by Fred Smith
Change the Stakes is a group of parents and
educators who want the best education for all children.
We are a work in progress and about progress for
the entire New York public school system.
We are a growing group
concerned with the harm high-stakes testing is doing to our children
and schools. We oppose an overemphasis on tests and misuse of the
results for purposes they were never intended to serve. We believe high-stakes
testing must be replaced by valid forms of student, teacher, and school
assessment.
We are asking parents and community members from
districts across the city to join hands to improve teaching and learning
opportunities for all children. We believe a good education is the right
of every child and a right that every parent should demand. It must
never become a matter of luck, lottery or good fortune. And good education
is not something that can be measured by a test score.
What is High-Stakes Testing?
We strongly reject the way
multiple-choice tests are hurting our children and denying them highquality
teaching in a healthy atmosphere that fosters the full development of their
capabilities.
The Department of Education and the State
Education Department have made testing a substitute for education. Testing
has come to dominate school activity, dimming children’s natural enthusiasm
for learning. It has made 8-year olds anxious about what could happen if
they don’t do well on the tests. So
much time is spent preparing students to take the annual statewide exams, field
tests and an endless number of other tests that history, music, art and
gym have been squeezed out of the school day. Testing has been used to
bully teachers, turning them into drill instructors who must follow stifling
classroom routines to generate high test scores. It has
made teachers fear for their jobs, knowing they will be rated ineffective if
their students don’t do well on unreliable exams. It has made them
compete against each other in an effort to survive, rather than work
cooperatively.
And it has forced principals to intensify
pressure to produce good-looking results, no matter what, because they are
being threatened with the reorganization or possible closure of their schools
if they fail to do so.
Where high stakes tests are the rule, it is no surprise that
cheating has often followed. These different forms of punishment
inflicted upon the public school system by high-stakes testing have been
called accountability. The end result has been to create hundreds and
hundreds of elementary and middle schools in which disruption and
instability are the norm. Students,
teachers and principals are held accountable, but the low quality of the tests
themselves is never accounted for. Still there is another equally troubling and
unacceptable aspect of all the testing. As more and more testing has
been piled on every child—parents have been left out of the discussion. We are offended by the lack of respect
shown to parents who have been kept in the dark by the DOE and SED about
all the testing that is taking place and we demand immediate and specific
answers to basic questions. We are entitled to a complete test
inventory—a matter of accountability on the part of the city and state
officials responsible for approving, organizing and implementing the various
testing programs.
To break down the information for us in an
understandable way, we need to know about the testing that is being conducted
this year (July 1, 2012 to June 30, 2013) on a grade-by-grade basis from K-12:
How many professionally designed and developed
tests are being given in New York schools? What is the purpose of each?
When are they scheduled to be given? How much time is spent
administering each test? How many students and schools are involved?
And how much money does each test cost (the material, the scoring and the
reports)?
Which publisher constructed or supplied each
exam? Who owns the exams we are paying for? Which ones are
field tests—tests and questions that do not count but enable commercial
publishers to develop and sell exams for future use? Which exams are used
to screen children for entry into special programs or selective schools?
Which must be passed as a basis for promotion or to fulfill
graduation requirements? Surely, the city and state know and can
give us these details for the current year.
What Else We Believe and What Parents Must Know
Change the Stakes believes in sunshine laws and
the absolute right of parents to know what is happening to their children
in school. We believe parents must have a real voice in the life of their
schools. We see efforts to keep parents uninformed as a way to prevent
opposition to questionable policies, programs and weak test instruments
and a sure sign that those running the school system have little regard
for us.
We wonder when the state will make the 2012 ELA
and math exams available. In the past, parents and interested
parties could see the actual items online—the items that counted and would not
be used again. Thus far, SED has withheld the information. We believe in
sound alternatives to the continued use of statewide multiple-choice and short
answer exams, which lack reliability and, therefore, lead to invalid
decisions about students, teachers, schools.
We demand that the state set forth a policy on how alternative
assessments of performance shall be carried out this year to meet agreed upon
standards. A clear statement is
required explaining howprojects and portfolios will be used as measures of
achievement and growth. It must reflect high expectations for all children
and specify the kind of work and behavior students will be evaluated on
to provide relevant evidence of learning and ability.
It is imperative that parents who choose not to
have their children participate in the April 2013 state exams know in
advance what the alternate assessment procedures will entail. We are tired of
hearing that the state offers no opt-out provision or that the sky will
fall if parents object to marching along with test-driven education. Other
large states have processes recognizing the legitimate conscientious choice
parents/guardians have made to protect their children from harmful testing
programs.
Guidelines for parents and teachers should be
issued by SED spelling out the methods to be followed, the teacher
training to be given and the criteria that will be applied uniformly to assess
the progress of the opt-out children. We
insist that the guidelines direct principals to provide meaningful
educational activities to children who do not take the 2013 exams.
Missing school or sitting in an office are not an option. Principals
need to be cautioned that parents requesting to keep their children out of the
exams should not be harassed nor have their children mistreated at school in
any way.
We demand a statewide directive that requires
timely parent notification about all field testing programs and creates a
mechanism that allows us to say “NO” to this extra burden and the use of children
as subjects in test research projects. We strongly believe that insinuating
children into test development projects without informed parental consent
is a violation of parent and student rights.
We were shocked to learn that our schools gave
field tests last month in reading, math and science without letting
parents know. ACT and Pearson bought entry into schools by offering principals
I-Podsin return for student participation—behind the backs of parents. We view
this as a bribe and an end run that lets publishers exploit children and
take away more school time to try out test material.
We want written, legally binding assurances from the state and
city that they will not engage in or enter agreements that allow any
entities to use individual information about students or to distribute such
data to third parties without the knowledge and consent of parents or guardians.
We believe the right to privacy is
fundamental and must be protected and we demand harsh punishment of any party who
violates these restrictions.
We know that the state’s testing program flows
from the national No Child Left Behind Act, which was originally intended
to help the most vulnerable students. Instead, NCLB’s testing
requirements are now widely acknowledged to have placed severe stress on
English Language Learners (ELLs) and children with special needs. As parents, along with teachers, guidance
counselors and child psychologists, we know firsthand the kind of
frustration and struggle the tests put such children through. To what end?
We believe that federal policies and practices with regard to these
student populations, which are largest in urban areas, need to be
overhauled.
Finally, many Black and Hispanic parents have
felt arguably that testing was fairer to their children than leaving
decisions about them to unsympathetic, disparaging or biased teachers and
principals.
Over the last decade, however, the era of high-stakes testing, the
achievement gap has closed little or none for these students--despite all
the exams. We cannot fix one set of problems with ineffective solutions
dressed in the cloak of reform.
And the way the results have been distorted over time has left
high school students from poor economic households, deficient in reading
and math, unprepared to find other than low-level jobs and, should they
graduate, unready to do college level work. All of the testing has added no
benefit or value whatsoever to the populations NCLB promised to help.
The need to change the stakes cuts across all
lines. Parents should never forget: We are the schools!
In Unity,
Fred Smith for Change the Stakes
Please join us. You may follow us at
www.changethestakes.org. We look forward to working together with
you and other parents in your school or community to build a better education
for all children.
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