Arlington ISD asked the Texas Education Agency to regrade STAAR tests at several campuses after A-F scores were released earlier this year. The results show 38 schools did better than first thought, six of them improving an entire letter grade, and the district’s overall grade increased by one poi nt. TEA uses an automated system to grade STAAR, which many school district leaders have called AI and have been highly critical of the system’s ability to grade essays. Arlington ISD Superintendent Matt Smith started with the district nearly two years ago and, from the star,t has questioned the grades his schools received. TEA allows schools to ask to have humans regrade the test, but if the schools are wrong, they have to pay the bill for the retesting. Smith took the risk, and in every test they asked a human to grade again, the result showed a higher score than what the automated system gave. The point changes were minor in many instances, only changing by a point or two, but in several cases, they raised the school’s score an entire letter grade. Arlington High School went from a C to a B. Berry Elementary is no longer an F school and is now a D. Smith said this shows there is value in the appeals process, but he stands by his concerns about the process the state uses to hold schools accountable. ...read more read less