New York Times Editorial Board on Annual Testing: “PREECCCIIOOOUUUUSSS!”
The Editorial Board of The New York Times is a reliable source of pro-education reform articles, and yesterday they published their take on the potential new testing environment that will be ushered in if the “Every Student Succeeds Act” (ESSA) is passed and signed into law. The Board was relieved that earlier drafts which “seemed poised to weaken…its protections for impoverished children” were changed in the final legislation and urged its passage by the Senate. What “protections” for our most vulnerable children were at stake?
Annual standardized testing of all children.
The Board acknowledged flaws with how No Child Left Behind labeled and sanctioned schools, noting that testing well beyond federally required exams proliferated as states and school districts administered diagnostic and practice exams lest they fail to prepare students for the examination with potentially dire consequences. They also correctly noted that the backlash against testing is justified – even if they only tangentially admit the central role of federal policy across two administrations in getting us to this point. However, they also celebrated the preservation of annual standardized testing of all students in grades 3 through 8 and once in high school, and they approved of maintaining the requirement that schools must test 95% of all students and called it a discouragement to the opt-out movement.
The Editorial Board treads familiar, almost entirely mythological, ground with their defense of annual testing of all students: Once upon a time, the federal government “kept doling out education money to the states no matter how New York Times Editorial Board on Annual Testing: “PREECCCIIOOOUUUUSSS!” | Daniel Katz, Ph.D.:
