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Shawnee Mission presents mixed assessment gains, explains new state cut scores and plans testing changes
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Summary
District assessment staff reported incremental growth on district screeners (I Ready/Acadience), previewed preliminary Kansas assessment baselines (57% ELA, 53% math in 2025), announced a proposed reduction in some NWEA MAP math licenses (saving about $67,000), and spent substantial time explaining the state's new cut scores and accompanying controversy.
District assessment leaders told the Shawnee Mission Board that local diagnostic and universal-screening measures are showing incremental gains while the state has revised its performance-level cut scores, a change that district leaders said is intended to better align state results with other local measures.
Dan Grumman, director of assessment and research, summarized 2025 Kansas results as a new baseline: "Last year, as the new baseline, 57 percent of Shawnee Mission students scored at or above proficient in ELA, 53 percent scored at or above proficient in math," he said. Grumman added the district expects preliminary results for the current year in about a month and audited results later in summer.
Locally, teachers and curriculum coordinators highlighted growth on district-administered tools. Presenters said the I Ready winter snapshot showed progress (one slide noted a rise from 12% to 27% of students at mid-or-above grade level during the semester for some cohorts) and that district growth measures show the district on track for typical annual growth (presenters cited a winter typical-growth figure of 62% across K'8).
The administration also proposed renewing Acadience licenses and reducing most NWEA MAP math licenses because I Ready has become the district's primary math diagnostic. That change was presented with an estimated district savings of approximately $67,000.
Board members pressed presenters on the state's new cut scores and whether the changes mean inflated performance. One board member summarized concerns about the legislative attention around cut scores and asked for clarity on how Shawnee Mission uses the performance levels. District staff said the state updated assessments in 2025 and the accompanying performance-level descriptors (PLDs) were created to more clearly define what students at each level can do.
"My understanding is that this assessment attempts to really better define what those scores are and make sure that there's a delineation between each of those cut scores," a district leader said, denying any intent to inflate outcomes.
Presenters urged the board and community to look at the PLDs rather than only the headline proficient percentages: the PLDs provide standard-level descriptions (for example, what kinds of division problems a student at one level can be expected to solve). Panelists also described how PLCs and curriculum cadres are aligning instruction and proficiency scales to the PLDs and to district assessments to create more consistent vertical expectations.
The board engaged in detailed questions about how assessment changes affect parents, teachers and state reporting. Members asked how the district will communicate results to families and how new testing choices affect longitudinal data comparisons if the district reduces MAP licenses.
District staff said methods exist to map historical MAP percentiles to current measures and that the transition will require some additional analytic work but is feasible.
The presentation closed with next steps: ongoing monitoring of state releases, renewal items on a consent agenda for the licensing of screening tools, and continued professional learning to use data in instruction.
Board members thanked the assessment team and described the report as a strong basis for future budget and program decisions.
