Testing

We believe that an emphasis on high-stakes testing undermines our children's education and demoralizes their teachers by taking away their autonomy. Learning should be about challenge, creativity, and critical thinking, all of which inevitably vanish in a test-driven curriculum. We can address the needs of all of our students by attracting the best teachers and giving them the support and training that they need, and our schools will be all the better for it.

MCAS: Making Children Anxious and Sad

THE TESTING CHARADE Pretending to Make Schools Better By Daniel Koretz 288 pp. University of Chicago Press. $25. Available at Brookline Booksmith by Mike Offner January 2018 Test scores are a primary focus of the administration of the Public Schools ...
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Jack Schneider, “Beyond Test Scores,” Sept 20th, Harvard Coop

by The Coop Event Series...Authors, Coop Kids & More! Wed, Sept 20, 7:00 – 8:30 PM Harvard Coop, 1400 Mass Avenue, Cambridge, MA 02138 Beyond Test Scores reframes current debates over school quality by offering new approaches to educational data that can push ...
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34 problems with standardized tests

By Valerie Strauss April 19 at 12:57 PM A picture of the scene in court on Aug. 12, where a judge heard a lawsuit by parents against education officials in Florida. This was drawn by Peyton Mears, an 11-year-old who was at ...
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How the SAT and PSAT collect personal data on students — and what the College Board does with it

By Valerie Strauss March 30 If your child takes the SAT or PSAT, is his or her personal information being collected, profiled, licensed and sold? That is the question that Cheri Kiesecker, Colorado parent and member of the Parent Coalition ...
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Local legislators reconsider the standardized test

PAT BLAIS, Middlesex East, March 24, 2017 As state education officials prepare to unveil a next-generation MCAS exam this spring, a growing number of Beacon Hill legislators insist Massachusetts needs to reconsider the purpose and scope of high-stakes testing in local ...
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8 Reasons To Opt Out

Peter Greene, Curmudgucation, Wednesday, March 8, 2017 Depending on your state, it is that time again-- time to waste students' school time on the Big Standardized Test. Whether it's the PARCC or the SBA or whatever mutant offspring of the testing ...
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State Officials Vague on New Standardized Test

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 ...
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School offers ‘incentives’ to get kids to take Common Core standardized test

Washington Post, Valerie Strauss March 8, 2017 Mayfield High School student Isabela Bencomo, 15, holds a sign while participating in a walkout with her classmates on March 2 at the school in Las Cruces, N.M. Students were protesting the new PARCC exams ...
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School board debates ‘high-stakes’ testing

By PATRICK BLAIS WOBURN - The local School Committee may waddle into an ongoing debate over the future of MCAS and its successor exam and the linking of teacher performance reviews to student testing results. During a recent meeting, School ...
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Bill SD.1486 would put a 3-yr moratorium on high-stakes standardized testing

Sen. Michael Rush's Bill SD. 1486 would put a three-year mortatorium on high-stakes testing in Massachusetts and require a re-evaluation of the use of standardized testing in public schools. Here are some highlights: SECTION 28. (a) Notwithstanding subsection (i) of ...
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