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Results Similar to Eighth
Grade Test
Fifth graders in the Cobb County School District performed
as well as eighth graders on the new Georgia writing
assessment administered earlier this year. Cobb students
posted higher scale scores and had a higher percentage of
students meeting or exceeding standards than the state and
metro Atlanta averages. Cobb students had an average scale
score of 216, compared to the state average of 209 and the
metro average score of 213. District administrators were
pleased to see that 78 percent of all Cobb students met or
exceeded standards, a higher rate than their metro and state
peers’ performance of 74 percent and 70 percent, respectively
(Table 1). Because this is a new test, results of the Fifth
Grade Writing Assessment for 2007 cannot be compared to
previous years’ results, but do serve as a baseline from which
to measure future growth.
The new writing assessment includes information about
student performance in different aspects of writing or
domains. These domains include Ideas, Organization, Style, and
Conventions. Domains are rated on a scale of 1 to 5.
Performance of Cobb students was similar across all domains,
ranging from 2.9 in Organization to 3.1 in Ideas.
While Cobb’s overall scores were strong, one remaining
concern is the gap that continues to exist between the
performance of regular education students and students in
special populations (Special Education or English Language
Learners). The percentage of students meeting and exceeding
standards in both groups was significantly smaller than in the
regular education program (Table II). This same gap is
apparent on other assessments at both the state and district
levels, although recently released results from the Georgia
High School Graduation Test showed steady progress among
subgroups at the high school level.
“I am proud of our students, and even though this test is
different from previous writing assessments, the information
is very useful,” said Superintendent Fred Sanderson. “The
results confirm what we saw with the eighth grade writing
test. Overall our students are doing well, but we have
additional work to do to address the gap between our regular
education students and certain subgroups. Addressing these
issues is critical for meeting No Child Left Behind standards
on other assessments, as well. Language Arts supervisors will
work with the schools to evaluate the results from the new
assessment and develop plans for improvement.”
Thirty-nine of Cobb elementary schools topped the state
scale scores, with scores ranging from 191 to 242. Highest
scores were posted by Mount Bethel (242); Davis and
Shallowford Falls (239); and Tritt (238). At nine schools more
than 90 percent of students met or exceeded standards (Davis,
Tritt, Shallowford Falls, Sope Creek, Ford, Mount Bethel,
Kemp, East Side, and Still).
As a part of the statewide testing program, the Fifth Grade
Writing Assessment was administered in March and requires
students to write a composition on an assigned topic. The
assessment provides fifth graders with a measurement of their
writing performance. This information can help students,
parents, and teachers understand areas where students may need
to focus their efforts to improve writing skills before taking
the Eighth Grade Writing Assessment.
Each student paper is scored by professionals who have been
trained to evaluate writing. Evaluators score student
compositions on four qualities of effective writing. These
qualities, or domains, of effective writing should be present
in a composition regardless of the topic. The domains include
Ideas, Organization, Style, and Conventions.
The scale score range for the new Grade 5 Writing
Assessment is 100 to 350. Writing scores are reported in the
following performance levels: Does Not Meet (100-199), Meets
(200-249), and Exceeds (250-350).
Download the release with data
tables in Adobe PDF format.
Released 5/21/2007
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