CSAP: Grade 3 reading results Students' scores best yet High marks on Spanish version not counted
Hundreds of children who took third-grade state reading tests this year in Spanish outscored their English-speaking classmates, but their scores won't count when school report cards are issued this fall, which angers bilingual-education advocates. In Denver, 57 percent of the 749 students who took the third-grade reading test in Spanish received a passing score. That compares with 49 percent of the 5,442 students who tested in English. In Brighton, the results were even more dramatic - 92 percent of the students who took the test in Spanish passed, while 70 percent of those who took it in English passed. Those numbers don't hold up statewide, where 56 percent of those testing in Spanish scored proficient or advanced, while 72 percent did so in English. But bilingual-education advocates say scores good and bad statewide should be used in evaluating a school's performance. As it is, they say, schools that do an excellent job of educating Spanish-speaking students get no credit and will end up with lower grades than they deserve. 'We are concerned about disparity in treatment,' said Rufina Hernandez, executive director of the Latin American Research and Service Agency, or LARASA. 'I do believe there is basis for a lawsuit. Valdez Elementary in Denver would earn a B when school rankings are issued this fall if test results of Spanish speakers - the majority of Valdez students - could be counted, says principal Tom Archuleta. Without them, his school gets a D. Of the reading scores released Thursday, 81 percent of students tested in Spanish passed, while 28 percent of those who took the test in English passed. According to calculations made by Denver Public Schools assistant superintendent Wayne Eckerling, if the scores were combined, 53 percent of the students would score proficient or above. Other CSAP scores were not released Thursday, but students also could take Spanish tests in fourth-grade reading and writing. Don Watson, head of assessment at the Colorado Department of Education, said English and Spanish tests aren't comparable because only the English CSAPs are 'refreshed.' Each year 25 percent of the test is new, with the old 25 percent used as practice questions. The Spanish CSAP stays the same. Spanish-speaking kids may or may not outperform English speakers, Watson said. So far, the legislature isn't willing to spend money to equalize the two tests and find out. State Rep. Val Vigil, D-Thornton, has been fighting unsuccessfully to change the laws involving Spanish tests. By refusing to either update the Spanish tests or count them in school evaluations, the legislature forces the state into 'treating two types of students differently,' Vigil said. 'They're telling the Spanish speaker, 'You don't count. You have no bearing on anything.'' But Kathy Escamilla, an associate professor of education at the University of Colorado at Boulder who has researched the subject, said discrimination is not exactly the issue. She says the real agenda in not including students' Spanish CSAP scores is that it 'blows their whole argument about bilingual education,' that bilingual education doesn't work as well as English immersion. Proponents of bilingual education believe that when children learn to read first in the language they understand, they're better able to acquire knowledge they need to pass the CSAPs, and also better able to pick up the second language, English. Opinions vary as to why solid bilingual education such as that at Valdez might result in higher CSAP scores in Spanish than English. Valdez principal Archuleta says it's the immigrant factor. 'I can't explain it except for in the Spanish-speaking population, education is a must,' he said. 'It's the first step on the road to success. Spanish speakers are coming here to live the American dream - to buy a home, to settle down.' Archuleta says immigrants work hard, then move to southwest Denver, Aurora, Montbello. 'There go some of our better kids.' Lorenzo Trujillo, past chairman of the Association of Directors of Bilingual Education, says kids in bilingual classrooms may learn more because their teachers deliver knowledge in a different way. 'My theory is that because we work with kids with a method called sheltered English, and because we provide them native language support, all concepts and all lessons are broken down so that they are understood by all students.' Given that the Spanish test isn't refreshed like the English one, 'a precise statistical comparison is questionable,' Trujillo said. 'However, is it indicative, is it informative? Yes.' No, said Rick O'Donnell, director of Gov. Bill Owens' Office of Policy and Initiatives. 'The Colorado standards were written for students who've learned to read and write in English.' DPS will start counting Spanish CSAP scores in its own grading of schools, which makes principal Archuleta happy. 'It really pleases me they're going to recognize all my students,' he said. 'I just wish Gov. Owens would.' |