2017 ISTEP Scores Expected To Be Released This Week

ISTEP scores from Spring 2017 are scheduled to be released Wednesday. The standardized exam is used to calculate a school’s state A-to-F accountability grade.

State officials say test results also be used to help schools better gauge students’ academic growth and how well they understand a subject.

Average statewide scores of the standardized test dropped dramatically in 2015 after a new type of test was given to students grades three to eight and grade 10.

In 2015 53.5 percent of students in grades three to eight passed both the English/Language Arts and math sections of the ISTEP — that was a plummet of nearly 20 percentage points from the previous year.

In 2016 the average pass rate decreased again at around 2 percentage points from the previous year.

Schools have already received test results for the 2017 exam taken by more than 400,000 Hoosier students.

The current version of the ISTEP exam will be given again, for the final time, this coming spring.

A new version of the standardized test — called ILEARN — is under development now for 2019.

The deadline for potential vendors to submit proposals for how they would design and administer the ILEARN was August 24. The new test will be adaptive — meaning, it will be completely online and test questions will change whether a student gets the current question right or wrong.