Richmond (Map, News) - Following the increase in the number of Northern Virginia schools that did not meet federal reading standards this fall, more schools may now choose not to test some of their non-English-speaking students.

Many of the schools that failed to meet the English standards, which were set as part of the national No Child Left Behind law, said it was because they were forced to test students with little more than one year of English instruction using the same standardized tests given to their fluent peers.

The matter had been the subject of a lengthy squabble between federal and state education officials; Virginia was one of a score of states involved in the dispute.

Protracted protests led to a compromise: Schools wouldn’t have to test the reading skills of their least fluent students the same way.

This spring, Texas students without English proficiency were given the option of a Linguistically Accommodated Test, which accounts for English novices, Texas Education Agency spokeswoman Suzanne Marchman said.

In Virginia, an assessment of these students’ classroom work was performed. Disabled students who can’t take the standardized tests have used this method in previous years. Non-English-speaking students in six Fairfax County schools and four students in Alexandria were assessed this way last year.

Participation was low because the option was not available until January, officials told The Examiner.

“To do (the portfolio) with limited English-proficient students, you want to start in September … because you’re supposed to demonstrate improvement,” said Monte Dawson, Alexandria’s executive director of monitoring and evaluation.

The portfolios are also very labor-intensive for staff, Dawson said.

“We chose not to use it (because) our staff didn’t feel two months was enough time,” Arlington schools spokeswoman Linda Erdos said.

Arlington officials are considering the option for the coming school year, Erdos said. The amount of staff time the assessments require, however, will make it difficult to

do at schools with high non-English-speaking populations, she said.

Nearly ninety-seven percent of the Fairfax students assessed this way, passed, Fairfax Deputy Superintendent Richard Moniuszko said.

Meanwhile, the state is continuing to try to find or develop a test for non-English speaking students that will meet federal standards, said Billy K. Cannaday Jr., Virginia’s superintendent of public instruction. He doesn’t expect the problem will be resolved by testing time this school year.

mhegstad@dcexaminer.com

dgenz@dcexaminer.com