Florida sets ‘more rigorous bar’ for state tests in public schools

Florida’s public school students likely will find it harder to pass required state tests, including key ones needed for high school graduation, under a new scoring system approved Wednesday.

The State Board of Education voted unanimously to adopt the scoring plan for FAST, Florida’s newest series of standardized language arts and math tests. Students took FAST last school year, but it was scored on a system devised for the FSA, the test retired in 2022.

FAST, unlike its predecessors, is a progress-monitoring exam that includes shorter tests at the beginning and middle of the school year to show how students are progressing. The third test, given in the spring, is a high-stakes one, with third-grade language arts scores used to make fourth-grade promotion decisions and the algebra 1 and 10th-grade language arts exams required for a diploma.

If the new scoring system had been in place when students took FAST last spring, fewer students in grades 3 to 10 would have passed compared with a year earlier, state data shows.