Proficiency tests: Help available for students who struggle

By Mandy Walton

Friday, March 20, 2009 | 1:24 p.m.

High school students across the valley took the junior proficiency exams Tuesday. Not all that long ago, most students were unaware of what the exam was and why they had to take it. Its effects can jeopardize an 11th-grader who was on-track to graduate. I speak from experience.

As a sophomore, I remember taking a very long “pre-test” one day, mid-year. I didn’t think much about the test: I merely thought it was a practice run for what was to come a year later when I was a junior. Sophomore year ended, junior year began, and by January of that year, I was in the midst of all the things an over-achieving high school upper classman is involved with. Swimming practice, band, Advanced Placement classes and work filled my schedule.

A call from my coach and guidance counselor quickly put the brakes on my busy year.

“You did not pass the math portion of the proficiency exam when you took it last year,” my swim coach informed me.

As I looked, confused, from her to my guidance counselor, they explained that the proficiency pre-test was actually a “first try” and had I passed, I wouldn’t have to take the test again. They were concerned because I had done so poorly on the math portion the first time, they didn’t want me to fail it the second time.

Failing the junior proficiency exam meant I wouldn’t graduate with my class. I’d never heard such a thing until then. I was an honor student -- how could one test keep me from graduating?

My coach wanted me to be able to continue to swim on the team and keep up my grades, so I was enrolled into an early-bird consumer math course to teach me the math problems that would be on the proficiency exam. The teacher (Mr. Black -- I still remember him) is probably the one person responsible for my passing the math portion of that test. Our class of about 20 students was taught the easy, basic principles of math and accounting – the ones we had missed because of skipping levels in math and being placed into algebra and trigonometry way too early. I have no idea if Mr. Black is still at Basic High School, but if he is, someone please show him this blog!

I only tell you this story because the junior proficiency exam is still making news. This exam has made headlines before because of the number of students who continued to fail it, and I wondered if anything was being done to help these kids.

I decided to ask a junior at Foothill High School how his school helped him prepare for the exams.

“Our school helped us prepare by letting the people who failed the math one take a class for two days that was four-periods long called ‘math camp’,” said junior Colton Webb. “They went over everything on the test and taught it over again to make sure everyone knew it.”

Just as when I was in high school, Webb said that they took a pre-test while they were sophomores.

“The hardest part of the exam was probably the entire science exam, because lots of the questions on it were things we haven't yet learned or things we learned a long time ago,” Webb said.

He went on to state that the teachers again helped students prepare for the science portion by reviewing and teaching the principles that would be on the exam, and the students took a few pre-proficiency science tests.

When I asked Webb how he felt about the exam determining graduation status, he said,

“I don't think it should determine if we graduate or not because we all have been in school for at least the past 10 years and they shouldn't make a test affect our graduation if we're already passing school and have our credits and all our classes out of the way.”

I couldn’t agree more, and I’m sure there are thousands of other Clark County School District students who would second that. But for now, this is the way it is, and I’m pleased to see that our Henderson high schools have taken a step forward with ensuring that students pass this exam.