State assessment scores explained

Eleventh-grade Maine Educational Assessment Test scores were released Sept. 17. According to the Department of Education, 13,900 high school juniors took the test last spring.

The list above shows individual high school scores for the six subjects in the test. The highest possible score is 400; the lowest possible score is 100.

Statewide average scores this year are: reading, 275; mathematics, 260; science, 265; social studies, 260; and the humanities, 265. Writing is not included because it has a fixed average that does not change over time.

The first column shows the name of each school and the total number of students tested in each school. Scores for the six subjects follow in columns across the page followed by a low-high score range.

A three-year average is included with each subject.

The writing score was excluded from scores for Stearns High School in Millinocket because of an administrative error. Randy Walker, director of the state Division of Assessment that coordinates the test, said a test administrator in one class at Stearns High School allowed students to choose their own writing topic from a list rather than requiring students to write on a specified topic as ordered in the test.

The mathematics score was eliminated at Deering High School in Portland after a “breach of security” was discovered, Walker said.

Walker said a teacher at the high school reportedly copied some questions from last year’s mathematics test and used the questions in drills before the test was administered.