Scores from this year’s standardized test at one southwest Michigan elementary school won’t count at all.
According to Michigan's Department of Education, individual administrative errors on the Michigan Educational Assessment Program test happen every year. But this kind of mistake, affecting hundreds of student tests, is rare.
MDE found out third and fourth-graders graders at Coloma Elementary School were allowed to go back and complete answers on the MEAP test after the testing period was over. That’s not allowed. The state was tipped off to the mistake by an anonymous source.
Coloma Community Schools’ superintendent did not return requests for comment on this story. It’s not clear if the district will take any action because of the error or what the district will do to prevent such an error from happening again.
The school district is about 40 miles west of Kalamazoo. It serves fewer than 2,000 students. More than 300 students go to Coloma Elementary School.
It’s not clear how the situation will affect the elementary school in the long run, but an MDE official says the move will certainly impact the school’s ranking on the state’s top-to-bottom list of school performance.
