#STOPESEA
For several months, I have been blogging like a madman about my suspicions that we are being ushered into a new era of embedded, competency-based assessment that has been planned behind the scenes for years by the testing, ed-tech, and student loan industries.
And now here we are. The final bicameral version of the ESEA rewrite has been released for us to view, two days before the House intends to vote on it.
I wonder – are our Congressmen busy doing what many of us are tonight? Searching this document madly to see what’s in it? Trying to make sense of which clauses go with what, and what all the double-speak actually means?
Do they know what is meant by “competency-based“? How about “instructionally embedded”? Do they know the difference between community schools and Community Schools?
What will your representative think when (if?) he or she reads this section below? Do they know who stands to gain from all of this, and what it may mean for our kids?
INNOVATIVE ASSESSMENT SYSTEM DEFINED:
The term ‘innovative assessment system’ means a system of assessments that may include competency-based assessments, instructionally embedded assessments, interim assessments, cumulative year-end assessments, or performance-based assessments that combine into an
annual summative determination for a student which may be administered through computer adaptive assessments; and assessments that validate when students are ready to demonstrate mastery or proficiency and allow for differentiated student support based on individual learning needs.
Please call if you haven’t and ask them to delay this vote. We need time to explain to them what all this means.
202-224-3121