MCAS in the news (6/2 - 6/16)
After a lull in stories, there was a burst of news at the end of the week.
The New York Times, 6/16, provides some national context: In reconciling school bills, 2 chambers agree on tests
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/06/15/national/15SCHO.html
.... Heralded by President Bush as a centerpiece of his campaign, the legislation comes amid growing opposition to the
expanding use of tests to determine promotion, graduation, merit pay and school evaluations.
Parents in affluent suburban communities have complained that the focus on the tests has led to dumbing- down of lessons.
Reports of cheating, by students and adults, have become widespread. Teachers are fleeing from classrooms where test
preparation has usurped their curriculum. And a series of scoring errors by the handful of large companies that create most of
the tests has raised questions about fairness and reliability.....
.... Only 15 states have annual testing; the rest will have to develop additional exams over the next few years. The quality of
state exams already varies widely, and some experts fear that the pressure to add tests quickly will lead to cheap
multiple-choice questions rather than essays that are more substantive but difficult to score. With the tiny industry that produces
and scores tests already stretched thin, many wonder whether fly-by-night companies will spring up to grab the $320 million in
federal money set aside for test development.....
And in MASSACHUSETTS:
AP wire/Boston.com, 6/15: More tests could be ahead if national education bill is approved
http://www.boston.com/dailynews/166/region/More_tests_could_be_ahead_if_n:.shtml
BOSTON (AP) Critics of the state's MCAS exam say the education bill passed by the U.S. Senate Thursday will mean
one thing for Massachusetts students: more tests.
The bill would require states to develop annual math and reading tests for students in grades 3 through 8. The Massachusetts
Comprehensive Assessment System exam does not test students in all of those grades, meaning new exams would have to be
created to meet the federal requirement.
The Senate vote came just days before a state hearing next Wednesday at which hundreds of MCAS opponents are
expected to speak out against any testing at all.
''People in the field don't think this is way we should be doing things,'' said Massachusetts Teachers Association Stephen
Gorrie. ''The increase in testing just channels you away from what you should be doing in schools. There are better ways.'' ....
..... Massachusetts now tests students in English in grades 4, 7 and 10; reading in grade 3; and math in grades 4, 6, 8 and 10.
Developing more tests to fill in the gaps would not be difficult, said Education Commissioner David Driscoll. The tests in the
''off-years'' could be multiple choice exams that are less stressful to take than the MCAS exams, and easier to correct, he said.
''We will be able to develop something to complement the MCAS, not develop a whole big, new test,'' he said. ''But
testing is here to stay. There's no question about that.''
U.S. Senator John Kerry, D-Mass., who voted in favor of the education bill, pledged to push for federal funding to ease
the financial burden of developing the new tests....
.... Monty Neill, head of the anti-MCAS FairTest in Cambridge, called the national movement toward testing a ''stampede.''
''Expanding the MCAS and mandating more testing is exactly the wrong thing to do,'' he said. ''They've all talked
themselves into believing that testing will improve schools, despite the absence of any evidence to prove it.''
Boston Globe, 6/15: Youngsters debate MCAS with officials
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/166/metro/Youngsters_debate_MCAS_with_officials+.shtml
First came the video showing sparse library shelves in an urban school, contrasted with state-of-the-art libraries with
computers in suburban schools.
Then came a heated, hourlong debate on unqualified teachers, large classroom sizes, and why urban public schools like
those in Boston don't get enough money.
''How can Boston students learn if the shelves in their libraries are empty, few classes have computers, and students can't
even take their books home?'' asked Asia Grady, 19, who moderated yesterday's session between 30 teenagers from Teen
Empowerment and top state educational officials....
.... But Education Commissioner David P. Driscoll told students that the state has poured millions of dollars into Boston's
public schools, and he urged students to talk with local school officials about how school funds are allocated....
.... The agenda's most controversial topic was the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System test.
Nadine Wilkerson, a student at Madison Park Technical Vocational School, called the test unfair. ''Given the fact that our
teachers do not expose us to literature early on, of course we're going to fail,'' she said.....
Quincy Patriot Ledger, 6/15: Graduates are going to college: Low MCAS scores not seen as an impediment
http://ledger.southofboston.com/display/inn_news/news08.txt
Two years ago, their low scores on the MCAS test shocked parents and educators in Randolph.
The average score of the math section of the test was 219, a failing grade on the MCAS scale. Two-thirds of the 10th-graders
who took the test failed the math section.
So what is happening to many of these same students who graduated from Randolph High School on Sunday?
They're going to college, the highest numbers in memory even though Randolph is less affluent than surrounding suburbs and
has a large minority population.
