The Narrow Parameters of the HSPA Exam

“What kind of English/writing instruction have our students received in the state’s public high schools prior to coming here?”

I imagine we’ve all wondered this on occasion while grading a stack of Comp I papers at half past midnight on a Tuesday.

Kelly recently presented on the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA) at The Teaching of Writing Circle (PowerPoint below) and I must admit that it was the first time I’ve really been informed by any actual research into the above question.

For one, as should come as no surprise, it seems that a lot of class time is spent preparing for this test. Furthermore, the test is concentrated on one narrative essay and a first-person letter-to-the editor style persuasion piece (with probably lots of room for uninformed opinion).

Obviously, the value of those two types of writing as preparation for the demands of college is debatable in itself. Yet, more interestingly to me is how presumably wide-spread the preparation of this test must have been for the students in our writing classes. Considering that the vast majority of our student populace has attended a state public school (and has done so since 2002 when the test was first administered), it is staggering how the preparation for these two types of writing functions - squeezed into the exact parameters of this assessment - must have dominated the last three years of writing instruction they’ve received prior to coming to Bergen.

Perhaps my ignorance of this is an anomaly amongst most of us (especially amongst those who have children in the schools) - hence my reaction seems a bit naïve. However, if this uniform experience is truly this wide-spread, I really think we all would benefit from engaging in more discussion on how to address the narrowness of this instruction and find ways to push our students in new directions that they will most certainly need to have experienced for the 300-level courses many of them wish to take in the future.

Adam