Juniors improve English, math scores in state standardized test

By Rene H.

Every year students have to prepare for the state standardized test in subjects like math, science and English. How have CATS students’ scores changed over the past three years?

According to Mr. Albert Mandujano, testing coordinator, the Smarter Balanced Assessment ( SBA) is the test that demonstrates what juniors have learned in high school and shows whether they are prepared for college.  He said that the SBA is a series of three different tests, math, English and science, and that it is composed of 2 parts: an adaptive test and a performance test. 

He said, “I am happy to report that for the past 3 years our scores in math and English have been doubling especially, specifically with math but English has more than doubled, so we are actually on a roll.”

According to the data, which is attached below and was provided by Principal Sean Gosselin, scores have increased for both math and English since 2023.

For example, for the school year 2022-2023, only 8 percent of juniors exceeded the standard and 31 percent of students met the standard for English.

However this year, 20 percent of students exceeded the standard and 34 percent of students met the standard.

This shows that English scores have improved. The same goes for math.

In 2023, only 2 percent of juniors exceeded the standard and 11 percent met the standard. Three years later, in 2025 , 7 percent of students exceeded the standard and 16 percent met the standard.

Mr. Victor Dominguez, 11th grade English teacher said, “I prepared his students by using the Student Provided Playbook to help students practice.”

He also talks about how he gets his students ready for the SBAC .

He said,”I just make sure that the stuff that I go over in class is similar to what’s on the test, just to kind of kill two birds with one stone, so that I’m not overloading the kids.”

Even though he prepares students for the test, he has mixed feelings over the test itself and said it doesn’t necessarily fully capture what students know.

“I feel bad for them because they’re being tested all the time constantly day in day out, and then sometimes a test doesn’t really measure how much a kid has learned, and I feel like they’re going based off of these tests,” he said.

“Maybe they have a bad morning and they don’t do so well on the test, but in the classroom they’re actually really on it.”

Ms. Eden Nava, 11th grade math teacher, talked bout how she prepares her students for the SBA as well.

Like Mr. Dominguez, she said she used the SBA practice playbook to help her students for the math exam. But unlike him, this is the first time she administered the test.

“In order to adjust my teaching I’m going to use the data to see where our students are,” she said. “This is the first time that I teach algebra, too, so just seeing what we need to practice more in the skills will kind of help me align my course for next year.”

She had some advice for students who may be scared of the test.

“When testing, I feel like going with your gut and being confident. I feel like a lot of students tend to give up or they don’t believe in their mathematical abilities and that’s one of the most important things of and just in any tests, like, fake it to you make it right,” she said.