The Central Okanagan School Board says it hopes the Ministry of Education will stop making Foundation Skills Assessment results public.
The Ministry is reviewing whether it will continue to publish the results after the BC School Trustees Association asked them to stop the practice in a letter.
School District 23 Chairperson Moyra Baxter says the board has written its own letters over the years, asking for the change, because while the tests are a good way to evaluate how students are doing, it's problematic when the results are put out there without context by third parties.
“For instance how many students took the test, what’s the situation, what type of school is it, have lots of the other indications of how well students do been taken into consideration?” she says “And we just feel that these results, when they’re used by outside organizations as a way to rank schools is not the best way to use that information.”
The results of the test, which is taken by grade 4 and 7 students to measure reading, writing and math skills, have been used by the Fraser Institute to rank schools.
Baxter says the results are beneficial for teachers and parents, not outside groups, adding the board strongly feels they should be kept private.