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Calvary Academy Blog

CALVARY ACADEMY
Achievement and Ability Tests
2007

*printable version

As a Calvary parent, you know that each student yearly takes part in a series of standardized tests. This letter will help you gain a clear understanding of your child’s Stanford Achievement Test Series, Tenth Edition report. Our school administration and teachers carefully review each student’s test results, and we believe that it is very important for parents to understand the scores. The report contains valuable information about your child, and it can help you to identify your child’s academic strengths and weaknesses. Therefore, we offer the following explanation for the categories and numbers found on your student’s score report. If you have further questions after reading this letter, please contact the school office.

REPORT DIVISION

The report is divided into three general parts: the upper left (percentile ranks, stanines, and grade equivalents), the upper right (percentile bands), and the bottom (content clusters). These sections present much of the same types of information, but they do so in different formats and with varying degrees of precision. 

UPPER LEFT 

Number of Items: The number of questions on a particular test or sub-test of the Stanford Achievement Test.

Raw Score: The number of correct answers on a particular test or sub-test.

Scaled Score: A statistical conversion of the raw score.

Natl PR-S: National percentile rank and stanine. Percentile ranks represent a nationwide grouping of students into ranks from one (the lowest) to 99 (the highest), with the 50^th percentile being average. Stanines represent a nationwide grouping into nine groups from one (the lowest) to nine (the highest), with 4^th through 6^th being average.

ACSI PR-S: Compares the student’s scores to results of students attending other member schools of the Association of Christian Schools International rather than to nationwide scores (which include public, Christian, and secular private schools).

Grade Equiv: Stands for grade equivalent. This score is often misunderstood and misused since some people assume it means the student is working on a particular grade level. In reality, it means that the average student on the indicated grade level would have made the score your child made on that particular sub-test. As an example, a fifth grader might score 9.6 (ninth grade, sixth month) on a math sub-test. This does not mean he could skip four grades and successfully resume his math studies in ninth grade math. It does mean that the average ninth grade student would have made the same grade your child did on that part of the fifth grade achievement test. Therefore, it is never recommended that a student be moved up a grade or more based on achievement test scores. PHS means “post high school” or beyond the range of the test.

AAC Range: Calvary students in first, third, fifth and seventh grades also take the Otis-Lennon School Ability Test. When a student has taken the Otis-Lennon School Ability Test (see explanation of this test below) along with the Stanford Achievement Test this column will be filled in. AAC means Ability-Achievement Comparison. If “Middle” is written, this means that the student’s ability (capacity for school learning) and achievement (the amount of school learning that has taken place) are about the same in the sub-test indicated. In other words, the student is working up to his or her level of ability, If “High” is written, this means that, in the sub-test indicated, the student’s achievement is actually above what would be expected. If “Low” is written, this means that, in the sub-test indicated, the student’s achievement is not as high as may be expected.

The Otis-Lennon School Ability Test (OLSAT) assesses verbal and nonverbal reasoning abilities related to success in school. Tasks such as detecting likenesses and differences, recalling words and numbers, defining words, following directions, classifying, establishing sequence, solving arithmetic problems, and completing analogies are included in the OLSAT. All of these have been shown to be valid measures of an individual’s ability to reason logically. In addition to percentile and stanine scores on the OLSAT, the student also receives a School Ability Index (SAI) score. The SAI has an average of 100 and is an indicator of a student’s standing relative to his or her age peers.

Upper Right

National percentile bands represent the range of achievement your child demonstrated, whereas a percentile rank represents a specific point on the scale. The bands project that on a re-test of the same material, your child’s score would most likely fall within the range of scores included in the band.

Bottom Half

Here you will find Content Clusters. Content Clusters contain the following data:

RS (Raw Score): The number of correct answers on a particular test or sub-test.

NP (Number Possible): The total number of questions on a particular test or sub-test.

NA (Number Answered): The number of questions answered by the student on a particular test or sub-test.

Checkmarks: A check is placed in one of the three columns labeled “below average”, “average”, or “above average”. This section is most helpful in pinpointing how well the student has done in specific parts of a sub-test (thus enabling teachers and parents to determine if there are remedial topics which need to be addressed).

Explanatory Note

It is not uncommon for Christian school students to score high on Reading sub-tests and low on Environment sub-tests in the early grades (1^st through 2^nd). Please do not be alarmed if this is true of your child, since it is normal when teachers in Christian schools strongly emphasize reading skills rather than social sciences at this level. Nearly all Christian school students are on or above grade level in social sciences by the 3^rd grade and move upward in percentile and grade equivalent scores in social science tests as they advance in grades.

Also, we at Calvary are much farther ahead of public school students in reading and math skills. The goal often stated by the U.S. President and legislators that, “students should be able to read by third grade,” has little meaning when all of our students are reading by the end of kindergarten unless they are facing learning challenges.

Final Word

Please keep in mind that achievement and school ability tests are only one measure of a student’s academic progress. Class grades, general alertness and response, and personal observation by parents and teachers are also valid indicators of learning ability and academic achievement. Parents should not be overly alarmed if a child does not score as high as may be expected on achievement and ability tests. Some students simply do not test well (they tend to “freeze up” on tests). Others seem to test beyond their capability. These students might be called “over achievers.” Please keep standardized test scores in their proper perspective. They do give an indication of how well a child is doing, but they are not the final and only measurement of academic ability and/or achievement.