Prairie State Wire

Illinois State Board of Education Education Policy Planning Committee of the Whole met May 13.

Here are the minutes provided by the committee:

1. Roll Call

Committee Chair Dr. Donna Leak brought the meeting to order at 2:32 p.m. Roll call was taken. A quorum was present, with five members attending in person. State Superintendent Dr. Tony Sanders also was in attendance.

Chair Leak stated that members would consider the participation of Laura Gonzalez via video conference due to employment purposes. In accordance with the bylaws of the Illinois State Board of Education, the Board may permit a member to participate by other means if they cannot physically attend a meeting because of employment purposes.

Dr. Jonah Rice moved that the State Board of Education permit the participation of Ms. Gonzalez via video conference. Dr. Patricia Nugent seconded the motion, and it passed by a unanimous roll call vote.

Members Present

Committee Chair Dr. Donna Leak

Dr. Steven Isoye

Dr. Sherly Chavarria

Laura Gonzalez (virtual)

Dr. Patricia Nugent

Dr. Jonah Rice

Members Absent

Dr. James Anderson

Staff Present

Dr. Tony Sanders, State Superintendent

Kim Clarke, Executive Assistant to the State Superintendent

Jo Ireland, Board Services Coordinator

Isabel Schoeman, Special Assistant to the State Superintendent

Kristen Kennedy, Chief Legal Officer

Dr. Kimako Patterson, Chief of Staff

Dr. Matt Seaton, Chief Financial Officer

Tassi Maton, Chief Internal Audit Officer

Edobor Efam, Chief Information Officer

Dr. Jason Helfer, Chief Education Officer – Instruction

Jennifer Saba, Chief Education Officer – Operations

Irma Snopek, Chief Policy and Communications Officer

Miguel Calderon, Chief Operating Officer

Rae Clementz, Executive Director of Data, Assessment and Accountability

Kirsten Parr, Director of Standards and Instruction

Dr. Tiffany Burnett, Executive Director of Safe and Healthy Climate (virtual)

Dr. Ronda Dawson, Executive Director of Teaching and Learning

2. Public Participation

There was no public participation.

3. Approval of Minutes: April 15, 2025

Ms. Gonzalez moved that the Education Policy Planning Committee of the Whole hereby approve the April 15, 2025, meeting minutes. Dr. Isoye seconded the motion, and it passed by a unanimous roll call vote.

4. Discussion | Assessment Update

Rae Clementz, executive director of Data, Assessment and Accountability, discussed an update on assessment. She announced that spring assessments are now complete. She explained that the correction window is opening this week and will remain open until Aug. 22, during which time schools will review and confirm student enrollment records, explain cases where students did not take assessments that were expected of them, and address duplicate or missing records. The result will be final participation data that aligns enrollment numbers with test score files, which will be necessary to provide updated data for testing vendors. Ms. Clementz then discussed the April ACT outage and reminded the Board that students affected by the outage were allowed to test on another date or move their assessment to the next testing window. She added that ACT provided vouchers for affected students to retake the test on a national test date in June or July, allowing them the chance to earn a college-reportable score under potentially more favorable circumstances. Ms. Clementz noted that there are some concerns about seats available for students with vouchers, especially for those doing online testing. To address this, ACT is expanding the number of seats at existing national testing sites in June and July, allowing schools to serve as unlisted test sites open to their own students and permitting these schools to potentially offer online testing with proctor costs covered by ACT. Ms. Clementz noted that this is the first year that ACT is offering online testing nationally, so spots filled up very quickly, and sites were required to provide their own secure devices. ACT will continue to work with ISBE to address these challenges. Chair Leak thanked Ms. Clementz for the update and said she was pleased to hear about the accommodations provided by ACT.

5. Superintendent’s Consent Agenda – May 14, 2025

There were no questions regarding the consent agenda. Chair Leak remarked that she is proud of ISBE’s work with the National Association of State Boards of Education.

6. Discussion & Approval

A. Approval of Unified Academic Achievement Standard Setting Methodology

Ms. Clementz discussed this item.

Dr. Rice said he was impressed by the undertaking and said it helps end a self-inflicted wound without sacrificing learning outcomes. Ms. Clementz credited Dr. Sanders for providing the vision for this project and emphasized the outcome will not lower learning standards in Illinois.

Dr. Chavarria expressed appreciation for the amount of engagement cultivated around this work and the information provided on the process. She asked for further detail on the feedback Ms. Clementz and her team have received thus far given that the memo mentions 6,700 on the initial performance level descriptors (PLD) that have been crafted. Ms. Clementz stated that common themes in the comments included replacing the use of the terms “thoroughly,” “accurately,” “consistently,” and “inconsistently” for English language arts (ELA) PLDs; the desire to see asset-based language highlighting what students can do so that PLDs have value and utility outside of standard setting; and elementary and high school science teachers wanting to borrow elements of the other grade levels’ PLDs.

Dr. Chavarria asked if there has been an opportunity to engage parents in the standard setting process. Ms. Clementz said her team members held a set of focus groups with parents, including multilingual parents, as their aim was to choose language that is simple, clear, and accessible to parents in multiple languages. She shared that parents requested examples of student work, which led to her team creating the samples to success with sample test items for all standards at all performance levels. Ms. Clementz noted that almost no other state has taken this step. Dr. Chavarria said that these examples are very important for parents to understand their students’ performance.

