Despite the fact that the majority of students failed last year’s AzMERIT test, the Arizona schools chief doesn’t want parents to feel discouraged.

Arizona’s Measurement of Educational Readiness to Inform Teaching, the annual standardized test is used to assess what students have learned and what they failed to learn. The test is used to determine an annual letter-grade a school gets, along with factoring in to the amount of state funding a school receives.

According to Superintendent of Public Instruction Diane Douglas, the test only exhibits “a one-day snapshot” of students’ performance in school. Douglas also said that the test doesn’t fully reflect what is really going on inside classrooms and it shouldn’t measure teachers, schools or school districts. 

Only 41 percent of students passed the math and reading portions of the test during the last school year. The results also showed that Asian and Caucasian students performed better on both math and reading than African American, Latino and Native American students.

73 percent of Asian students and 55 percent of Caucasian students passed the math portion. Passing math scores were also seen from 31 percent of Latino students, 26 percent of African American students and 21 percent of Native American students.

In the reading portion, 66 percent of Asian students and 55 percent of Caucasian students received passing scores. Comparatively, 30 percent of Latino students, 28 percent of African American students and 18 percent of Native American students passed the reading category.

Following this school year, the Arizona State Board of Education will no longer continue the AzMERIT test. The future plan is for a new statewide test that hopes to bring a higher level or accountability for the students, the teachers and the school’s systematic structure.