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Posted: 6:51 PM- State education officials are still working to get to the bottom of inaccurate state accountability results released Friday.
On Friday, state officials told Utah State Board of Education members and the media that 73 percent of Utah high schools met performance goals of the state U-PASS system. Further analysis of state data, however, shows only about 52 percent of Utah high schools met the goals. Another 27 percent did not meet the goals, and 21 percent were not evaluated for various reasons. In all, about 66 percent of schools evaluated for U-PASS met the goals.
The blunder was that the state counted schools that weren't evaluated as meeting the goals.
Judy Park, Utah State Office of Education Associate Superintendent of Data, Assessment and Accountability, called the slip-up an honest mistake.
"This is our first year of the high school report and we've been trying to work through some of the bugs and issues," Park said. "I think there's obviously some glitches in this." Each year, the state releases U-PASS results, which show whether elementary and middle schools are meeting state goals and making progress in testing and attendance, among other things. Those results, released last month, showed that 85 percent of elementary and middle schools met U-PASS goals.
For the first time this year, the state education office also released U-PASS results for high schools, which evaluate progress in testing and attendance but factor in graduation rates as well. Park said the percentage of high schools that made U-PASS is likely lower than that for elementary and middle schools due to different criteria high schools must meet.
"High school is just so very, very different than elementary and middle school," Park said. "There's so many more indicators in there." She said the state will continue to study the differences.
Of 189 high schools listed by state, 99 met U-PASS goals, 51 did not meet the goals and 39 were not evaluated. Most of those 39 were alternative schools that were not evaluated due to their "unique characteristics," according to the state office's Web site. The results of another school, a 190th school listed, could not be verified.
Schools that don't meet goals are labeled as "needing assistance" but face no consequences from the state. In Utah, schools are scrutinized under two systems: U-PASS designed by the state and No Child Left Behind by the federal government. U-PASS takes progress into account whereas No Child Left Behind expects schools to hit certain testing targets and imposes consequences on those that don't.
Many state educators say they prefer U-PASS to the federal accountability system because U-PASS measures growth and does not punish schools that fail to meet goals. Critics of U-PASS say it does not hold schools accountable for making sure all ethnic and ability groups of students reach goals.
Some districts, such as Alpine, did well this year according to high school U-PASS results. All of Alpine's high schools, except two alternative ones that weren't evaluated, met U-PASS goals.
Alpine School District Director of Research and Evaluation John Jesse said it's too early to say how Alpine managed such a feat. Most of Jordan School District's schools also met U-PASS goals with the exceptions of Valley and West Jordan highs, as well as several others that weren't evaluated.
None of the Salt Lake District's high schools met goals. Four of Granite School District's nine traditional high schools made U-PASS, said Darryl Thomas, Granite director of research, assessment and evaluation.
Thomas said it concerns him that the U-PASS system is designed in such a way that it can leave out the highest performing math students.
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