The use of the TAAS High School Exit Exam

Introduction to the Issues

The Texas Education Agency (TEA) is implementing invalid discriminatory standardized tests as requirements for high school graduation.

Under state law, the TEA denies diplomas to Mexican American and African American students at a rate significantly higher than that of Anglo students, without sufficient proof that use of the tests will enhance the education or life opportunities of students.

The method of using this test, called the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills (TAAS) exit test, results in significant and irreparable reduction in the ranks of Mexican American and African American high school graduates. This is occurring and will continue in light of an already high minority drop-out rate.

The method of using this test violates a variety of United States Constitutional, statutory and regulatory provisions, as well as fundamental fairness. The implementation of the TAAS exit test in a state with Texas' history of discrimination is particularly counterproductive and violates the orders of the Court in U.S. v. Texas.

Official Documents

Legal Document filed to the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas San Antonio Division detailing the complaint

Full Document

Newspaper Articles

5/20/98; Access Waco News

By JEN SANSBURY, Tribune-Herald staff writer

http://www.accesswaco.com/news/1210.html

• About 2,900 elementary and middle school students in Waco are in danger of being held back this year because of their projected performances on standardized tests, Superintendent Rosanne Stripling testified Tuesday in state district court. But about half of them would be promoted based on report card grades alone, Stripling said, and a higher percentage of minority students than white students are likely to be retained. In a full courtroom Tuesday afternoon, Judge Alan Mayfield listened to about three hours of testimony in a hearing on whether to dismiss a lawsuit that contends test scores should not be used to determine whether to promote students to the next grade level.

05/01/98; Houston Chronicle Interactive

http://www.chron.com/cgi-bin/auth/story.mpl/content/chronicle/metropolitan/98/05/01/taas-scores.2-0.html

• A record percentage of Texas 10th-graders have cleared one major hurdle to graduation -- passage of the high school exit level test --state education officials announced Thursday. Of the 220,085 sophomores who took the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills test in March, 72 percent, or 158,958, passed all three portions of the exam. The passing rate is up 5 percentage points from 1997 and 20 percentage points from 1994.

03/24/31;  Houston Chronicle Interactive

http://www.chron.com/cgi-bin/auth/story.mpl/content/chronicle/metropolitan/98/03/24/testscores.2-1.html

• Numerous HISD schools that were rated exemplary by the state last year had students who performed below grade level on the fall-administered Stanford Achievement Test, a new study shows. George Scott, president of the Tax Research Association, said many of the schools that did well on the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills performed poorly on the national standardized test given by the Houston Independent School District. The Stanford Achievement Test, the first national standardized test given to HISD students in four years, measures how students in the district compare to students representing the national norm. Results were released in December.

03/12/98; Houston Chronicle Interactive
By Carlos Byars

http://www.chron.com:80/cgi-bin/auth/story.mpl/content/chronicle/page1/98/03/13/schools.2-0.html

• In a dramatic move to improve academic performance, Houston school Superintendent Rod Paige said Thursday he wants to end the practice of exempting some students from standardized testing. Paige said he will ask the Houston Independent School District board to approve the measure. The district and the state rank schools' academic performance in part on students' scores on the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills test. But state law allows districts to exempt special education students and students with limited English proficiency from the final calculation of a school's rating.

03/08/98; The Denver Post Online
By Carlos Illescas; Denver Post Education Writer

http://www.denverpost.com:80/news/news2343.htm

• March 8 - Throughout Texas schools, teachers are leading cheers and shaking pompons at pep rallies. One principal recently climbed atop her school's roof to lead a chorus of the macarena. At other schools, students and faculty wear pins that say, "Beat the TAAS.'' The enthusiasm isn't over some sports championship. It's test time. The Texas Assessment of Academic Skills - TAAS - is here. A serious matter. Schools throughout the Lone Star State are gearing up for Texas' version of the reading and writing test that Colorado students are taking this month. In Texas, one of the first states in the country to institute a series of statewide assessments based on assigned standards, pep rallies and wacky antics by principals are some of the ways educators try to motivate students. "People take that test very seriously around here because it is compared statewide,'' said Loretta Simon, spokeswoman for the Dallas school district. "Everyone wants to do well because so many things are tied to it.'' Indeed, there is a lot riding on the results - for students, teachers, schools and school districts.

