In order to comply with federal law, all students in Illinois will take the Illinois State Achievement Test, including students with limited English skills, according to this article in the Chicago Tribune. The Illinois Measure of Annual Growth in English (IMAGE) exam will no longer be given to students learning English. In Berwyn, about 10% of District 98 students are classified as "Limited English Proficient". District 100 has a LEP rate of 18% and Morton West reports 4.6%. I think this presents two challenges to Berwyn schools:
1. The state's decision to scrap the IMAGE test means there will no longer be a yearly exam testing LEP students for their mastery of English. This may present an accountability issue. How will we know that students are learning English at an acceptable rate? Scrapping the IMAGE test means we will have LESS information about the effectiveness of instruction for students learning English.
2. Overall ISAT scores for our districts may be negatively impacted as we will be administering reading and math tests to students in English before they have mastered English.
Since ISAT testing does not begin until 3rd grade, I think the % of LEP students taking the ISAT may be lower than the % of LEP students in the school, but in this age of No Child Left Behind, every score counts! And certainly, every student in Berwyn counts. The intent of the No Child Left Behind law is to raise standards for all students and schools. Expecting students who do not speak English yet to learn reading and math skills at their grade level is an ambitious and worthwhile goal. Hopefully, those students (and the teachers charged with the task of educating them) will rise to the challenge.
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