after showing 80% correlation with SOL
Summary
Norfolk staff told the board the Renaissance STAR assessment correlates about 80% with state SOL outcomes and recommended phasing STAR out in favor of Student Growth Assessments (SGA); staff will recalibrate interim measures and present timelines for SGA-based monitoring.
At the Aug. 6 work session staff recommended removing the Renaissance STAR assessment from division-wide requirements and relying on the Student Growth Assessment (SGA) instead, saying the SGA correlates strongly with Standards of Learning (SOL) outcomes.
Dr. Pohl told the board he had asked ARA (Assessment, Research and Accountability) to analyze three years of SGA results to establish reasonable interim goals tied to SGA performance. He said the division'wide correlation between SGA and SOL is about 80%, and that removing STAR would "buy" instructional time and reduce testing burden because STAR typically required fall, winter and end-of-year administrations.
Staff stressed that STAR will remain available to any school that chooses to continue using it, but not required division-wide. The SGA is scheduled for administration in October; data based on SGA will begin to appear in November and will inform the December board monitoring reports and goal 2 (reading) reporting.
Board members asked about alignment and whether STAR'to'SGA changes would reduce useful diagnostic data; Dr. Pohl said the renaissance vendor is revising STAR but that SGA provides the reading and math trend data needed for board monitoring. He also noted other assessment programs such as VALs (an at-risk reading measure) have a different scope (VALs is administered only for at-risk students in some grades), so SGA will be used as the primary division-wide interim measure.
What's next: ARA will review prior SGA data and propose revised interim measures for board goals; staff will post revised monitoring calendars and begin using October SGA results for the fall reporting cycle. There was no formal vote recorded; this was presented as a superintendent recommendation and administrative direction to ARA.