School officials said 90 percent of the class plan to attend two- or- four-year colleges, including four who are headed to
prestigious Ivy League schools and others who will attend other colleges and universities rated as "highly selective" when it
comes to choosing students.
"If they were this bad, why are these schools taking them?" asked school Superintendent Arthur Melia, referring to the
image created by the class' MCAS scores....
.... The biggest impact the test had was a blow to the image of the town and the school system, [school committee chairman
Edward] Gilbert said....
Boston Globe, 6/15: Plan to tie MCAS to college admissions shelved
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/166/metro/Plan_to_tie_MCAS_to_college_admissions_shelved+.shtml
A state plan to require MCAS scores for admission to the University of Massachusetts and nine state colleges has been
shelved amid sharp complaints that the exam is not a valid way to judge college applicants.
Some state officials have been urging the Massachusetts Board of Higher Education to pass the requirement at its meeting
next Tuesday, to give MCAS a political boost before a legislative hearing scheduled for Wednesday on the future of the test.
In 2003, high school students will have to earn at least a 220 on the 280-point MCAS test to receive their diplomas.
According to officials at the higher education board, some advisers in the governor's office and the Board of Education have
proposed making MCAS yet more important by requiring students to earn at least a 240 to enter a state college, and at least a
260 to enter UMass....
.... [Board of Higher Education Chairman Stephen] Tocco and others are concerned that entrance standards at UMass and
state colleges have become rigid, based chiefly on grades and SAT scores. MCAS, they say, would offer an alternate route of
admissions for applicants.
''If you have a kid who earns As in his last year but he's dragging up a C average, he probably won't get into the state
system - and you don't want to miss the potential of kids who would be very good college students,'' Tocco said. ''Having
another tool to measure knowledge would be useful.''
But UMass-Amherst admissions officials are strongly opposed to an MCAS requirement, fearing that it could decimate
minority enrollments, since blacks, Hispanics, and recent immigrants tend to score lower than members of other groups. ''We're
trying to get away from tests like the SAT,'' said Joe Marshall, who oversees admissions to the flagship Amherst campus.....
Boston Globe, 6/15: College offers incentives for high MCAS scores
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/166/metro/College_offers_incentive_for_high_MCAS_scores+.shtml
Fitchburg State College will pay more than half of the tuition and fees for any high school student who posts top-level
English and math scores on the controversial MCAS exam, the president of the college said yesterday.
President Michael Riccards said Fitchburg State is offering a $2,000 scholarship to any student who scores in the
''advanced'' category (between 260 and 280) on the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System.
Annual tuition and fees at the college of about 6,000 students total $3,176 for in-state students. Students who enter
Fitchburg State with high MCAS scores can receive the $2,000 each year as long as they maintain at least a B grade
average....
.... Riccards's tuition offer is the latest in a series of gestures designed to raise the college's profile....
Boston Globe, 6/15: MCAS backers obtained state aid: Some say group claims objectivity
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/166/metro/MCAS_backers_obtained_state_aid+.shtml
.... Mass Insight Education and Research Inc., a nonprofit pro-business group that bills itself on its Web site as an
''independent'' voice, took $105,000 in grant money last year from the State Department of Education.
''They try to put themselves out as an independent nonprofit advocating for standards-based reform and the MCAS, when
they are much more closely linked to the department than they purport to be,'' said Dan French, a former Department of
Education official....
.... Yet at least one key lawmaker who has received pro-MCAS polling data from Mass Insight Education said yesterday that
she was disturbed that she didn't know about the financial connection between the group and the administration.
''To the extent that we get information that purports to be research and in fact unbiased research on MCAS, then I think
that would concern me,'' said state Representative Alice Wolf, a Cambridge Democrat who is a member of the House
Committee on Education, Arts, and Humanities.
''When you get polling information, it is very important to know what the questions are and where they are coming from,''
said Wolf, whose committee will hold hearings next week on bills that would affect MCAS.....
See also, AP wire/Daily Hampshire Gazette, 6/15: MCAS grant raises questions
http://www.gazettenet.com/06152001/schools/3133.htm
A non-profit group that has been a vocal supporter of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System tests has
received $105,000 in state grant funding, leading some MCAS critics to question whether the group has a conflict of interest.
Mass Insight Education and Research Inc. received the grant money from the Department of Education last year....
.... "[MassInsight Education is] more of a well-compensated tool of the DOE than they are an educational policy think tank,"
[MTA's Robert] Duffy told The Boston Globe. "It raises obvious questions of conflict of interest." ...
