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My name is Dr. Kari McGann. I am the Superintendent of the Flemington-Raritan Regional School District. For over 30 years, I have served in education in the State of Florida and New Jersey...'
[N.B.: The GSCS website's formatting does not accurately reproduce the tables used in this testimony. For a copy of the testimony with tables, please email gscschools@gmail.com]
Date: August 7, 2024
Re: State Board Testimony NJQSAC Scoring
From: Kari McGann, Ed.D.
Superintendent of Schools
Flemington-Raritan Regional School District
kari.mcgann@frsd.us
My name is Dr. Kari McGann. I am the Superintendent of the Flemington-Raritan Regional School District.
For over 30 years, I have served in education in the State of Florida and New Jersey. I've called New Jersey
my home for over 25 years, moving to New Jersey from Florida after marrying my husband; a retired United
States Air Force Boom Operator, formerly stationed at New Jersey’s McGuire Air Force Base. We've raised
our four children in New Jersey, all of whom attended New Jersey's public schools. Our youngest daughter
will be a senior in high school for the 24-25 school year. I am a taxpayer, a parent of children educated in our
public school system, and an educator with over thirty years of experience.
I’ve been honored to be the Superintendent of Schools in Flemington-Raritan for six years. We are the
largest school district in Hunterdon County. We operate on a 79 million-dollar budget, supporting every
student, every day, every opportunity. Flemington-Raritan enrolls over thirty-two hundred pre-K through
grade 8 students. Table one (1) details the district's demographics in each school in the district.
● 21% economically disadvantaged students;
● 20% special education students;
● 9% multilingual learners.
Table 1
Flemington-Raritan’s enrollment continues to grow, especially in the number of multilingual students. In 2018,
when I began serving as superintendent, the district enrolled 120 multilingual students. In October of 2023, we
had 273 multilingual students; a 127% increase in 6 years.
Table 2
In addition to the sheer number of enrolled multilingual students, the district has seen a significant change in the
age when multilingual students enroll in our district. In 2018, the predominant age of multilingual students
enrolled in the district was between five and seven, students in grades kindergarten and grade one. In 2018, the
district enrolled only 22 students in grades five through eight. Table two (2) details the count of multilingual
students between October 2018 and October 2023 in grade levels kindergarten through grade eight.
Over the past three years, we have seen a shift. Families are moving to the community and enrolling their
children in our schools when their children are older; moving into the district predominately when their children
are in grades five through eight. Currently, there are 91 students in grades five through eight compared to only 22 students in 2018. This matters because the district has fewer years to provide a thorough and efficient
education before students are required to take a standardized academic state test.
Table 3
Table three (3) provides the specific number of students in each grade level enrolled in the district from October through October 2023 using the October 15th snapshot. The number of students enrolling in the District in grades 5 through 8 has grown significantly.
The current QSAC Instruction and Programming calculations penalize my district—and by extension our
students--based on factors that are beyond the District’s control. Subgroup weighting unfairly discriminates against low-income, high-diversity districts with high numbers of multilingual learners. The more diverse the district is, the more the scales are tipped against them when it comes to earning NJQSAC points.
The NJSLA Science Indicator is inequitably scored for K-8 school districts undergoing NJQSAC. Allow me to provide evidence of my claim. According to page 17 of the NJQSAC user manual, “Note: The minimum n-size for science proficiency must be 20 or greater in total student population for a school district to receive points for Indicator 3. If the minimum n-size is less than 20, the school district will receive all science indicator eligible points”
1
(“New Jersey Quality Single Accountability Continuum (NJQSAC) User Manual”)
If the minimum n-size is less than 20, means that if a district has less than 20 total student population in the science testing grades of 5 and 8, that district receives all science indicator points. In high school, there are zero points required to be earned, even though students in eleventh grade take an NJSLA science test. Larger K-8 school districts are being held to much higher standards.
