Education

Compare Connecticut students’ test results to those in other states

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Andrew Ba Tran

Data Editor

Jacqueline Rabe Thomas

Education Reporter

Curious how Connecticut students’ test results compare to those of students in other states?

It’s finally possible to see that thanks to the adaptive online exams students took last year.

So far, 10 of the 17 states whose students took the Smarter Balanced Assessments have released their results, but officials from those states have voted against creating a database for such comparisons.

“Some states didn’t want that head-to-head comparison,” Connecticut Education Commissioner Dianna Wentzell told reporters the day she released the state’s test results. “We are not as worried about that comparison.”

So though most states opted not to create a central place to compare scores, TrendCT decided make one anyway to see how Connecticut compares.

And overall, Connecticut fares well.

The state came in third in both English language arts and math statewide scores.

Washington had the highest percentage of students meeting or exceeding achievement levels, however only half of 11th graders took the Smarter Balanced tests.

Some scores were preliminary, like those from Oregon, Washington and Idaho. And several states did not provide level-specific student performance figures for each grade — only the percent that met or exceeded achievement goals.

Drawing conclusions from these comparisons should be done carefully without a more complete dataset. The student population in each state differs, as well as the percent of low-income students or English learners.

Only five states had disaggregated data available: Missouri, Vermont, West Virginia, California and Connecticut. We’ll analyze the different subgroups as more information becomes available.

We will update the data once more states release their test scores.

Scroll down below to see how Connecticut or each state did in each test by grade.

















What do you think?

  • thingfishp

    I think what’s most important to note here is that SBAC is dead and these comparisons don’t mean a damn thing. Give up the fetish for data already. I know that a certain geek demographic will wet their pants over this, but these numbers don’t tell us anything about student achievement. And given the fact that most of my students didn’t give a rat’s ass about this test (many of them admitted to just punching keys) and CT still comes out at the top, maybe it’s time to tell the Achievement First, ConnCAN and other corporate “reform” entities that their narrative is just a steaming pile of nonsense.

  • Joseph Brzezinski

    Now that SAT scores are being released , is some comparison on a normalized bases of some sort feasible? Some universities are beginning to use advanced data science technologies to profile student application data followed by performance statistics in college. Profiling includes SAT, GPA, and various secondary school information, so SBAC would likely be included as well.

  • Jill S Keith

    Greatly appreciate this analysis and planned future updates – thanks!

  • Mary Burnham

    Once the SBAC test results were made available that they would be impossible to ignore.
    Even with the caveat “these comparisons should be done carefully”, such comparative
    analyses give legitimacy to a highly controversial assessment system that fails to meet validity,
    reliability, or standardization expectations. Even though the SBAC developers have
    couched their psychometrics in mountains of verbiage and convinced politically-appointed
    education commissioners to promote their efficacy, these test results provide
    no worthwhile information to teachers working with students and, after diverting millions of dollars
    that could have been put towards improving student learning opportunities,
    serve no purpose other than to continue the “test and punish” privatization agenda of
    corporate education reform.