Doug Page, Bay State Parent, March 14, 2017
Massachusetts students in Grades 3 through 8 will take a new standardized test this month, but it’s unclear how new the test really is.
Dubbed “MCAS 2.0” in October 2015 by Mitchell Chester, commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE), the new test was proposed by Chester as a compromise between the aging MCAS and the controversial Common Core-aligned PARCC exam. When suggesting a hybrid test, Chester said it would be a combination of Common Core-based questions, like those found on the PARCC, along with those not aligned with Common Core standards. At the time, critics predicted that MCAS 2.0 would be akin to a wolf in sheep’s clothing — a backdoor way to administer the PARCC test to Massachusetts public school students without the critical backlash of adopting the PARCC outright.