HARPSWELL

After questions about Harpswell Coastal Academy’s choice of a replacement assessment, the charter school has changed course and will use a different one.

Due to what HCA Head of School John D’Anieri said was “misinterpretation of a letter,” the first-year charter school did not administer the New England Common Assessment Program, an assessment required statewide for grades 3 to 8.

“My understanding was that the test was only administered to fifth and eighth grades,” he said, “when in fact it is just a section of the test that is only administered to those grades.”

Harpswell Coastal Academy is a nonprofit, charter school that opened in September 2013 and serves 60 students in grades 6 and 9; it plans to expand to grades 6 to 12 by 2017, offering grades 6, 7, 9 and 10 in the upcoming school year, and 6 to 11 beginning in the 2015-2016 school year.

NECAP reading and math assessments are administered in grades 3 through 8, while writing assessments are administered in grades 5 and 8 only.

With a background focused on high school level education, D’Anieri misread the criteria for the exam administered in elementary and middle schools across the state to certify achievement in math, reading and writing in compliance with the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2001.

“I made a rookie mistake, which I profoundly regret at this point,” he said. “We’re taking it very seriously and we’re taking very deliberate and speedy steps to remedy the error.”

The school had proposed using the Accuplacer, a series of assessment tests often used to determine college level placement, a choice that had been questioned by the Maine Charter School Commission this winter and again this week.

By the end of Thursday, D’Anieri said in a phone interview with The Times Record, an order would be placed for the Northwest Evaluation Association (NWEA) assessment and would be administered to the school’s students as soon as practicable.

“We’re getting a quote and putting a purchase order in today,” D’Anieri said. “We’ll have to wait until Monday or Tuesday to announce the actual exam date.”

The cost of the NWEAs is estimated at $3,000, D’Anieri said, which is the minimum charged for the exams. Half of the expense goes to training teachers to administer the exam and the other half represents the cost of the exam itself.

“We had proposed at the charter commission to use the Accuplacer instead,” he said, “but we decided to go with a more traditional and acceptable exam to resolve this as quickly as possible.”

rgargiulo@timesrecord.com

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