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By Tom Chorneau
Thursday, July 11, 2013
As California transitions from its existing student testing system to one based on the new national common standards – school administrators faced the unhappy prospects next year of subjecting a large number of students to both assessment programs next year.
But state officials said Wednesday that U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan has offered states participating in the consortium developing the new testing based on the common core a waiver allowing them relief from double testing.
There are no guideline yet governing how the waiver would work and expectations are that Duncan would be considering them state by state. But the good news, said Deb Sigman – deputy superintendent at the California Department of Education overseeing student achievement issues – is that federal officials recognize the problem.
At a hearing before the California State Board of Education, Sigman noted that California would be applying for the waiver and expected to have additional information about the proposal for the board to consider in September.
Pending legislation aimed at positioning California for transiting to the new assessment system by the 2013-14 school year calls for the suspension of the Standardized Testing and Reporting program – or STAR – as of July, 2013.
The bill, AB 484 Assemblywoman Susan Bonilla, D-Concord, includes an exception for those tests still required for