Do you allow SOL retakes?

[Anonymous]

I would. This week I asked for child to be excused and it postponed a week or two as grandparent was going to pass and was told no. Except they were not offering a retake. Grandma died the night before the test.

[Anonymous]

I probably would allow it.
There is no way my kid wouldn’t know he failed unless I blatantly lied to him. The kids know what score us passing, and my kid would ask what his score was, want to see the report, etc. He would also be stressed about having failed (no matter what we said to him) and want to fix it, if possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. For ES, SOL’s do not affect class placement. Even my 5th grader, headed to MS, has already been placed for next year.

It may not technically affect class placement, but you can bet the faculty will have full knowledge of which kids failed, and their class and homework, types of pull outs, etc. will all be impacted by that knowledge.

Not totally true.
-teacher

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. For ES, SOL’s do not affect class placement. Even my 5th grader, headed to MS, has already been placed for next year.

Our school does use it to determine lowest and middle math group and whether to bump anyone to level 4. It's also a data point used to determine if a kid should take Math 7 or Math 7 honors.

OP here. I’m in LCPS which sadly has NO classroom differentiation, except reading groups which are done by DRA, not SOL. There is a 1 day/week gifted program in 4th and 5th that my daughter does, but it’s based on Cogat/nnat, not SOL. And all of her classes for next year (6th) were recommended/confirmed in February, well before even the original SOL test date.

I teach at an LCPS ES. There is indeed classroom differentiation. There are classrooms that are primarily EL, SPED, advanced, etc. We just can’t call it that, but you can tell by the support teachers who do (or don’t) serve each room. It’s also fairly obvious by the concentration of students in each classroom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our ES has us sign a form in advance of testing saying if we will allow our student to take an SOL retake if they qualify (miss it by only a little.) I always say no because I don’t want my child missing instructional time just to boost the school’s pass rate. If my child didn’t pass, well then she didn’t pass.

Do others actually allow retakes? If so, why?

No. If my child fails the SOL that means the school is failing my child. No retake.

Do you blame your dentist when you get a cavity? smh

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our ES has us sign a form in advance of testing saying if we will allow our student to take an SOL retake if they qualify (miss it by only a little.) I always say no because I don’t want my child missing instructional time just to boost the school’s pass rate. If my child didn’t pass, well then she didn’t pass.

Do others actually allow retakes? If so, why?

No. If my child fails the SOL that means the school is failing my child. No retake.

Do you blame your dentist when you get a cavity? smh

The analogy doesn’t work. The dentist is not in your home on a daily basis, monitoring what you eat and when and how well you brush your teeth. A teacher is with your child day in and day out and should be instructing them well enough so they can pass the SOL. Of course there are the extremes, like kids with severe learning disabilities who may fail, but an average kid should be able to pass. Yes, I would blame the teacher if my average kid (with no disabilities) failed.

[Anonymous]

Teacher here. I work very hard throughout the year to develop a love of reading in my students AND teach them how to take the reading SOL. We teach them to highlight, re-read, take notes on the passages and write down the answers and the paragraph number where they found the answer. I teach songs and raps to remind them how to identify author’s purpose, separate fact from opinion, and remember affixes. It requires an incredible amount of work to make learning how to take a test enjoyable and somewhat meaningful for the kids. Despite all this, there are always a few very capable kids who don’t take the test seriously. They don’t re-read to find answers. They finish a multi-passage test in fifteen minutes. There is absolutely NOTHING I can do. The state does not allow me to say “slow down” (or anything else) during the test. There are no repercussions for the student. 40% of my evaluation is based on how students do on this test. I’m very thankful that my principal is reasonable and understands all this, and that my husband has a great job and our financial livelihood doesn’t depend on mine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our ES has us sign a form in advance of testing saying if we will allow our student to take an SOL retake if they qualify (miss it by only a little.) I always say no because I don’t want my child missing instructional time just to boost the school’s pass rate. If my child didn’t pass, well then she didn’t pass.

Do others actually allow retakes? If so, why?

