More high schoolers are passing MCAS tests

More high school students than ever before are passing the MCAS exams required to graduate, even before they reach senior year, the state Department of Education announced yesterday.

About 90 percent of students in the Class of 2006 have passed the English and math tests of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System after three tries. Their passing rate outpaces each senior class since 2003, when passing the MCAS exam became a requirement to earn a high school diploma. By contrast, 81 percent of seniors in the class of 2003 had passed the tests before their senior year began.

State education officials said they are pleased with the results, attributing them to high schools that have redesigned their daily lessons to match state academic standards in English and math. But others say that the statistics are not as rosy as they appear because they do not account for students who have dropped out.

Principals and administrators chalked up the results to extra tutoring, lessons that match the way questions are asked on the MCAS test, and more writing.

''We've all gotten better at what's expected," said Principal Charles Skidmore of Arlington High School, where 93 percent of incoming 12th-graders passed. ''I don't think there's any sleight of hand. I really do think people settled down and said we need to teach real literacy and numeracy skills."

Skidmore said they have to do test preparation, such as reviewing the types of questions asked.

In Boston, 74 percent of incoming high school seniors have passed the MCAS, compared with 72 percent of rising seniors a year ago and 68 percent two years ago. Some of the progress stems from test preparation, but not all, said Chris Coxon, deputy superintendent of teaching and learning.

''Teachers overall have become a lot smarter about their instruction," Coxon said. Teachers are ''really digging beyond the first level of questions of just facts, and getting at kids' thinking."

Students must score at least 220 on a scale of 200 to 280 points to pass. They take the MCAS test once as 10th-graders and can take it over again until they pass. They also must meet their high school's course requirements to earn a diploma.

''I am very pleased with the number of students we have meeting the MCAS standard, but we need to recognize that this standard is minimal," Education Commissioner David P. Driscoll said in a statement.

A Globe analysis last month found that 37 percent of incoming college students had to take a remedial course in the state's public colleges last year, even though they had passed the MCAS test.

Yesterday's report showed that some students are making more headway than others in clearing the MCAS hurdle, regarded as one of the country's toughest graduation exit exams. About 94 percent of white 12th-graders and 91 percent of Asian 12th-graders passed MCAS. But about 75 percent of black 12th-graders and 71 percent of Hispanic 12th-graders passed.

The figures clash with estimates of the number of Massachusetts students who actually leave with a high school diploma. The Department of Education's own projections show that just 75 percent of ninth-graders typically graduate with a diploma four years later. And the Urban Institute, a nonprofit research organization in Washington, D.C., pegs Massachusetts' graduation rate at 71 percent.

Yesterday, the state reported that 61,564 out of 65,165 students, about 94 percent, in the senior class of 2005 passed the test. But far more students, 69,981, sat down to take the test two years earlier; judged against that larger number, the pass rate would dip to 88 percent.

Lisa Guisbond of the National Center for Fair and Open Testing, a Cambridge group opposed to the MCAS exam, said the passing rates are inflated because the state uses 12th grade instead of the larger 10th-grade enrollments to calculate who passed.

''The public's not getting accountability if we get this dishonest information," said Guisbond, an analyst at FairTest. ''They're pretending that gaps are closing because of their policies, and they're reporting it based on ignoring the existence of all these kids. That's really wrong."

Enrollment typically falls between 10th and 12th grade because students drop out, move, or transfer to private schools.

Driscoll was traveling out of state and could not be reached for an interview. In the past, he has said that it is unfair to assume that the students who have left the class would have failed the MCAS and thus lowered the pass rate.

Anand Vaishnav can be reached at vaishnav@globe.com.