By Sara Ballenger

The Los Altos School District scores keep climbing, according to the 2001 Standardized Testing and Recording (STAR) examination results that the California Department of Education released Aug. 15.

On average, students in second through eighth grades scored in the 90th percentile, increasing .8 percent from last year’s score of 89.5 to 90.3.

The STAR test scores are based on national norms using the 50th percentile as the average. The STAR test is a standardized state test used to evaluate California schools.

Students are tested in reading, math, language and spelling. Los Altos students showed improvement in 17 out of 28 possible subtests (four per grade level). Scores stayed the same as the previous year’s on 11 of the subtests, with no decrease in score on any of the subtests, according to the California Department of Education.

With the exception of eighth-grade spelling, all seven grade levels had at least 90 percent of students scoring above the 50th percentile in all four content areas, said Dick Liewer, assistant superintendent of curriculum.

“I am thrilled with the district’s STAR results,” said Liewer. “The triad of parents, staff and children again rallied to bring home the highest test results in district history.”

Besides the STAR results, the district is also paying attention to the second part of the test, the STAR Augmentation. Intended to assess a student’s mastery of California’s academic standards, the augmentation contains questions about language arts and math, which are added and changed annually, according to the district.

“As you can see, our students did very well on that part of the test also,” said Marge Gratiot, superintendent of the Los Altos School District.

According to the district, students improved over last year’s scores by 3.7 percent, with an average score of 81.4 percent on the two tests.

While the greatest Augmentation Test gains were in mathematics, 86 percent of district children scored at the highest two testing levels on the language arts test, Liewer said.

In comparison, only 30 percent of California children scored at the highest two testing levels.

“These scores would not be possible without a strong standard curriculum and intensive training of our new teachers by our experienced teachers,” Gratiot said.

The differences in scores among each school in the district are extremely small, she added.

For a statewide list of STAR test scores, including information on other local districts, visit the California Department of Education’s Web site at http://www.cde.ca.gov/.