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Pennsylvania DOE Removes Scores from School Performance Profiles Website

Secretary of Education Pedro Rivera sent a message to the superintendents of all 500 school districts saying the academic performance data for the profiles will be suppressed for "further review."

(TNS) -- Harrisburg, Pa. -- The Pennsylvania Department of Education has pulled school performance scores off its website over concerns of the "accuracy and reliability" of the data.

The department last week released its latest School Performance Profiles, which rate all schools across the state based on standardized tests scores and other factors.

On Wednesday afternoon, Secretary of Education Pedro Rivera sent a message to the superintendents of all 500 school districts saying the academic performance data for the profiles will be suppressed for "further review." The Reading Eagle obtained a copy of the message, which was sent to districts just after 2:30 p.m.

The problem occurred with the growth measure portion of the profile scores, according to department press secretary Nicole Reigelman.

Reigelman said the Pennsylvania Value Added Assessment system scores - which track students' academic growth - had "acuracy issues" and caused some schools to get incorrect scores. She said a small number of schools will see a modest change in their scores when the problem is resolved.

The issue affected only schools that administer the Keystone Exams, Reigelman said. The Keystone Exams are end-of-course tests whose scores are counted whe students are in 11th grade.

Reigelman said the department is in the process of notifying all stakeholders - school administrators, teachers, policymakers and the public - about the situation.

"Supporting our schools, students and communities is the Department of Education's top priority, and we know collecting, synthesizing, and releasing accurate data is essential in meeting that objective," she said Wednesday evening. "The department takes these issues seriously and believes a swift and transparent response best serves our schools and communities."

By 3:30 p.m. Wednesday, the academic performance data had disappeared from the profile website.

Clicking on the academic performance tab at first resulted in the following message:

"Due to an error in the data reported to the department, a building level academic score is not available at this time. The department of education is working with the district to make corrections to the data used to calculate an SPP and should be available within 90 days."

It was later changed to read:

"The academic performance tab has been temporarily removed by the Pennsylvania Department Education for a review of data integrity. We will restore this page upon completion of that review."

In Rivera's message to superintendents, he said the department will hold three meetings over the next two days at locations across the state. Thursday's meeting will be in Malvern, while ones on Friday will be in Harrisburg and Pittsburgh.

The purpose of the meetings, open only to superintendents, is to provide additional background on the situation.

This is not the first time there has been an issue with the performance profiles.

The initial release of the new system in 2013 was delayed for four days to give schools more time to review the department's data. And when those first profiles were finally released, they were not available for several schools.

Those missing scores - representing about 20 percent of schools across the state - were due to the schools reporting that their data were incorrect or incomplete. The scores were included on the website about two months after the initial release of scores.

©2016 the Reading Eagle (Reading, Pa.) Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.