Collective human judgment informed by reliable evidence is a much better way to assess teaching and learning in schools than data - driven judgment based
on high stakes standardized tests.
The consortium intends to use the eventual system to press the state to change the
current high stakes standardized tests to a system that actually benefits the learning of our growing diversity of learners.
The corporate reform narrative is based on three assertions, 1) that the collective voice of teachers is unwelcome in the discussion of the direction of education, 2) that a single metric —
high stakes standardized test scores — can discern effective schooling, and 3) that the marketplace and profit motive are the best way to improve schools.
Forcing special needs and English language learners to
take high stakes standardized tests is «abusive,» Regents Chancellor Betty Rosa told parents and community leaders at a forum held last week.
Teacher assessments employ an approach known as «assessment for learning»
whereas high stakes standardized tests rest on a mechanistic foundation of «assessment of learning» akin to weighing children instead of feeding them.
We believe there are positive alternatives to high stakes, standardized testing We oppose
high stakes standardized testing because it is a tool of corporatization, stratification, and social reproduction.
This expansion is occurring even
though high stakes standardized testing has never been shown to improve student achievement or teacher performance, and even though the testing mandated by the federal No Child Left Behind legislation is widely considered to have undercut, rather than raised, national achievement levels.
With regard to issues specific to education, AFT National president Randi Weingarten celebrated the new federal education law, «Every Student Succeeds Act» (ESSA), and said it promises to
decouple high stakes standardized tests from teacher evaluation.
Incentivizing districts to develop local formative and summative measures in collaboration with other districts, vetted by the Connecticut State Department of Education, similar to the longstanding exemplary «New York Performance Standards Consortium», which was founded in 1997 on the premise that
high stakes standardized tests do not measure what matters most.
In the past two weeks, hundreds of thousands of parents across the state staged a parental uprising against the Common Core curriculum and culture of over-utilization
of high stakes standardized tests and exercised their right to refuse to have their children take the grades 3 - 8 ELA and math exams.
We're going to have to organize fights against cookie - cutter evaluation rubrics (such as Danielson), against the plan to tie teacher evaluation to
high stakes standardized test scores, and in defense of basic protections such as tenure.
This is historic because it is the first time that a legislative body has sent a clear directive to the DOE, NYSED and Governor
that high stakes standardized tests must be replaced by multiple measures.
Unfortunately, Weingarten's proposal reinforces the teacher quality problem myth and the idea that
high stakes standardized tests can promote high quality teaching and learning.»
As someone who has been a conscientious objector of
high stakes standardized tests and is actively involved in the opt out campaign in our state, the decoupling of standardized tests scores from the teacher evaluation does not get at the root of the issues.
It seems that opponents of
high stakes standardized testing are fighting an old war; the old TAKS regime is gone and we should give the new system a chance to work.
She works alongside other MOREistas and Change the Stakes, a grassroots coalition of parents, teachers and community members who are concerned with the destructive use of
high stakes standardized testing and to bring awareness to the inextricable link between teachers» working conditions and students» learning conditions.
No Child Left Behind mandated
a high stakes standardized testing environment that unintentionally narrowed schools to focus on rote learning in reading and math.
The campaign will among other things seek to end the abuse and overuse of
high stakes standardized tests and reduce the amount of student and instructional time consumed by them.
BL: And I'll begin with some things that are in the news this week, beginning with your new Schools Chancellor, Richard Carranza, urging parents not to opt their kids out of statewide standardized tests... Is that consistent with your own views as a critic of
high stakes standardized testing?
«We've doubled down on the status - quo — an accountability system based on one
high stakes standardized test,» said Jessica Tang, president of the Boston Teacher's Union.
In the past two weeks, hundreds of thousands of parents across the state staged a parental uprising against the Common Core curriculum and culture of over-utilization of
high stakes standardized tests and exercised their right to refuse to have their children take the grades 3 - 8 ELA and math exams.