CURMUDGUCATION: Scrap The Big Standardized Test!

CURMUDGUCATION: Scrap The Big Standardized Test!

Scrap The Big Standardized Test!

Education writers have been saying it for a week. I said it.

There are plenty of reasons to question the high stakes use of these tests in any year, but one thing is clear—this year, they will produce no useful data.

Peter DeWitt said it.

Given all of the stressors that students, teachers, staff and leaders are under right now, and given the fact that there is still so much we do not know about Covid-19, might education departments, like NY State's Education Department, take this one step further and cancel the assessments all together for just one year? Schools have enough to worry about, and high stakes testing should not be on their plate of concerns. 

Steven Singer said it.

This is at least a month of wasted schooling. If we got rid of all the pretests and administrator required teaching-to-the-test, we could clear up a good 9-weeks of extra class time.

Education leaders in states across the country are saying it. Here's Michigan state superintendent Michael Rice:

In many cases, children will have experienced trauma. In other cases, they will simply need to be reacclimated into their schools. In all cases, students will have missed instruction, and this lost instruction will render any conclusions about test results dubious, especially any comparisons CONTINUE READING: CURMUDGUCATION: Scrap The Big Standardized Test!