1st Integrated Geometry regents – initial reaction

Yesterday the first exam in “Integrated Geometry” was administered throughout New York State. (see previous post)

My first reaction is that this is the best examination in mathematics New York State has administered in over a decade.

The exam was content-focused. There were a few algebra questions, two logic questions, but the vast majority of the points were directly related to the study of geometry.

The State did something good? Of course this is an accident. It is still a performance-based exam. Only, in the case of Integrated Geometry, when they wrote the standards, they didn’t integrate much with geometry. They were also so scared of the difficulty factor going off the scale that they avoided adding silly, confusing context to most problems.

Only 4 problems that I have found so far had problems as written. (post later today)

Because they still test standards, not content, NY State repeated the same content (equation of a circle) in three questions, while missing quite a bit of content.

At the Association of Mathematics Teachers of New York State listserve, the main concerns seem to be how easy the exam appeared, and the repetition of material. (See the AMTNYS discussion)

Scoring:

The exam was 28 two-point multiple-choice questions, 6 two-point free response questions, 3 four-point free response questions, and 1 six-point free response question (the proof). This is a total of 86 points.

Today schools across the state will grade the exams, and mail them to a vendor. Next week New York State will convene a committee of teachers to look at each question closely, and make some recommendations about scoring. The following day a committee of supervisors, superintendants, teachers, and school board members will make a political decision recommendation based on what pass rate is acceptable. Until then, we will not know what the passing score will be.

Click here to enter the “Jd2718 First Geometry Cut Scores Pool“