KSDE defends new 2025 cut scores and concordance table as alignment with ACT/NAEP; lawmakers call it "moving the goalposts"
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Summary
KSDE officials said new 2025 assessments and cut scores were set by Kansas educators to better align with ACT/NAEP benchmarks and provided a concordance table linking 2024 and 2025 scaled scores; some legislators, including Representative Steele, criticized the change as shifting standards.
Dr. Lehi Nugent, newly in her role at KSDE, and other agency staff explained the 2025 state assessment updates and the process used to reset cut scores. Nugent said English language arts standards were updated in 2023 to align with the science of reading and national benchmarks, and Kansas educators convened to set new performance‑level cut scores.
"The scores were set by educators in Kansas," Nugent said, describing a weeklong educator standard‑setting process. KSDE provided a concordance table intended to show approximate links between scaled scores on the 2024 test (roughly 220–380 on that scale) and the new 2025 scale (about 400–700). Nugent emphasized the concordance is a statistical linkage — "approximate relationships, not exact matches" — and warned it should not be used to compare individual students across grades.
Representative Steele responded sharply in questioning, saying, "We completely moved the goalpost," and asked how cut score changes reconcile with declining NAEP and ACT trends. Nugent said KSDE would provide the concordance and related comparison charts and reiterated that the cut scores were educator‑determined and intended to make state results more consistent with postsecondary indicators.
KSDE also noted practical differences in the test design: the 2025 tests were shorter (about 40 questions in the example cited) and focus on grade‑level depth and prioritized standards, with the balanced assessment system intended to pair summative results with formative and screener data to guide instruction.
What comes next: KSDE agreed to share the concordance table and comparison materials with committee members and to provide further detail on how cut scores relate to ACT and NAEP benchmarks.