Eric.ed.gov – Readiness Matters! 2014-2015 Kindergarten Readiness Assessment

Maryland’s demanding new Kindergarten Readiness Assessment was administered statewide for the first time. Its results are revealing and sobering. Many states do not even check in any systematic way on their children’s readiness for kindergarten, and in previous years, Maryland used metrics based on modest expectations, outdated standards, and feel-good politics. With the leadership of State Superintendent Lillian Lowery and Assistant Superintendent Rolf Grafwallner, Maryland has brought a new sense of reality to the skills that five-year-olds should possess if they are truly prepared to succeed in kindergarten and the early grades. These span four domains, two of them cognitive (language, math), plus physical well-being (motor development, hygiene, etc.) and what they term “social foundations” (self-control, for example). The assessment is individually administered by kindergarten teachers and was given this year to all of the Old Line State’s sixty-seven thousand kindergartners. The results are sorted into three bands, politely labeled “demonstrating readiness,” “developing readiness,” and “emerging readiness.” But only the first of these means actually ready to succeed in kindergarten–and slightly fewer than half of Maryland’s entering kindergartners met that standard. Which is to say that more than half are not ready. This report candidly displays the results not just for the state as a whole, but also for each of Maryland’s twenty-four local districts–and further disaggregated in all the ways we have come to expect and demand in the NCLB era. There are gaps seen and often the gaps are alarmingly wide–by district, by race, by income, and more. Children who enter school without what they need to succeed in kindergarten are destined to have great difficulty catching up, even in schools that do their utmost. It is not impossible, but it is very hard. The following are appended: (1) Ready for Kindergarten: Maryland’s Kindergarten Readiness Assessment Common Language Standards Assessed; (2) Definitions and Presentation of School Readiness Information; (3) Individual Stakeholders, Group Participants and Testing Sites; and (4) Frequently Asked Questions.