Arkansas DOE Clarifies PARCC Scoring Levels.

The Arkansas Democrat Gazette (10/14) reports that the Arkansas Commissioner Johnny Key on Tuesday discussed “the scoring levels that will be applied to” PARCC tests, saying that “score information from the department last week ‘left a misleading impression that Arkansas was backing away from high standards’” on the exams. The piece reports that Key was responding to media reports indicating that “Arkansas and Ohio had redefined what it meant to be ‘proficient’ on the tests.”         The Washington Post (10/15, Brown) reports that Arkansas officials said “they never meant to define proficiency in a way that would inflate student performance.” Key is quoted saying, “Upon review of the communication regarding the release of scores from the PARCC assessment, it is apparent that we used language that left a misleading impression that Arkansas was backing away from high standards. Nothing could be further from the truth.”