For hundreds of parents across Johnson County, opting their children out of in-person learning was meant to keep their students out of classrooms and away from COVID-19.
But all students are being asked to come in to school buildings for in-person-only standardized tests, such as the high school ISTEP retake for juniors, the ILEARN for elementary and middle school students and the IREAD for third graders, regardless of whether their family chose for them to learn virtually, and educators and parents alike aren’t happy about it.
Laurie Rodriguez has children at Webb Elementary School and decided online learning was the safest option during the fall semester. With a demanding schedule at Franciscan Hospital that hindered the amount of time she could supervise her kids, she had no choice but to put them back in the classroom this semester. She isn’t comfortable with it though, she said.
Since going back to school, one of Rodriguez’s children has had to quarantine twice due to contact tracing efforts.
“I think it can work if they have school at 50%,” she said of in-person testing. “Everyone is thinking kids can’t get sick with it, but they’re wearing these Old Navy masks that don’t cover their noses.”
Middle and high schools throughout Johnson County — with the exception of Edinburgh schools — have had students in classrooms two days a week on alternating schedules, but elementary school students have been in person every day.
The next in-person state exam is the ISTEP retake, which high school juniors will take after pandemic-related shutdowns prevented them from taking the exam as sophomores. The new testing window is from Tuesday to Feb. 26, according to the Indiana Department of Education.
Students are required to either pass the ISTEP exam or attempt it each year they are eligible to graduate. Students graduating in 2023, however, will have the option of completing alternate pathways that don’t include the test but still result in a diploma.
One possibility for juniors with health concerns is to come in and test on Wednesdays, typically a day without students, which would allow enough space to spread out with no classes in session.
The exam’s sections add up to just less than 10 hours combined, so this would create a situation where students would be taking several hours of the test at once, which is not ideal but may be one of the only solution, said Laura Mattox, assistant principal at Franklin Community High School.
“A lot of (school) corporations had concerns with the ISTEP testing not being modified in any shape or form during a global pandemic,” Mattox said. “Normally, you wouldn’t test an entire test in a day, or have over two hours of actual testing in a day. The state understands the concern about that. They’ll allow a full test (section) in a day, but asked us to watch for testing fatigue.”
Using that method, students could take the two-hour practice exam one day, the four-hour English Language Arts section another Wednesday, and the 3 ½-hour math section the final Wednesday. Other students who attend school two days a week on a hybrid schedule can take the test on the days they’re in school, she said.
Even with students spaced out, there is still concern about in-person testing among families who chose to opt their children out of classroom learning, said Patrick Spray, superintendent of Clark-Pleasant schools.
“The biggest concern is how we are going about this. At our middle school, we have 1,600 students and every student had to take the assessment in a four-week window,” Spray said of the ILEARN exam, which third through eighth graders are required to take in the spring.
“It’s a struggle for us to get that scheduled in a normal year with the number of students in breakout rooms and small group instruction. We’re being asked still to bring in virtual students that have chosen to be at home to test in person. There’s reluctance among families and how and when we can test students.”
One concern about in-person exams revolves around the quarantine period. If someone has to isolate for two weeks during the exam window, that cuts down drastically the amount of time students have to take the test, he said.
“During the testing window, we may have students excluded because of contact tracing. We can’t test them, and the lack of participation will count against the school corporation. It’s frustrating for the administrators to schedule this and for staff that know the significance and importance of testing. What we’re getting from the state level is the status quo, as if everything is normal,” Spray said.
Testing participation factors into a school’s letter grade, but the department of education is hopeful state lawmakers will pass an exemption so schools aren’t judged based on this year’s exams, spokesperson Holly Lawson said.
Schools have already been exempt from new letter grades, determined by the Indiana State Board of Education, the past two years, because of the difficulty of the newly introduced ILEARN exam in 2019, and the pandemic last year.
The exams are still needed so the Indiana Department of Education, or IDOE, can track student progress, but schools will be able to document the reason a student doesn’t take an exam, whether it’s quarantine, coronavirus-related health issues or a parent who refuses to have their child take the exam in person, said Charity Flores, the state’s chief academic officer, in an email to Indiana school district superintendents, building administrators and test coordinators.
“IDOE recognizes and appreciates the complexities and concerns with onsite testing during COVID-19,” Flores said in the email. “Spring 2021 assessment data is critical to identifying and analyzing student learning gaps to remediate the learning needs of all students. IDOE is committed to identifying and closing the learning gaps as a result of challenges from COVID-19.”
