show me the WASL

This parent's eye view of the WASL is worth reading for this fact alone:

Out of a total of 1.5 million WASL test booklets marked in 2007 by Washington students in grades 3 through 12, tests from just 746 students have been shown to parents.

That's because receiving the booklet is at the parent's insistence. It ought to be a required mailing by the state, at least to every student who hasn't met standard, both to parents and teachers. The limited data currently available--scores broken down into categories, with no detailed interpretation--are as helpful as a personals ad.

If the WASL survives the current legislative session, which is likely, given a threatened Gregoire veto to any attempt to quash it, we should still push for reform in the way the middle-level tests are structured, delivered, scored, and shared. Otherwise, they're meaningless as an individual assessment.