.... Mass Insight Education is a spinoff of Mass. Insight, a for-profit group that lobbies on business policy and conducts polls on
a number of topics.
Derrick Jackson, Boston Globe, 6/16: A lesson in education
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/166/oped/A_lesson_in_education+.shtml
IN APRIL US Education Secretary Rod Paige defended the test craze by telling the Education Writers Association: ''Tests
help us give each child an academic identity.'' That has stuck with me for two months because I knew if he wanted to see
identity, he could have come to my 10-year-old's school.
That same month, the fifth and sixth grades of the Cambridgeport School, a public school, put on what they called their
Living Wax Museum. In a huge history project, 68 students selected a figure from the 1700s or 1800s. They read several
books about that figure and then wrote autobiograpies that in some cases were 20 pages. They then made costumes to assume
that figure's role in a school assembly....
.... Galef-Brown's Banneker said, ''The color of the skin is unrelated to the powers of the mind or intellectual being.'' No
standardized test nourishes the mind or intellect as do projects where one transports the body and mind back into time. Two
months later, my son's teacher, Isabel Eccles, said two boys who respectively played Frederick Douglass and John Brown -
Nephtaly Paul and Matt Kelsey - are contining to debate in class the merits of violence and nonviolence in the struggle for
freedom.
Paul and Kelsey have traveled back in time, and the past is now an obvious part of them. The next generation of leaders is
much more likely to come from children like Paul and Kelsey, who understand not just what people did, but how they came to
do what they did. The how is almost never on a standardized test.
Daily Hampshire Gazette, 6/15: Boston to hear MCAS critics
http://www.gazettenet.com/06152001/schools/3135.htm
.... Area MCAS critics associated with CARE, the Massachusetts Coalition for Authentic Reform in Education, are among
those expecting to testify.
CARE organizers' strategy is to focus on the requirement that students must pass the 10th-grade MCAS to graduate from high
school. In an e-mail alert to members, the group suggests testimony will be strongest if members stay focused on that goal.
Having met with thousands of parents and educators, the group is convinced that the most urgent priority is to eliminate the rule
that students pass the 10th-grade test to receive their diploma. "We think that's the No. 1 damaging, unfair and inequitable
aspect of the entire testing program," said CARE organizer Karen Hartke.
According to Sens. Michael Knapik, R-Westfield, a former member of the joint education committee, and Stanley C.
Rosenberg, D-Amherst, eliminating the graduation requirement is not in the cards. "There is no momentum for that in the
Legislature," Rosenberg said. "It's not in the tea leaves," Knapik said.....
.... Some area MCAS critics remain hopeful, nevertheless, that legislators eventually will soften up on their insistence on that
and other requirements.
While he agreed it is hard to know what can be said at next week's hearing to change lawmakers' minds, critic Michael Hussin
of Pelham said legislators appear more open to suggestions than they have been.....
Quincy Patriot Ledger, 6/14: MCAS appeals explored; students who fail may have options
http://ledger.southofboston.com/display/inn_news/news05.txt
During the next several months, as the Class of 2003 anxiously awaits the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment
System scores that could keep them from receiving high school diplomas, a committee created by acting Gov. Jane Swift will
be studying a possible appeals process for students who repeatedly fail the test.
The 13-member committee, recommended by Swift when she was lieutenant governor, is an attempt to answer
widespread criticism from parents and school leaders who say that no one test fairly measures education, and students who fail
the exam should not be barred from graduating.....
.... Randolph School Committee member Robert Gass, who is president of the Massachusetts Association of School
Committees, said the MCAS committee has looked at what methods other states use to address failing students, including
appeal processes, exemptions, retesting and diploma alternatives.
The committee is expected to present preliminary recommendations to Commissioner of Education David Driscoll by the
end of the summer.
The committee's work coincides with increasing skepticism about standardized tests. This spring, two local students found
errors on test questions, and the Whitman-Hanson school district asked the state to review its scores after finding apparent
clerical errors.
A report by The New York Times last month found scoring errors in other states' standardized tests forced thousands of
students into summer school and other remedial programs.
MCAS is distributed and graded by a different testing company, Harcourt Educational Measurements, but a sense of what
could go wrong has left some local educators uneasy.
"I thought to myself, geez, is there testing out there that we're giving our students that quite possibly the same thing could
happen?" Silver Lake Regional School Committee member Kevin MacRae said. "Unfortunately, the students are really the
pawns in a political game. The state has spent a great deal of money through educational reform and now it's time to prove that
the money was well-spent." ...
