High-schoolers face end-of-year tests

For the first time, Hawaii high school students in expository writing, biology, U.S. history and Algebra I classes will take standardized end-of-course exams this school year to test their mastery of the subjects.

A new Algebra II exam will also be administered.

The exams will allow schools to see how their students performed compared with those at other Hawaii public schools, and will also offer valuable data about what percentage of students are proficient in the subjects.

Officials say the exams will eventually count as part of students’ final grades, but the Department of Education hasn’t said when that will kick in.

The exams could replace a final exam in the courses. The difference is, the end-of-course exams will be the same for all students across the state.

Cara Tanimura, director of the DOE systems accountability office, said the primary reason the department is rolling out the new tests is so schools can measure students’ "knowledge about a course — whether or not they’re getting it."

Tanimura added, "It standardizes the course expectations."

Hawaii began requiring an end-of-course exam for Algebra II in the 2009-10 school year but has not had standardized exams for other subjects.

With the new exams, Hawaii joins a growing number of states using end-of-course tests to gauge subject mastery. At least 18 states now require end- of-course exams, and some make students pass the tests before they can graduate, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Center on Educational Policy, an independent education advocacy group.

End-of-course tests differ from the state’s annual assessment used to determine how many students are proficient in math, reading or science. The Hawaii State Assessment is administered to third- through eighth-graders and to 10th-graders and often requires students to draw on prior knowledge.

This school year, the end-of-course exam in biology will replace the science portion of the HSA that had been given to 10th-graders. Fourth- and eighth-graders will continue to take the science portion of the HSA test.

Meanwhile, third- through eighth-graders and 10th-graders will also continue to take the math and reading portions of the HSA. The HSA testing window opens Oct. 15, and the online test can be taken up to three times.

More than 90,000 students will take the HSA this year.

The end-of-course exams, in contrast, will be taken once and administered near the end of the school year. Tani­mura said thousands of students will sit for the tests, which will be taken online.

In another change to annual testing this year, Hawaiian-language students in third and fourth grade will take a different version of the HSA that was redeveloped in Hawaiian to better measure proficiency.

Hawaiian-immersion schools had been concerned about the HSA Hawaiian-language test last school year because it had been translated into Hawaiian, rather than developed in Hawaiian, a distinction they say put their students at a unique disadvantage. The new paper-and-pencil Hawaiian-language test will be administered once in April.