Educators debate validity of MAP testing
The set of exams now under attack in Seattle was originally developed in the ’70s by an informal group of school administrators from Washington and Oregon, an attempt to improve upon the tests of their day.
Seattle Times education reporter
GREG GILBERT / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Jesse Hagopian, left, a Garfield teacher, spoke out against MAP testing during a noontime teacher rally in February.
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Four decades ago at the Jolly Roger restaurant in Chehalis, a group of school administrators dreamed up the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP), the set of exams that is now under attack in Seattle.
The group met in Chehalis because it sits halfway between Seattle and Portland, where most of them worked. They chose the Jolly Roger because they liked its giant cinnamon rolls.
They were mostly research and testing directors, not teachers. They were dissatisfied with the standardized tests of their time, national exams that students took whether they lived in Connecticut or California.
So they created a new set of tests they hoped would provide better information about how all their students were doing — exams measured academic growth, rather than just overall achievement.
They focused the questions on material they knew their school districts were teaching and they made sure the results could be available within days, not the weeks or months it took for national tests. At