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The new state education board says the tests would ensure that high school grads are truly prepared for college work.
By STEPHEN HEGARTY, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times, published January 19, 2002
PENSACOLA -- To ensure that Florida high school graduates are ready for college, members of the Florida Board of Education want the state to consider a 12th-grade "exit test" that would measure what students learn in their last two years of school.
Even with the state's recent expansion of testing, the last mandatory statewide test Florida students take is the 10th-grade FCAT test they must pass to get a standard diploma.
But board members suspect that one reason nearly 40 percent of Florida's high school graduates need remedial work when they enter college is that the state hasn't systematically taken stock of what those students learn in 11th and 12th grades.
"If you want to get something worthwhile out of those last two years, we need to have some way to assess what they're learning," said board member Bill Proctor.
Studies have shown that many students nationally cruise through the senior year of high school with as little studying as possible. Often that wasted year does not hinder their ability to graduate from high school, but it hurts them when they get to college.
The problem is a lot clearer than the solution, and the discussion is only beginning. Board members and education officials say it's too early to say whether there will be a test, what such a test might look like, or when it might be implemented. Some aren't ready to commit to the need for a 12th-grade test -- at least not in the near future. And any changes to the state's mandatory testing program would require legislative action.
But members of the new board that oversees education in Florida say they think that's where the state is headed.
"We need to align graduation standards with being able to do college level work," said board member Charles Garcia. "And that's not 10th-grade level work. We have to talk about some sort of a test in their senior year."
The board is set to appoint an advisory council to make recommendations on that and other matters related to accountability through college. Board members generally agree that with testing in third through 10th grades, Florida has a good accountability system in place for those grade levels. It is at the other levels, including post-secondary education, where much of the work needs to be done.
Nothing illustrates the problem better than the state's annual School Readiness report. Each year it shows that almost four of every 10 recent Florida high school graduates enter a state college or university not ready to do college work.
Deputy Education Commissioner Betty Coxe, who recently oversaw the state's ambitious expansion of testing to cover grades 3-10, said the state now has "a wealth of data that will help us see how Florida students are doing. If we get the job done in those grades, the other parts will take care of themselves."
In Florida's new education system, the Board of Education is supposed to consider those big-picture issues and take a lead role in formulating education policy. Board members this week listed as one of their top priorities "increasing the percentage of high school graduates . . . who enter post-secondary education without remediation."