By contrast, most countries that outperform the United States on worldwide exams test students three times during their school careers. The National Assessment of Educational Progress, commonly referred to as NAEP, is a periodic testing of students in subjects like reading, math, science and writing, among others, that long predates Common Core. Thats why accurate information on student learning is so crucial – and like it or not, high-quality testing is an essential element of that.
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To reform the system, Obama’s first step would logically be to repeal incentives for schools based on standardized test scores.
While conceding the turnabout, Mr. Earnest said the president “has always made the case that standardized testing is not the only way to evaluate student progress, and that an overly time-consuming focus on standardized testing is not the best way to ensure that our students are getting a good education”. In Florida, the state’s sixty-seven school superintendents are up in arms because the latest high-stakes assessments are seriously flawed.
Jindal said teachers whose students are facing Core-aligned tests have no choice but to “teach to the test”, that is, teach the things they know will be on the exams.
“In the ultracompetitive global economy, the U.S.is facing a awful mismatch between high-skill jobs and our labor pool”, Bloomberg wrote. More time on testing means less time for teaching and learning. This decision is a response to intense push back by parents and teachers against the testing regime. Parents have mounted their own protests by opting their children out of the annual tests that the 2001 No Child Left Behind Act requires schools to give.
“In too many schools, there is unnecessary testing and not enough clarity of objective applied to the task of assessing students, consuming too much instructional time and creating undue stress for educators and students”, the administration’s testing action plan said. We just finished a pop quiz in English. This served to widen the gap in the quality of education between states while pushing schools toward more preparation for testing. I understand: Test-taking is no ones idea of fun, but it is part of life and shielding students from it does them a great disservice. In states with letter grade systems of accountability, school administrators quickly figured out how to game the system, concentrating their best teachers on students in the grades with mandated assessments, and, within those grades, on the students just below the thresholds of performance, which, if exceeded, would bump the school’s overall grade up. Can one really gauge how well the students are learning material and understanding new concepts from crunching numbers? The business interests seeking those profits fund the campaigns of politicians who mandate more and more tests. One of the best ways to help identify such teachers is via regular data on student performance. It called on Congress to “reduce over-testing” as it reauthorises the federal legislation governing the nation’s public elementary and secondary schools.
However, both proposal would keep in place the federal requirement that states test students annually. In Florida, they supported a bill to limit standardized testing in local schools. We ought to embrace that challenge, and make it a national mission to meet it in the near future.
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The department underscored that the president’s fiscal 2016 budget requested $403 million for state assessments, which it noted states will be able to use to review their existing test. By January, the department will provide additional guidance on what federal funds states and districts can tap to audit their current testing regimen.