.... Research at Boston College's Lynch School of Education suggests that the potential pitfalls of high-stakes tests outweigh the
benefits, said Marguerite Clarke, associate director of the National Board on Educational Testing and Public Policy at the
Lynch School.
She said research shows that such tests lead to a greater dropout rate and a single test cannot accurately measure all
students' knowledge.
Berkshire Eagle, 6/12: Dem. Gov. candidates may use MCAS exam to unseat Swift
http://www.berkshireeagle.com/S-ASP-Bin/Ref/Index.ASP?puid=2187&spuid=2187&Indx=921296&Article=ON&id=61307392&ro=2
...... Senate President Thomas Birmingham, D-Chelsea, the author of the 1993 Education Reform Act, supports using the
MCAS test as a graduation requirement, with some modifications. Businessman Steve Grossman proposes an alternative path
to a diploma if students meet a series of requirements.
U.S. Rep. Marty Meehan, D-Lowell, supports the test as a graduation requirement only if the state develops a
comprehensive plan to help students who fail.
Former state Sen. Warren Tolman supports it as part of an entire assessment system but not as the sole criterion for
graduation. Secretary of State William Galvin doesn't want to abandon the MCAS, but believes there should be some flexibility
in granting diplomas. Treasurer Shannon O'Brien has not taken a position on the graduation requirement.
Despite support among top Democratic legislative leaders, such as Birmingham and House Speaker Thomas Finneran, for
the 2003 graduation requirement, the state party adopted a platform that includes opposition to the MCAS test. It says that the
party supports curriculum standards and fair student evaluation mechanisms, including, but not limited to, periodic testing.
"We oppose the use of the MCAS test as a solely decisive determinant of graduation from high school," the platform states.
Party spokeswoman Jane Lane said the party developed the platform after holding six public hearings across the state and
hearing testimony from local Democrats. She said concerns about the MCAS were raised at every meeting.
AP report/Daily Hampshire Gazette, 6/11: School watchdog agency stalled
http://www.gazettenet.com/06112001/news/2970.htm
(BOSTON AP) - Eighteen months after Gov. Paul Cellucci said a new watchdog agency would make sure schools spend
education dollars wisely, the administration has yet to figure out how the $3.9 million office is supposed to work.
The Office of Educational Quality and Accountability has been embroiled in controversy and bureaucratic infighting, say
those involved in the dispute.
``We're rushing ahead pell-mell on the side of holding students accountable, but not adults,'' said Paul Reville, chairman of
the Education Reform Review Commission. ``To fiddle and diddle and dawdle on this is inexcusable.'' ....
.... The Department of Education, meanwhile, created an accountability program in September 1999, with about 20
employees. They looked into schools that have foundered after scoring poorly on the MCAS tests to determine whether
they're likely to improve. Four have been declared ``underperforming'': Arlington School in Lawrence, the John Lynch Middle
School in Holyoke, the Matthew Kuss School in Fall River and the Roosevelt Junior High School in New Bedford.
But Cellucci and then-Lt. Gov. Jane Swift thought the Department of Education was too soft to audit school performance
and proposed the independent watchdog, said Rep. Brian Golden, D-Boston, who agreed with them. ``You need an
arm's-length agency whose sole purpose is to evaluate
performance in schools,'' said James Peyser, acting Gov. Swift's senior advisor for education and worker training. The
department of education is put into an awkward position when it evaluates the same school districts it's supposed to be helping,
he said. ....
.... On Jan. 4, Cellucci signed an appropriation to restore $13.2 million for urban schools in exchange for $3.9 million for the
independent watchdog and the authority to establish a five-member board he appointed to oversee it.
``Then it just went into limbo for the better part of the year,'' Reville said.
The commission members, led by Peyser, met for the first time May 2 and voted to seek a consulting firm to figure out how
to combine the auditing functions of the revenue and education departments into an independent office.
Last Monday was the deadline for consultants to submit their proposals to structure the office. ....
.... Senate President Thomas Birmingham, an architect of education reform, said he's disappointed by the delay.
``This administration received everything they said they needed - the management structure they wanted and the funding
level they requested - and have nothing to show for it yet,'' he said.
Birmingham, a Democrat, compared the accountability office with Swift's pledge to find a volunteer tutor for every student
who failed the MCAS, a plan that has received a lackluster response. ....
.... Another independent watchdog group views the Office of Educational Quality and Accountability as another layer of
bureaucracy.
``It seems counterproductive to form a new agency to do it,'' said Michael Widmer, president of the Massachusetts
Taxpayers Foundation. ``It should be part of the (education) department.''
