Opinion | Is M-STEP a college killer?

In schools, fall is the time of year for new beginnings.  For kindergartners, it’s a new experience, and a new box of crayons.  For sixth graders, it’s life as a “big kid” in middle school.  And for high school seniors, it’s a chance to be the leaders of the building, and to think about what comes next.

Students looking at life after high school often consider college, and applying to college can sometimes be challenging.  That’s why every effort should be made to eliminate the roadblocks between students and college access, especially since Michigan is committed to having 60 percent of our residents have some kind of postsecondary credential by 2030.

It comes as a surprise to many that some of those roadblocks exist in the Michigan Student Test of Educational Progress, the tests given each spring to high school juniors to assess student learning.  M-STEP was considered one of leading-edge assessment tools when it debuted in 2014-15, but like all tools, it requires maintenance in order to stay sharp and effective—and when it comes to college access, there are three key ways M-STEP needs to be updated, and soon:

Elimination of Transcript Requirement 

State law currently requires M-STEP scores to be posted on student transcripts. This includes the SAT portion of M-STEP, a test that used to be required by nearly all four-year colleges as part of the requirements for admission. But many four-year colleges no longer require test scores, leaving it up to the students to decide if their scores are strong enough to be included in their college applications.

State law doesn’t give Michigan public school students that choice—they have to send their transcripts to colleges, so the colleges get their SAT scores, even if they are low.  This means some Michigan students are giving colleges information the student doesn’t want to send—information that could put them at a disadvantage when applying to college.  This also means that students from outside Michigan enjoy an advantage when applying to Michigan colleges that don’t require test scores.  Clearly, this needs to change.

Elimination of SAT essay Evidence-Based Reading and Writing 

 M-STEP also includes the SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing Exam, a test that was part of the national SAT when M-STEP started.  This test was intended to give colleges some idea of a student’s ability to write at the college level by requiring a writing sample from all students.

It didn’t take long for most colleges to realize that the writing sample in this part of the test conveyed little information about a student’s ability to do college-level writing, and many colleges began dropping this requirement.  This ultimately led the College Board — the SAT parent company — to stop offering the test on its national exam.

Today, Michigan high school students are one, if not the only, group of students still submitting these scores to colleges — and even though the colleges don’t want the scores, it’s hard for them to unsee a test score that’s submitted. In addition, high school English departments use these results to fine-tune their curriculum decisions, even though colleges feel the results have no bearing on a student’s ability to write. Since the standard SAT taken as part of M-STEP includes a writing score the colleges accept and use, it’s time to drop this requirement, lighten the student’s test burden, and improve their chances at college access.

Elimination of WorkKeys

ACT’s WorkKeys is a tool designed to assess some job skills. No college requires WorkKeys as part of the admissions process, but it was included as part of M-STEP to give students some insights into their vocational options.

Unfortunately, the administration of WorkKeys in spring of the junior year has not delivered on that promise. Since WorkKeys results aren’t available until fall of the student’s senior year, school counselors report that WorkKeys plays little, if any, meaningful role in shaping students’ plans for life after high school, since they’ve already planned their senior year schedules and have been working for up to a year with school counselors on their postsecondary plans. 

Combined with the elimination of the SAT Evidence-Based Reading and Writing exam, elimination of Work Keys would give students one less day of M-STEP testing, allowing them to focus on doing their best on the parts of M-STEP that matter most, saving thousands of dollars in assessment costs, and getting students back in the classroom for additional days of instruction.

It's important to measure student progress in school, so long as that assessment occurs in meaningful ways that create opportunities for better, and more, learning.  These changes to M-STEP would streamline the assessment process, add to the relevance of the remaining testing tools, and remove impediments Michigan students have to higher education — impediments that put them at  a disadvantage when applying to college.  

It’s time to put Michigan back in the lead among states promoting meaningful postsecondary planning, and these changes to M-STEP are a strong step toward achieving that goal.