Fewer Than Half of Indiana Students Meet New Exam Standards

(INDIANAPOLIS) — Fewer than half of Indiana students met expected achievement levels on the state’s new standardized test, leading the state’s top educator to renew her call for changes on how those results are used for rating schools and teachers.

Statewide ILEARN exam results released Wednesday show that 47.9% of students in grades 3-8 met proficiency levels for language arts and 47.8% for math. Those are both down more than 10 percentage points from last year’s passing rates for the previous ISTEP exam.

Even before the ILEARN results were released to the public, Republican Gov. Eric Holcomb called for a one-year delay in using those scores toward teacher evaluations or the A-F ratings for schools.

State schools Superintendent Jennifer McCormick says ILEARN uses tougher standards of whether students are making sufficient progress.