Testimony of Paul J. Phillips of Quincy, MA 9/9/03

 

My name is Paul J. Phillips, President of the 900 member Quincy Education Association. Since the Education Reform Bill of 1993, the legislature has stepped away from direct involvement in educational policy.  It has allowed the regulatory force of the Board of Education and the Department of Education to determine what Education Reform means.  This has resulted in a blizzard of conflicting and changing regulations regarding teachers and their licenses, which, along with the hideously insulting, neglectful treatment we receive from our dealings with the DOE, has resulted in the DOE and the BOE being, by far, the most hated organized body with which teachers have to deal.  Calling the DOE for any purpose is a guaranteed headache, occasionally mixed with heartache, if you can get through.  And, for our students, this has resulted in education that is test-centered and not learning-centered.  It has resulted in regulations that insist that multiple administrations of a single assessment fulfills what you meant when you said "multiple assessments" in the Education Reform Act.  In other words, as educators we have seen that the Education Reform Act has had unintended consequences that have harmed both us and our students, and we haven't seen a legislature ready and willing to address these problems.

Let's draw an analogy.  If the goal had been to improve physical fitness and you had passed a Physical Fitness Reform Bill in 1993, what we'd have now is a single assessment in place.  Let's imagine "jumping" was chosen…and for the same reasons MCAS was chosen in education: it results in numbers that can be posted, compared, and used to blame people.  We must assume that jumping is the "fitness determiner."  After all, it's a test, and we have implicit faith in such things.  So we make every kid jump: broad jump, vertical jump, whatever, and we measure the results.  Well, some kids cannot jump, but probably could demonstrate fitness some other way, but they are now punished.  They are allowed to take the jump test repeatedly, and we call that "multiple assessments."  Other kids are great jumpers, but are incredibly lucky we didn't choose throwing…or lifting…or running.  Nonetheless, because they can jump, we "determine" that they are "fit."  And, because we now spend inordinate amounts of time in school on jumping, at the expense of the rest of physical fitness, our Jumping Scores will improve, and we can tell ourselves that we are making progress.

Well, for what it's worth, what we'd need is many different ways of assessing if our kids are physically fit.  And what we need in education is multiple ways of assessing if our kids are being educated.  The current system is plainly unfair, and hurts kids, both kids who don't pass and kids who do.  Educators have been clear about this since the beginning when we worked with you for "multiple assessments".  The DOE and BOE bureaucracies thwarted our wills, yours and ours.  We can correct this if you approve Senate Bill 257, a bill filed by Senator Creem.  Teachers and other educators, as well as many parent groups, School Committees and others intimately involved with education, urge you to do so.  A real assessment system is much more complicated than the easy, quick solution of the DOE…one test.  But it's the only way to serve our kids well.

As part of that, House Bill 3487, filed by Representative Balser, should be considered and approved.  Please do so.  The required assessment should be the entire SYSTEM implied in Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System, not merely a test out of what should be a system.

As an immediate palliative, and a good first step, override the Governor's Veto of the SPED exemption which you included in House 1, and which is contained in the bill filed by Representative Peisch.  At the very least do something to protect our most endangered children in our SPED programs!  Right away, please vote for House Bill 1250.