On the Web:
To see Department of Education assessments:
http://www.doe.mass.edu/ata/eval01/prreports/01notice.html
Boston Globe, 6/10: Alfie Kohn: One size all education doesn't work
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/161/oped/One_size_fits_all_education_doesn_t_work+.shtml
.... The first meaning of standards has to do with outcomes: Here's how well we expect students to do. Of course, all students
deserve a quality education. But declaring that everyone must reach the same level is naive at best, cynical at worst, in light of
wildly unequal resources.
..... Consider the current accountability fad, with its callous, no-excuses rhetoric. It demands we set the bar higher for
achievement but fails to address underlying inequities. The idea is essentially to bully students and educators into better
performance. A wry bumper sticker captures this model of school reform: ''The beatings will continue until morale improves.''...
... Educationally speaking, standards are even more problematic when three things are true. First, when they consist of lists of
specific content, teachers must adopt a ''bunch- of-facts'' model of teaching that
discourages depth of understanding. Vast amounts of material are covered that even many successful students will not
remember, care about, or be able to use. Thinking is messy, while standards documents are nothing if not orderly. When
Harold Howe II, who was President Lyndon B. Johnson's
commissioner of education, was asked what national standards should be like if we had to have them, he summarized a lifetime
of wisdom in four words: They should be ''as vague as possible.''
Second, meaningful education is compromised when standards are chosen on the basis of whether they lend themselves
to measurement. Linda McNeil, who teaches education at Rice University, put it well: ''Measurable outcomes may be the least
significant results of learning.''
It's easier to quantify how many semicolons are used correctly in an essay than how many wonderful ideas it contains.
Those who make a fetish of specific, measurable standards end up dumbing down the learning.
Finally, we should beware of standards that are top-down mandates. Current standards-based reform may well be the
most undemocratic movement in the history of American education. Mandating uniform standards for the entire country will
only make things worse.
Boston Globe, 10/6: Harry Spence: Uniform treatment can erase stereotypes
http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/161/oped/Uniform_treatment_can_erase_stereotypes%2b.shtml
.....Clear educational standards help all adults - and particularly teachers - resist the pull of long-standing cultural stereotypes in
evaluating student performance and potential. By being precise about what students need to learn and what constitutes
evidence of successful learning - and by being clear that it is effort, not inherent ability, that determines how much we can learn
- the standards movement supports teachers in objectively evaluating student performance. Used correctly, standards hold the
greatest promise for genuine equality of educational opportunity.....
.... These are topics where long-standing stereotypes about the capacities of African-Americans, Hispanics, and girls have
eroded opportunity for these groups at every turn. Mastery of these subjects is crucial to effective participation in our
knowledge-based economy. Without clear standards, many able students will languish in math classes where it is assumed,
based on their identity, that they can't excel. Surely it is absurd to oppose standards in these areas.
Admittedly, language and literature are more culturally grounded. If standards merely reinforced the discarded notion that
only the traditional Anglo-American canon warrants attention, then those standards would contradict the deeply egalitarian
purposes of the standards movement. But in many states, the development of standards for English language arts have engaged
educators in powerful work. This is the work of celebrating diversity by defining what we deeply share across our class and
ethnic boundaries....
.... The danger of not having explicit educational standards is that implicit ones will inevitably prevail. These will reflect either the
idiosyncrasies of a particular teacher, the biases of a principal, or the
power hierarchies of an elected school committee, transmitted to children without examination or debate.
In my experience, that is far more dangerous to the well-being of all children, of whatever ethnicity or gender, than the
honest confrontation with ourselves and our aspirations for our culture that the development of standards depends on......
Metrowest Daily News, 6/6: Senate throws cash at schools
http://www.townonline.com/tol/news/education/15732771.htm
Senate leaders journeyed to a Roxbury school yesterday to pledge a $315 million hike in education spending next year,
despite signs that a slowing economy might squeeze state coffers.
If approved, the lucrative aid package would mark the seventh straight year the state has pushed through a major increase
in aid to local schools. The proposed Senate budget would reach $4.2 billion.
Senate President Thomas Birmingham said the hikes are needed to help children meet high achievement standards set
under the 1993 Education Reform Act, and boost what have to date been poor scores on state MCAS exams.....
.... The Senate proposal released yesterday would boost basic school aid by $221 million, add an additional $10 million to
help schools reduce class sizes, and put an extra $10 million into tutoring programs for students who fail the MCAS exam.
The Senate would also create a new $2.5 million fund to help expand after-school programs. The money would be given out
in annual grants. Communities would be required to match each dollar the state put in.....