According to the state assessment results posted publicly on the NJDOE website, Hampton Borough School District is listed as having 17 valid scores for the 5th grade NJSLA-Science in 22-23, less than 6 of those 17 are multilingual students. Of those 17 scores, the mean score is 157, and the percentage of students who scored a level 3 or 4 was 11.8% (New Jersey Department of Education)2 . Hampton Borough School District has a minimum n-size is less than 20, therefore the district receives full points on the point value science achievement score, a total of 10 points, despite the percentage of students who scored a level three or four for the achievement growth of the overall student population.
Lebanon Borough School District is listed as having 16 valid scores for the 5th-grade NJSLA- Science in 22-23, less than 6 of those 16 are multilingual students. Of those 16, the mean score was 175, and the percentage of students who scored a level 3 or 4 was 37.6% (New Jersey Department of Education)3
.Lebanon Borough School District has a minimum n-size is less than 20, therefore the district receives full points on the point value science achievement score, a total of 10 points, despite the percentage of students who scored a level three or four or the achievement growth of the overall student population.
Meanwhile, the 5th-grade NJSLA-Science Assessment in Flemington Raritan is listed as having 359 valid
scores for the 5th grade, 40 of those students are multilingual students. Of those 359, 40.9% of students scored at a level 3 or 4, higher than both previous examples. In addition, the mean score was 184, also higher than Lebanon Borough and Hampton Borough (New Jersey Department of Education)4
.Table four (4) demonstrates how Flemington Raritan has a larger number of students that are identified as multilingual learners, a higher mean score, and a higher number of students scoring at level 3 or 4 on the 5th grade NJSLA Science assessment than two other comparative districts, yet Flemington-Raritan receives less points on NJQSAC Science Indicator three (3). Despite having an overall higher mean score and percentage of students achieving a level 3 or higher than either of the two districts mentioned, the Flemington-Raritan Regional School District was awarded only 3.1 points for science indicator points on the NJQSAC. This is counterintuitive and does not make sense.
If Flemington-Raritan was a K-12 school district we would have only had five (5) points as a point value for the Instruction and Programming calculated district score. In a 9-12 district like Hunterdon Central or South Hunterdon High School School District, zero (0) points are dedicated as a point value on NJQSAC. All high school districts do not get evaluated on Indicator 3 science achievement at all.
School District Number of Valid 5th-grade NJSLA-Science Scores
Number of
multilingual
students
Percentage of
students
scored at a
level 3 or 4
The mean
score on
5th-grade
NJSLA-Scien
ce
# of points scored on the
NJQSAC Science
Indicator
Hampton Borough
School District
17 *(less than six) 11.8% 157 10 points
Lebanon Borough
School District
16 *(less than six) 37.6% 175 10 points
Flemington Raritan 359 40 40.9% 184 3.1 points
Table 4
My testimony today provides evidence that K-8 districts with an n value greater than 20 in terms of the overall science achievement indicator are disproportionately harmed by current NJQSAC scoring in Instruction and Programming. The three examples I provided today only begin to demonstrate how K-8 districts are disproportionately harmed by current NJQSAC scoring in Instruction and Programming.
The New Jersey Department of Education introduced amendments to be made with its re-adoption of the
evaluation of the performance of school districts. I greatly appreciate the steps that are taken in the right
direction because they have put an increased emphasis on student growth and acknowledge the overemphasis of the science assessment. The proposed changes offer more balance to the evaluation, focusing on growth.
A K-8 school district's science achievement score is comprised of the overall performance of the proficiency rates of all students in a school district. Additionally, a K-8 school district’s science achievement score is comprised of the district’s subgroup performance-- the proficiency rate of all students' subgroups, thereby double counting students in subgroups, such as multilingual learners.
Accountability is useful and necessary, but only when it accurately reflects student growth. It is within the State Board’s power to ensure that changes to Chapter 30 reflect that.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak today and share with you a few examples of evidence that K-8 districts with an n value greater than 20 in terms of the overall science achievement indicator are disproportionately harmed by current NJQSAC scoring in Instruction and Programming.
I’d like to thank Flemington-Raritan’s math & science supervisor, Mrs. Kristen Wolf, for her expertise and
gathering the data that I’m sharing today.
