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FCAT scoring change will take time

1 min read

To Supporters of Lee County Public Schools:

For the past few months I’ve been talking with anyone who will listen about the significant changes that were coming to the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT). And while I may have sounded like the little boy who cried wolf, I wanted to ensure the community was prepared for what it would see when the 2012 results were released.

Well, the first part of those results are out, and to say it was a shock to people both locally and statewide would be an understatement.

This year the State changed what was graded as part of FCAT 2.0 writing. Unfortunately those changes were made without giving districts enough time to properly prepare. And when the results came out, it was clear the State may have made a slight miscalculation. That’s because virtually overnight the percentage of students at or above standards dropped by nearly 60 percent.

Now I think we all realize that our students didn’t become poor writers from one school year to the next, and the State admitted as such when they agreed to adjust the minimum score needed from 4.0 to 3.0.