Payzant weighs options on MCAS

By Megan Tench, Globe Staff, 4/25/2002

Faced with roughly 40 percent of Boston's 10th-graders still failing the math
portion of MCAS, Superintendent Thomas W. Payzant said yesterday he is
concerned about requiring students to pass the subject in order to graduate from
high school. But he fell short of completely opposing it, saying he wants to evaluate
more test results.

Payzant's reservations
came as the district
yesterday released results
of the December 2001
retest showing that 27
percent of 1,567 students
who took the math portion
passed, while 33 percent
out of 1,469 who took the
English portion passed.
That means that so far,
about 70 percent of
Boston's Class of 2003
has passed English while
61 percent have passed
math. Students must pass both subjects to graduate.

''I am not ready to blink yet,'' said Payzant, who still backs high-stakes testing. ''But
if we don't see major acceleration in the second and third retests, then that may be
the time to say to the state, if not sooner, that for the class of 2003, they need more
time.''

One other option Payzant is considering: asking the state to allow those who score
in the 216-218 range in math, near the passing score of 220, to graduate.

But officials from the Department of Education said yesterday that the state is not
budging on math.

''The commissioner feels strongly that with all the progress that we've made now,
and certainly in the past few years, this is no time to be backing down,'' said Heidi
Perlman, a DOE spokeswoman.

The Class of 2003 is the first group that must pass the 10th-grade Massachusetts
Comprehensive Assessment System exam to graduate from high school. They first
tackled the controversial test in spring 2001 with 3,367 Boston 10th-graders taking
the test. Those who failed have four chances to retake it before their senior year,
starting with the December 2001 retest.

While the district has been slowly making progress in English, math has been
tougher, reflecting a trend statewide.

''We've got a good shot at getting most kids in the English Language Arts,'' said
Payzant, who presented the results to the Boston School Committee last night. ''I
am still concerned about math, and the possibility that we may need more time in
math,'' he said.

Despite the scores, Payzant said he was encouraged by the number of students
who scored a few points below 220. Overall, 38 percent of students fell between
the 216-218 range in English, while 35 percent of students fell within the range in
math.

District officials said one of the biggest obstacles continues to be attendance. About
half of those who failed the spring 2001 test and the December retest also missed
more than 15 days of school in 2000-01, Payzant said. Under Boston's attendance
policy adopted in 1999, at the time hailed as one of the toughest in the nation, a
student can have no more than 12 unexcused absences in order to be promoted to
the next grade.

''Seventeen-year-olds and 18-year-olds have to start taking responsibility for their
education ... families have got to be a partner in this effort,'' Payzant said yesterday.
''I'm not going to give up on those students. But we are not taking 100 percent
accountability for them. We are willing to meet them more than halfway.''

He is asking high school headmasters to determine what MCAS help students have
taken advantage of, whether it's after-school programs or in-school tutorials. ''It's
clear we've got a lot of work to do over the next year and a half,'' Payzant said.

Some students pose particularly tough challenges. Of the 1,929 Boston
10th-graders who took both the spring 2001 MCAS and the retest, 444 or 23
percent failed both English and math. Half those students attend four out of
Boston's 20 high schools: Madison Park, English High, Hyde Park, and South
Boston.

''For the most part, the kids who are not passing, their attendance is not good,''
acknowledged Charles McAfee, headmaster at Madison Park. But, like Payzant,
he was encouraged that ''most of the others missed the math or English score by
[just] two or three points.''

McAffee said he plans to devise a plan for each student to pass the test. ''These
kids are excited about taking the test again,'' he said. ''They haven't given up.''

This story ran on page B1 of the Boston Globe on 4/25/2002.
© Copyright 2002 Globe Newspaper Company.