Third Grade Testing Bill Still Alive
Crucial third-grade reading test results due Friday; Tulsa lawmaker still works for local option
By ANDREA EGER World Staff Writer
The results of Oklahoma’s first high-stakes reading test for third-graders are due out Friday, even as legislation that would restore control over the lowest-scoring students to parents and teachers is still clinging to life.
“Of course every parent is going to want to know how their child did on the test as soon as possible. If I had a third-grader, I would be on the edge of my seat,” said Vickie Johnson, executive director of curriculum and instruction at Tulsa Public Schools.
Because of an amendment to the state’s Reading Sufficiency Act passed in 2011, third-graders who score “unsatisfactory” in reading on the Oklahoma Core Curriculum Test risk not being promoted to the fourth grade.
Those students must pass an alternate reading test, such as an Iowa Test of Basic Skills, or meet the qualifications for one of six exemptions allowed under the law, or they will be held back in the third grade.
Meanwhile, state Rep. Katie Henke, R-Tulsa, has gone to extraordinary lengths to keep alive House Bill 2625, which she co-sponsored with Sen. Gary Stanislawksi, also R-Tulsa.