Opting out of testing in Connecticut — now a civic duty by Drew Michael McWeeney
Drew Michael McWeeney is an Early Childhood Education major and teacher candidate at Southern Connecticut State University. His powerful commentary piece first appeared in the CTMirror. You can read and comment on it at:http://ctviewpoints.org/2016/10/13/opinion-drew-michael-mcweeney/
Opting out of testing in Connecticut — now a civic duty
Since implementation of the new teacher evaluation system by Gov. Dannel Malloy and the legislature, I have believed opting out of standardized testing was a student right. I now see it as a civic responsibility.
Under the current system, 45 percent of a teacher’s evaluation is based on student test scores. According to a 2014 Brookings Institute study, however, teachers can elect not to be evaluated on the scores if a significant number of students do not show up to take their standardized tests. This is because having too few test takers can cause the test data to produce false results, labeling a teachers’ classes either high- or low-performing incorrectly.
What Malloy and the legislature did was a direct attack on public education under the guise of raising standards. Because of this, here is the narrative the system creates: Since students are failing tests, teachers must be poor performers. Therefore since public school teachers are poor performers, let us close down public education and Opting out of testing in Connecticut — now a civic duty by Drew Michael McWeeney - Wait What?: