Catch a Falling STAAR: Alternatives to the STAAR Exam

I ended my last post with a promise that we’d get into the nitty gritty of the STAAR exam, and I’m here to deliver. But before we get into that, I want to take you back in time. 

The year is nineteen-whatever-whatever, summer break is just around the corner, and you’re fifteen years old. That’s right, you’re back in high school. What is most important to you at fifteen years old? Where is your attention focused, what are your priorities? For me it was making the varsity team, blogging about my favorite TV show in the days before social media, and trying to figure out whether the boy I met at summer camp liked me back. Your answer is probably different, but similarly relatable in the way that youth always is. What I know for sure is that you weren’t focused on the performance of your school in comparison to other schools in the district. Because no one in high school is remotely concerned with something like that. So as we talk about the STAAR exam, I want you to keep in mind your fifteen year old self - how you saw the world, and what you most needed from our education system to get to where you are now.

Why does Texas use the STAAR exam? 

In order to understand how the STAAR exam functions, we’re going to start by outlining its general purpose. The state of Texas says the STAAR test makes sure students in Texas are competitive with students in other states and countries. The exam is also used to evaluate how well teachers and schools prepare their students, and to assess students every year because it's required by the Every Student Succeeds Act. Igna Cotton’s blog post on Alamo City Moms does a great job of breaking it down: high-stakes standardized testing is meant to make sure students are prepared for future aspirations. It's supposed to make the curriculum more rigorous, to measure student progress each year, and to compare success across districts. She also says the test is used to make sure students are held back if they aren’t ready to progress to the next grade based on test performance. 

This all sounds fine and good, but Igna points out a few criticisms too. The STAAR test creates a teaching environment where material on the test is the main concern. Administrators have a reason to skew results in their favor because of the financial incentives or penalties connected to exam performance. The exam creates a lot of anxiety for students. And, most relevant to the scope of this blog, accessible information about the test (like what behaviors it’s really measuring) is very vague. In theory, standardized tests create an environment where all students are held to the same standard, and schools are held accountable to provide a certain level of education. But that’s just theory - what does the STAAR really do? 

A STAAR Student’s Perspective

In 2021, the Austin Chronicle published an article written by fifteen year old student Aina Mariza. In her account, Aina says that exams like the STAAR “do not measure achievement or accountability at all." Well, that's a red flag. Instead, she says tests like the STAAR are used to decide which schools gets funding. She argues that many test questions are ambiguous and encourage a surface-level understanding of material, like the exam’s reading section. She also says that teachers are forced to dedicate large chunks of time to preparing students. This takes away from time spent learning. I recommend reading Aina's piece, as she also digs into the cycle of low-income schools not having access to adequate funding because of low test scores. She ends by saying the exam is essentially useless to students and is a waste of both time and money. I think Aina and I would get along.  

And Aina isn't the only one who takes issue with the STAAR test. Texas Monthly published an article in 2023 about how anxiety-inducing this exam experience often is for students, even in middle and elementary school.There is much to be said about how emotional distress could skew test scores. We aren't going to get into that too much here, but it means that some students don't perform at their best on test day. But they're judged for the effort of an entire school year based on their exam performance. Is this really a fair system?

STAAR Redesign

In 2019, the Texas State Board of Education (SBOE) decided to redesign the STAAR test. These changes were implemented by the Educatior Advisory Committee - a group of educators who offer feedback on the Texass assessment program as a whole. The redesign is geared toward making the test more representative of classroom experience (whatever that means?) and was put into effect during the 2022-2023 school year. The test changed in four major ways. First, the test is now administered online in order to allow more accommodations for test-takers. However, this online platform is not optional or based on accommodation needs - students who would perform better in a non-electronic environment are out of luck. 

The exam redesign also requires that no more than 75% of test questions can be multiple choice. This change addresses Aina’s concern with questions that could have varied interpretations or more than one answer. Another aspect of the test redesign is that some questions are “cross-curricular” meaning they combine knowledge from different subjects. However, the score isn’t based on knowledge of the added subject matter. Lastly, the exam redesign added a writing component to the test, with one essay prompt and another based on a reading passage.

These are all noteworthy changes, and the STAAR exam is going to look very different moving forward. Time will tell how these changes impact student experience. But the question still remains - is this particular brand of high-stakes standardized testing the best way to help students succeed? I believe it is irresponsible to accept the status-quo as the best practice without looking for alternate methods. Perhaps there is a better way, and we owe it to our community to find out.

Alternatives to the STAAR

I’m not going to claim that I have all the answers. But I am going to encourage you to start asking hard questions. There are numerous benefits to standardized testing when it comes to evaluating the success of specific schools in comparison to their district, or on a larger scale. But it’s hard to argue that this is really the best practice for individual students. 

I believe it’s worth considering a few alternatives to standardized testing. We could redirect the time and energy to evaluating student learning with classroom assessment. In other words, trusting the teachers to evaluate how their students are progressing. It’s something that already happens within the classroom, often through the grading process but there other ways to for evaluate success. We should trust that our teachers provide an effective education. I’m not suggesting we do away with all forms of accountability for teachers, but we could measure student learning with assessment techniques that account for varied skill sets and encourage creativity. Remember that model solar system you had to build? The volcano? I believe we should allow teachers to measure the learning of their own students as they see fit. These teachers are certified, and that has to mean something: they're also qualified. They work alongside their students every day. Can’t we trust them to gauge the success of individual students? Is it really a fair system when financial benefits or losses are attached to test scores? It creates an environment that is high-stakes not only for the students, but educators and administrators as well.

I do believe the state of Texas should measure school performance, but shouldn’t this measure be distinct from one that assesses individual student learning? One test doesn’t have to be a catch-all. Two very different behaviors should be measured with different strategies. Designing this hypothetical assessment tool is beyond the scope of this blog post. But I want you to think about your fifteen year old self again before you exit out of this web page and start hunting for the perfect acorn squash recipe. Think about who you were then, and how you got to where you are now. Ask yourself what helped you on your journey and what may have held you back. We all want to create a better world for those who come after us. We haver to start by asking questions and considering issues with the current system. Together we can figure out how to best support our community.