No. If my child fails the SOL that means the school is failing my child. No retake.

Do you blame your dentist when you get a cavity? smh

The analogy doesn’t work. The dentist is not in your home on a daily basis, monitoring what you eat and when and how well you brush your teeth. A teacher is with your child day in and day out and should be instructing them well enough so they can pass the SOL. Of course there are the extremes, like kids with severe learning disabilities who may fail, but an average kid should be able to pass. Yes, I would blame the teacher if my average kid (with no disabilities) failed.

You can present them with a wonderful buffet, but you can’t make them eat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. For ES, SOL’s do not affect class placement. Even my 5th grader, headed to MS, has already been placed for next year.

It may not technically affect class placement, but you can bet the faculty will have full knowledge of which kids failed, and their class and homework, types of pull outs, etc. will all be impacted by that knowledge.

Not totally true.
-teacher

In middle school and high school, failing the previous year's SOL can affect class placement because students can lose an elective so they can be enrolled in a remediation class instead. So it does matter if they fail an SOL, especially reading, writing, or math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here. I work very hard throughout the year to develop a love of reading in my students AND teach them how to take the reading SOL. We teach them to highlight, re-read, take notes on the passages and write down the answers and the paragraph number where they found the answer. I teach songs and raps to remind them how to identify author’s purpose, separate fact from opinion, and remember affixes. It requires an incredible amount of work to make learning how to take a test enjoyable and somewhat meaningful for the kids. Despite all this, there are always a few very capable kids who don’t take the test seriously. They don’t re-read to find answers. They finish a multi-passage test in fifteen minutes. There is absolutely NOTHING I can do. The state does not allow me to say “slow down” (or anything else) during the test. There are no repercussions for the student. 40% of my evaluation is based on how students do on this test. I’m very thankful that my principal is reasonable and understands all this, and that my husband has a great job and our financial livelihood doesn’t depend on mine.

I’m thinking of elementary school level SOLs, FYI. I think they are super easy to pass for most kids.

[Anonymous]

Former AAP teacher here...we did very little actual SOL prep for reading. These kids were already strong readers. We focused on novels all year, met in groups, had actual book discussions. My curriculum didn’t match the SOL test at all. And yet my kids mostly received pass advanced. What I see today is sad. All the kids do now in reading class is read passages, highlight, and answer multiple choice questions. It’s truly become about teaching to the test.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our ES has us sign a form in advance of testing saying if we will allow our student to take an SOL retake if they qualify (miss it by only a little.) I always say no because I don’t want my child missing instructional time just to boost the school’s pass rate. If my child didn’t pass, well then she didn’t pass.

Do others actually allow retakes? If so, why?

No. If my child fails the SOL that means the school is failing my child. No retake.

Do you blame your dentist when you get a cavity? smh

The analogy doesn’t work. The dentist is not in your home on a daily basis, monitoring what you eat and when and how well you brush your teeth. A teacher is with your child day in and day out and should be instructing them well enough so they can pass the SOL. Of course there are the extremes, like kids with severe learning disabilities who may fail, but an average kid should be able to pass. Yes, I would blame the teacher if my average kid (with no disabilities) failed.

You can present them with a wonderful buffet, but you can’t make them eat.

This is true. Kids have to be within 25 points of passing in order to be offered a retake. There are other factors that can cause them to fall within that range even if they normally would have performed well. A fight with a friend, not feeling well, etc., can be distractions that keep a child from doing their best. I would at least talk with my child to see if they thought they could pass it and see if he/she wanted another shot at being successful.

[Anonymous]

How soon after taking the SOL are parents of kids in the retake zone notified? Is it same day, next day, or possibly a week or two later (for tests completed early in the SOL window)?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How soon after taking the SOL are parents of kids in the retake zone notified? Is it same day, next day, or possibly a week or two later (for tests completed early in the SOL window)?

It’s usually same day, or by the end of the week that they took the test. So if they took the test on a Tuesday, you would know by Friday of that week at the latest.

[Anonymous]

Unless it's a high school verified credit, I wouldn't.