COLUMBIA- The state's 330,000 public school students face two new subjects on the Palmetto Achievement Challenge Tests that will be administered this week.

For the first time since the current testing program began in 1999, students in grades three through eight will be tested on math, English/language arts, science and social studies.

Students have previously been tested on math and English.

Testing begins Monday and wraps up May 13.

Testing for all four subjects is an annual requirement of the state's 1998 school reform law, the Education Accountability Act. Results are used to rate public schools and districts each year.

South Carolina's current testing program is patterned after the national "No Child Left Behind" plan, which requires every child in grades three through eight be tested annually in math, English and science. Annual school progress reports also must be made public.

Beginning this year, PACT scores will be tracked closely by state and federal education officials to see whether students are making gains toward a national goal that says each child should be capable of doing "B"-level schoolwork by 2013.

When the Legislature adopted the school reform law in 1998, PACT results were to be used by teachers as a guide in making promotion decisions. But legislators backed off that requirement and have postponed its enactment indefinitely. State Education Department officials say standardized tests should be one of several measures used in making such decisions.

Some teachers say a shortcoming of PACT is that no detailed evaluation of results is provided to identify patterns of strengths or weaknesses in a student's answers covering specific skills or topics. The state Education Department's testing division acknowledges the inability to do "item analysis" is a problem.

Nevertheless, test scores are broken down into four rating categories. Advanced is the highest, followed by proficient, basic and below basic. "Basic" is considered a passing grade.

Parents of students with scores judged "below basic," the lowest category, will be invited to a teacher conference where strategies aimed at improving academic performance will be outlined. Those notifications could go out as early as June.

Students who test below basic are supposed to be offered extra help in summer school. Many school districts are scaling back or canceling summer school this year because they can't afford the cost, in part because of the state's budget crunch.

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