By Holly Heller Staff Writer
BREMEN —  There is more than one way to interpret ISTEP+ scores. And for Bremen Public Schools, there is good news and bad news, depending on how you look at it.
“We look at the information in several different ways,” explained Russ Mikel, Bremen Superintendent of Schools.
There’s the traditional way of tallying up the percentage of students who pass the test at each grade level. Another way is to look at mean scale scores, which track a group of students as they progress through the grade levels.

“I try to look at it from both perspectives,” Mikel said.
Looking solely at the percentages of students passing, Bremen’s scores for grades 3 to 10 are inconsistent.
“They’re up in some areas, down in others, if you compare to a year ago,” Mikel said. “But we’re talking about comparing different groups of kids. When you look at ISTEP percentages, they’re comparing, for example, different third grade groups. That may show signs of curriculum issues. There’s some valid information to look at there.”
This year, scores were below the state average in language arts for three grade levels. In math, four grade levels scored below the state average. These results do not meet the goals established by the school corporation.
“Hopefully, we’re at least at the state average or above and hopefully we improve,” Mikel said.
There is good news, though.
“If I look at the scale scores and compare the same group of kids, the kids have improved at every level,” Mikel said. “We look at the same group of kids as they go through the system. We try to track them and look at the same group of kids over a number of years. We look at three, four, five years of data.”
Mikel noted that looking at scale scores paints a more accurate picture of student improvement for all students — not just those who pass the test.
“We may have a student who had a score of 200 last year, have a score of 300 this year, but it’s not going to show up because he didn’t make the 400 cut-off score,” he explained. “We try to look at all kids if we can.”
Now that the ISTEP+ data has been analyzed by the superintendent and administrators, they will meet and compare information.
“Then they’ll do the same thing with their staff. Have their staff analyze the data and share information. They’ll look at the areas and identify strengths and areas of improvement. They’ll look at the school improvement plan and make any changes or adjustments. That’s based on goals and there’s an action plan tied to the goal.”
An official report will be presented to the school board in January.