02/11/98;  Houston Chronicle Interactive

http://www.chron.com/cgi-bin/auth/story.mpl/content/chronicle/metropolitan/98/02/11/taas-tests.2-0.html

• More than 16,000 Texas high school seniors face the prospect of not graduating this spring because they still have not passed one or more portions of the state's mandatory exit test, education officials said Tuesday. State officials note, however, that the failure rate is about 8 percentage points lower than the previous year, and, for the first time, students who have failed the exit-level Texas Assessment of Academic Skills will be provided a study guide to help them pass on the next try.

10/22/97; Education Week on the Web

http://www.edweek.org/htbin/fastweb?getdoc+view4+ew1997+1670+0+wAAA+%26%28Discrimination%26Claimed%26In%26Texas%26Exit-Exam%26Lawsuit%29%26AND%26%28Discrimination%26Claimed%26In%26Texas%26Exit-Exam%26Lawsuit%29%3AKEYWORDS%26OR%26%28Discrimination%26Claime

• In the latest challenge to the use of standardized tests as gatekeepers to high school graduation, a Hispanic advocacy group last week sued Texas over what it claims is the state's "invalid, discriminatory" exit test. The suit filed Oct. 14 in U.S. District Court in San Antonio by the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund asks the court to stop the use of the high school graduation test as a requirement for earning a diploma. Albert H. Kauffman, the lawyer representing seven minority students who failed the test, said thetest's discriminatory effects are clear. Four of the students would have graduated this past spring, and one in 1993. The suit does not specify when the others were on track to graduate.

10/16/97; Houston Chronicle Interactive

http://www.chron.com/cgi-bin/auth/story/content/chronicle/metropolitan/97/10/16/bush.2-0.html 

• Gov. George W. Bush strongly defended the TAAS test on Wednesday, one day after a Hispanic civil rights group filed a federal lawsuit challenging the state's use of the exam as a requirement for high school graduation. MALDEF, in a class-action lawsuit filed in federal district court in San Antonio on Tuesday, said that biases against Hispanics and blacks make them more likely than Anglos to fail the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills.

10/15/97; Austin American-Statesman

http://www.Austin360.com/news/10oct/15/taas/taas15.htm

• Texas' high-stakes high school graduation test, which all seniors must pass to receive their diplomas, discriminates against blacks and Mexican Americans, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday by a civil rights group. "This test ... has particularly negative effects on minority students, who have long received a substandard education," said Al Kauffman, regional counsel for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which filed the suit in federal court in San Antonio on behalf of seven unidentified plaintiffs.

10/15/97; Houston Chronicle Interactive

http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/page1/97/10/15/taas.html 

• Labeling the TAAS test discriminatory and invalid, a prominent Hispanic civil rights organization Tuesday challenged in federal court the state's use of the standardized high school exit exam. In a class-action lawsuit against Texas, the Texas Education Agency and the State Board of Education, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund argues that biases against Hispanics and blacks make them more likely than Anglos to fail the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills. The seven individual plaintiffs, most of whom are from San Antonio, also allege the test is a poor indicator of educational or life success.

5/26/97 - The Houston Chronicle

http://www.chron.com/cgi-bin/auth/story/content/chronicle/page1/97/05/27/taas.html

• HISD elementary and middle-school students are showing steady, across-the-board improvement on the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills, officials said Monday. The test results will be the prime factor in rating schools later this summer as either exemplary, recognized, acceptable or low-performing.

04/21/97 - The Houston Chronicle

http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/metropolitan/97/04/22/taas.2-0.html

• A record 67 percent of sophomores passed on their first try at the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills, anexam they must conquer before receiving a high school diploma. Education Commissioner Mike Moses applauded the 10th-graders' performance in announcing the figures Monday. Sophomores who did not pass have another seven tries before graduation.

04/18/97 - The Houston Chronicle

http://www.chron.com/content/chronicle/page1/97/04/19/taas.html

• About 55 percent of HISD's sophomores -- up from 45 percent last year -- passed all portions of the high school exit exam on their first try this spring. "Specifically, we think the results are dramatic -- improvement in writing, reading and mathematics all across the district," said Houston school Superintendent Rod Paige. All students must pass the three-part Texas Assessment of Academic Skills before they can graduate.

Web sites relevant to the TAAS Case

Back to CTEST Home Page

Back to Spotlight Issues

Back to top