Dr. Chavarria highlighted that the Board memo mentions robust but at times conflicting feedback from the accountability Technical Advisory Committee (TAC) and asked for further explanation. Ms. Clementz said that line refers to a disagreement between two TAC members on whether the modified Angoff or item-Descriptor (ID) matching method is better suited to this project, which led her team to conduct a mini study comparing the two. Dr. Chavarria asked for further information on the difference between the two methodologies. Ms. Clementz clarified that modified Angoff method places the focus on the student level, while the ID matching method focuses on the item itself and its placement within the rubric of performance levels. She noted that ID matching is well suited to certain test designs with big item banks, but since the ISBE assessment is fixed form, the Angoff method was more appropriate for this project.

Dr. Chavarria noted that the memo mentions that the Angoff method is “widely used” and asked for clarification on what that means. Chief Education Officer of Instruction Dr. Jason Helfer explained that currently all Illinois teacher licensure tests use the modified Angoff method. Ms. Clementz added that of the past 15 standard settings conducted across all states, well over half have used the modified Angoff methodology, while ID matching is just starting to emerge as a more common method.

Dr. Chavarria asked what the response from the field has been to the unified standard setting initiative in general. Dr. Sanders said the response has been overall positive over eight Statewide System of Support tour visits with

high participation and engagement, especially related to the PLDs. He noted that accountability work will follow the assessment work, and the tour has helped school and district leaders understand the meaning behind labeling schools. Ms. Clementz said she and her team have been thrilled on what they have accomplished to date, but this is only the start, and they have several projects they are eager to partner with the field on. Dr. Sanders emphasized the creation of asset-based standards and that the project aims to set standards in a way that changes performance within schools and gives meaningful feedback for schools to improve. ISBE has received some hyper-technical comments from the field, but the overall response has been very positive. Dr. Chavarria emphasized she hopes her questions give life to the project, show support from the field, and showcase that standards are not being lowered in Illinois. Ms. Clementz invited Board members to observe parts of the standard setting process if they are interested. Dr. Chavarria asked for those dates to be made available, and Ms. Clementz said she would share those in the next Board Weekly Update.

Dr. Nugent asked about feedback received related to math assessment. Ms. Clementz said most of the math comments showed support for the samples to success, and she credited ISBE math content specialist Heather Colwell for creating over 900 items to then fill out as samples to success. Ms. Clementz added that participants did not request the same large-scale revisions to math as they did for ELA. Dr. Nugent expressed appreciation for Ms. Colwell.

Dr. Nugent asked if the four performance levels were consistent across all content areas. Ms. Clementz explained that her team settled on four performance levels to have PLD writers work on, and a large part of the Statewide System of Support tour and feedback collection was to determine if the four levels and descriptors were accurate and sequenced appropriately in all directions. She expressed appreciation for districts and representatives who participated in the feedback process.

Dr. Nugent asked if any of the individuals involved with setting the PLDs will continue as panelists to set the assessment cut scores. Ms. Clementz said it is possible there will be some overlap, but her team is trying to give as many people as possible an opportunity to participate in the standard setting process to increase understanding and support across the field. She added that her team has intentionally structured the scheduling of the standard setting to build in vertical articulation, and she noted that there was peer review across the different subject areas.

Dr. Nugent asked how Ms. Clementz and her team are narrowing down the 600 applicants who hope to participate in this process and asked Ms. Clementz to confirm that they will be considering geographic and demographic diversity. Ms. Clementz confirmed diversity is a priority and that her team hopes to build a panel that somewhat mirrors the student population. She said they will primarily sample from ELA, math, and science subject areas but also will sample from aligned subject areas. Ms. Clementz stated that they will need to narrow the applicants down to 150 participants, sharing that this is a challenging process, but ACT and Pearson have done a wonderful job to collaborate to create the best outcome for Illinois. She also credited Director of Assessment Angela Foxall with the success of this collaboration. Dr. Nugent said that is encouraging to hear and that it is powerful to give teachers the opportunity to feel professional outside of their individual classrooms. She thanked Ms. Clementz and her team for their work, and Ms. Clementz gave credit to Dr. Sanders.

Dr. Isoye asked if Ms. Clementz could provide the samples to success to the Board. Chair Leak commended Dr. Sanders, Ms. Clementz, and her team for aiding this alignment after assessment transitions. She stated her belief that this will be a nationwide model and emphasized the need to pay attention to non-English speakers and encourage them in this process. She also shared her confidence in Dr. Sanders’ communication plan pertaining to this project and thanked Ms. Clementz again.

7. New Business: Items for the Next Agenda

Chair Leak requested more assessment updates going forward.

8. Next Meeting: June 11, 2025

Dr. Leak reminded the Board that the next Education Policy Planning Committee Meeting of the Whole would take place on June 11 rather than June 10 due to quorum issues.

9. Adjourn

Dr. Nugent made a motion to adjourn. Dr. Isoye seconded the motion, and it passed by a unanimous roll call vote. Chair Leak adjourned the Education Policy Planning Committee of the Whole meeting at 3:14 p.m.

https://www.isbe.net/Documents_Board_Meetings/20250513-EPP-Minutes.pdf