Calif. Schools To Report LEP Students’ Scores

By Mary Ann Zehr

Taking the advice of Gov. Gray Davis, the California state board of education decided last week to require schools to report the test scores of their English-language learners for the state’s new accountability index. Schools will be permitted to drop scores only for such students who have been in their district for less than a year.

"English learners should command more of our attention, not less," the Democratic governor said at the board meeting. "By exempting them, we do them a disservice."

How to include English-language learners in testing and reporting has been a contentious issue across the nation, and especially in California. By state law, all limited-English-proficient students must take the test California uses, the Stanford Achievement Test-9th Edition. But some people say those students’ scores lack validity, and argue they shouldn’t be used as part of a high-stakes accountability...