Third-grade CSAP results arrive in Summit

Local native English speakers scored higher than state; Overall percentage of students scoring Proficient or Advanced was slightly lower than state

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By LORY POUNDER
summit daily news
Summit County, CO Colorado
May 1, 2008

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SUMMIT COUNTY — Results from the state’s third grade reading assessment arrived this week, reiterating that the achievement gap in Summit School District is largely related to English proficiency.

Overall, the percentage of local third grade students who scored Proficient or Advanced on the Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) reading test was 67 — three percentage points lower than the state average, according to a press release from the district. However, when broken out into categories, Summit’s English speaking students scoring Proficient or Advanced was 87 percent. For their peers who are learning the language, the percentage with those scores was 31.

“The increased number of Unsatisfactory scores is highly related to testing requirements for our English Language Learners who have been in our district for less than three years,” Robin Ziperman, the district’s director of assessment, wrote in a press release.

The spring 2008 overall proficiency rating shows a decrease of about 10 percent from last year, and a change in demographics is a major factor in that change, she added. In fact, the third grade non-English proficient population increased significantly throughout the past year at Dillon Valley and Silverthorne elementary schools, the district reported.

“Per Colorado law, we continue to test our ELL (English Language Learner) students in English before they have gained an adequate proficiency in English that would enable them to have more success,” according to the press release.

However, for this same group of third graders, the Colorado English Language Assessment (CELA) showed in reading, writing, listening and speaking, 93 percent of the students made at least one year’s growth. On average, it takes an elementary school student about three years to become fluent, leading to increased CSAP proficiency, school officials said.

These third grade reading results are released to the school districts before the rest of the CSAP results, which are anticipated in late July. This way teachers can use the information to help determine if a student should be placed on an Individualized Literacy Plan (ILP) that is part of the Colorado Basic Literacy Act.

Individual results for all the students who took CSAP will be sent to parents in August.

Lory Pounder can be reached at (970) 668-4628, or at lpounder@summitdaily.com.

Local breakdown
The percentage of students who were Proficient or Advanced for each of the six Summit School District elementary schools on the 2008 Third Grade Reading CSAP is listed below:

School, All students, English-speaking, Non and limited English proficient Breckenridge 86 91 50
Dillon Valley 22 72 10
Frisco 85 83 100
Silverthorne 43 72 23
Summit Cove 84 87 67
Upper Blue 94 100 75