Assessment/Accountability MCAS
Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System

Threshold Scores for the 2009 MCAS Tests

A threshold score is the minimum raw score (number of points) that a student must earn on an MCAS test for his or her performance to be classified at a particular performance level. For example, according to the table below, 24 is the threshold score for the Needs Improvement level on the 2009 MCAS grade 8 Mathematics test - in other words, a student who earned a raw score of 24 on the 2009 MCAS grade 8 Mathematics test earned a performance level of Needs Improvement, while a student who earned a raw score of 23 on the 2009 MCAS grade 8 Mathematics test earned a performance level of Warning.

Threshold scores are adjusted slightly each year. The Department makes these adjustments so that scaled scores have the same meaning over time - in other words, so that a 240 on the grade 8 Mathematics test represents the same level of performance in 2009 as it did in 2008. Threshold scores need to be adjusted because the MCAS test questions that determine a student's scaled score are completely new each year.

The Department is committed to maintaining the same level of difficulty for each MCAS test (i.e., the 2008 grade 8 Mathematics test should be as difficult as the 2009 grade 8 Mathematics test). However, since each year's common items are unique, there are slight, unavoidable differences in difficulty from year to year.

Adjusting the threshold scores each year to account for these slight differences allows the scaled scores to be meaningful over time. The adjustments are made objectively, using a statistical process called equating. The threshold scores for the spring 2009 tests are shown below.

2009 MCAS Raw-to-Scaled Score Conversion Tables

The accompanying file contains the 2009 MCAS raw-to-scaled score conversion tables for all subjects and grade levels. The conversion tables and the threshold scores shown below may be used in conjunction with preliminary MCAS reports to generate preliminary results for students, schools, and districts. The final reports, which will be posted for school and district review and released to the public on September 16, will provide official MCAS results. Please keep in mind that all MCAS results—both preliminary and official—are embargoed until the public release of final results in September.

1. The maximum score is the total number of raw score points that a student could earn in the tested subject if he or she answered all of the multiple-choice questions correctly (one point per question) and received the highest possible score for every other question (four points for each open-response question, except two points in grade 3 Mathematics; one point for each short-answer question [included in Mathematics only]; and 20 points for the ELA Composition given in grades 4, 7, and 10).

2. Above Proficient is the highest performance level at grade 3.