Georgia Milestones Might Not Matter For Promotion

Caption

Teacher Megan Causey works with third grade students on Georgia Milestones prep in Macon. / GPB

 Changes In How GA Milestones Relates To Grade Promotion

It looks like the Georgia Milestones test might not be tied to grade promotion this year after all.

So far, students in third, fifth and eighth grades had to perform up to grade level in core areas of study to pass onto the next grade.

State Department of Education communications chief Matt Cardoza says slow internet connections disrupted the Georgia Milestones Test in some school districts and may have made the test harder for some students. To be fair to everyone, the Department of Education is asking the elected State Board of Education to suspend the promotion/retention policy.

“Just any interruption for a student who may be eight or nine years old, that may cause them to not perform they way they might if there weren’t an interruption,” Cardoza said. “To insure we don’t penalize those students, we are going to ask our State Board on Thursday to waive the promotion/retention rule.”

The State Board of Education will also be asked to waive the piece of Georgia Milestones policy that tied teacher evaluations to their student’s performance on the test.

Cardoza said the computer problems came to light when complaints started bubbling up from a few school districts.  Cardoza said Fulton County Schools were the loudest voice in raising complaints.

Cardoza also said it remains to be seen if the test interruptions have made test scores unusable sources of data for teachers.

https://youtu.be/kgsTbs979XM

Support for Health, Education, and Poverty  reporting on GPB Macon comes from the Peyton Anderson Foundation.