Abbott waives grade promotion requirements tied to STAAR tests as COVID disrupts school
With the typical school year upended by the novel coronavirus’ outbreak, Gov. Greg Abbott announced Monday that grade promotion requirements tied to STAAR tests will be waived for the upcoming school year.
For the 2020-21 academic year, 5th and 8th grade students’ scores on the State of Texas Assessments of Academic Readiness, more commonly known as STAAR, tests will not be taken into account when determining whether they will move to the next grade level.
Typically, students in those grade are required to pass the STAAR math and reading tests in order to be promoted to middle or high school. Instead of having students who fail the test retake it in the spring or summer, 5th and 8th grade students will only be required to take the reading and math assessments in May, at the same time as the other grade level tests.
It will be up to individual districts’ discretion whether a student should advance to the next grade, and among the factors they should consider are a student’s STAAR tests results as part of their overall mastery of a subject, according to guidance from the Texas Education Agency. Districts will still be responsible for providing accelerated instruction to support students that fail to pass their STAAR exam.
While Abbott waived grade promotion requirements, he stopped short of canceling STAAR tests like some state lawmakers had called for. According to a news release Monday, the traditional “A-F” grading system for schools and districts will still be in place — “albeit with certain adjustments due to COVID-19.”
“As always, our goal is to provide a high quality education for every Texas student,” Abbott said in a statement. “This will be a uniquely challenging school year, therefore, this year is about providing students every opportunity to overcome the disruptions caused by COVID-19.
Texas Education Agency Commissioner Mike Morath said the annual exams are helpful for both parents and educators to understand where their students’ are academically, but stressed that the pandemic has upended the typical school year.
“But there is no benefit to our children by requiring them to repeat a year based on a single test score given the disruptions of COVID, so we are waiving the grade promotion requirements from STAAR this year for our students,” Morath said in a statement.
In March, Abbott waived STAAR test requirements after facing a wave of calls to delay the mandated exams amid school closures. In the wake of the canceled tests, the Texas Education Agency announced that school districts and campuses would forgo school accountability ratings and that districts would decide if students graduate or move up a grade level.
At the time, districts were instructed to consider teacher recommendations, students’ grades and academic performance, according to the TEA’s guidance.
In recent weeks, over a dozen state lawmakers have called on Abbott and Morath to once again waive STAAR test requirements for the school year, like back in March. Plans over returning to campuses this fall are still being finalized, just weeks ahead of the start of the school year in many districts.
“Given the historic challenges facing our students and teachers, I am concerned that an already flawed high-stakes testing instrument will unfairly and inaccurately determine student performance in an uncertain environment,” Sen. Beverly Powell, a Democrat from Burleson, wrote in a letter to Morath earlier this month.
If STAAR tests are still held, Rep. Matt Krause, a Republican from Fort Worth, asked that the high-stakes components of the exams at least be removed. In a letter to Morath earlier this month, Krause vowed to refile House Bill 2113, which would cut down on the number of exams and not require passing STAAR tests for students to graduate high school.
This story was originally published July 27, 2020 at 4:24 PM.
