Fewer Michigan seniors will be earning state college scholarships this year, due to a dip in MEAP scores on reading, writing, and math:
The mixed results meant only 51 percent of 2003 high school graduates earned $2,500 scholarships, compared to 54 percent of 2002 graduates. Students automatically qualify if they pass the reading, writing, math and science tests, but also can qualify in other ways.
Problem is, the aggregate scores were released late, and the school districts were frustrated.
Individually, students learned whether they won scholarships by early September, but aggregate scores weren't distributed in time to help school districts improve lesson plans because of delays caused by technical problems with the testing contractor, said Martin Ackley, a spokesman for the Michigan Department of Education....
The release of scores was met with a mix of disbelief and frustration at school administration offices, some of which said they had yet to see the scores. Others claimed they were in the process of making corrections.
"This was an odd day for the state to release them," said Diane Blain, a spokeswoman for the 13,000-student Chippewa Valley Schools, which scored near state averages. "It was the deadline for schools (to offer corrections) on the scores. So you had some people trying to get online to make changes, and others trying to read their scores and the Web site was tied up."
Previous posting on MEAP-related headaches can be found here, here, and here.
Posted by kswygert at November 6, 2003 11:47 AM