KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — The Tennessee Department of Education said as of Monday they received 9,205 appeal requests so far after third-graders across the state took the Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program exam.
They previously said around 60% of all students who took the exam failed to meet expectations on the test's ELA portion. To avoid retention, students had a choice to retake the test, enroll in summer school or advance to the fourth grade with a tutor assigned to them.
Parents and guardians also had a choice to file an appeal with the TDOE to make sure students could avoid retention or having to go through additional learning programs, as long as their student received an "approaching" score on the TCAP exam. Around 25% of third-graders scored "below" on the exam across the state, meaning they would not be eligible to appeal the score.
The TDOE said they received 9,205 appeal forms representing 8,206 unique students. Out of all those requests, they said granted appeals to 6,698 unique students. They denied the appeal for 642 students, and 434 were still being processed. They also said 432 appeal forms did not apply because students were not eligible.
"I received an email from the principal saying that I could appeal, and then I told her that I had already filed an appeal with the state," Kristin Corbitt, a mother, said. "She checked with the state and the state had told her that there was no appeal filed under my daughter's name or her state ID number."
A timeline showing the window families have to appeal the scores is available on the TDOE's website. They have between May 30 and June 30 to submit an appeal.
The state's appeals process is only open to students who received a score at or above the 40th percentile on their spring universal reading screener, or if a "catastrophic situation" occurred during the days leading up to the TCAP exam that impacted the student's ability to perform well.
"Some schools are filling out the appeals for their child," Corbitt said. "Some schools have already released some of the information to the kids about their test scores when they retook the test. Can we make it uniform, if we're going to do this? Make it as uniform as we possibly can make it, because people who met this might have some of their test scores where others of us won't have it till the middle of July."
Families should receive their final retention notification on June 24 if they did not participate in summer camp or opt for tutoring during the fourth grade. Families that chose to either go through summer camp but did not meet expectations there, such as maintaining a good attendance record, will receive a final retention notification on July 14.
Corbitt was able to sort out her appeal and her daughter was granted the appeal. In the meantime, she had already enrolled into summer school.
"She's going to remain at summer school because they only have two more weeks left," Corbitt said. "So, what's the point of pulling her out of summer school now that we're already halfway into it."
