More Parents Opting Kids out of Standardized Tests
More Parents Opting Kids out of Standardized Tests
While his eighth-grade classmates took state standardized tests this spring, Tucker Richardson woke up late and played basketball in his Delaware Township driveway.
Tucker's parents, Wendy and Will, are part of a small but growing number of parents nationwide who are ensuring their children do not participate in standardized testing. They are opposed to the practice for myriad reasons, including the stress they believe it brings on young students, discomfort with tests being used to gauge teacher performance, fear that corporate influence is overriding education and concern that test prep is narrowing curricula down to the minimum needed to pass an exam.
"I'm just opposed to the way high-stakes testing is being used to evaluate teachers, the way it's being used to define what's happening in classrooms," said Will Richardson, an educational consultant and former teacher. "These tests are not meant to evaluate teachers. They're meant to find out what kids know."
The opt-out movement, as it is called, is small but growing. It has been brewing for several years via word of mouth and social media, especially through Facebook. The "Long Island opt-out info" Facebook page has more than 9,200 members, many of them rallying at a Port Jefferson Station, N.Y., high school last month after a group of principals called this year's state tests — and their low scores — a "debacle."
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"We encourage parents to have their kids take the test, but there are no consequences of any kind," she said. "There's no formal process for opting out. They can keep their child home that day and write an excuse."
Maria Ferguson of the Center on Education Policy said she thinks the practice of parents pulling their kids out of standardized tests is symbolic.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/parents-opting-kids-standardized-tests-20193807
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Conclusions
Teachers and students feel a tremendous amount of pressure associated with high-stakes testing to produce high student test scores.
The pressure felt by teachers associated with high-stakes testing results in drill and practice type of curriculum and instruction.
There appears to be a consistent increase in test preparation activities in the period immediately preceding the administration of a test, ending abruptly following the test.
Teachers generally perceive a top-down filtering of test-related pressure, beginning with central office administrators down to the classroom level.
There is a clear feeling among most teachers that the focus on minimum standards and basic skills has diminished both the richness and depth of the curriculum and professional autonomy over curricular and instructional decisions.
The pressure felt by high-stakes testing is greater in disadvantaged schools and results in more drill and practice instruction.
There is a firm belief among teachers in both low-stakes and high-stakes testing environments that the pressure to improve student scores is steadily increasing.
Gifted and talented students feel pressure to perform well to bring up all scores, which can often result in disengagement from the learning process.
Many gifted students report frustration and resentment at the slow pace of learning and repetitive nature of test preparation.
It appears that the current high-stakes testing movement affects gifted students by providing a curricular ceiling that is well below their own academic potential.
ted.uconn.edu/nrcgt/moonbrja.html
My friend (and soon to be guest on a radio show I do on Friday nights) has a Masters in Education and has also written on the topic. She and other professionals despise the testing as it removes their ability to manage and teach classes and forces the focus to be more narrow, much as the failed attempt at Outcome Based Education in the 90's. Students are not robots or computers to be programmed - they are all different and have differing abilities on various topics. We cannot expect them all to be the same, they never will be.
Centralizing education on a federal level is a terrible idea and trying to make a one size fits all testing criteria is just plain stupid.
