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Santos takes aim at achievement gap with WASL bill

Goal is to help all students stay in school, achieve academic success

February 9, 2009

The high-stakes test known as the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL) would no longer stand between high school students and their diplomas if legislation sponsored by Rep. Sharon Tomiko Santos (D – Seattle) is successful this year.

On February 4, Santos testified before the House Education Committee on why her bill would encourage more students to stay in school instead of dropping out. But she was very clear that the bill would not eliminate the WASL.

“It eliminates the high stakes nature of the test - something that only serves to hurt our students, not help them,” Santos said.

Santos participated in the WASL Work Group, a group of state representatives and senators who have spent the past year reviewing the WASL and drafting recommendations on how to improve it. They presented their recommendations to the Legislature last month.

One of the major concerns Santos has about the WASL as a graduation requirement is that disproportionate numbers of students of color and special needs students do not successfully pass the test. Data from the class of 2008 revealed further evidence of this “achievement gap.”

“There remains a persistent achievement gap that cannot be blamed on the students,” Santos said. “What it means is that we’ve neglected to provide them with what they need in order to be successful.”

In order to ensure that these particular students’ needs are factored in to any WASL revamp, Santos pushed to include specifically-targeted language in the work group’s recommendations. This includes requirements that the test be “culturally, linguistically, and cognitively relevant,” and that data be collected to enable critical analysis of test results by characteristics of gender, poverty, ethnicity and disability.

Santos’ bill has 14 House co-sponsors signed on to it. A companion bill sponsored by Sen. Rosemary McAuliffe is being considered in the Senate as well. Both bills have now had a public hearing; the Senate bill was moved by executive action to the Senate Rules Committee today.

The bill number is HB 1341.