Great Neck, New York, is a suburban community outside New York City that has long been renowned for its excellent public schools. About 95% of its students graduate high school, and many are admitted to our nation’s finest colleges and universities.
At its meeting last Monday, the Great Neck school board unanimously passed a resolution opposing the state’s over reliance on standardized testing.
For their clarity of vision and their willingness to stand up for their students and for good education, I place the Great Neck Board of Education on the honor roll as champions of good public education.
Here is the resolution, which was read aloud in its entirety at the meeting and sent to the Governor, legislators, the Commissioner of Education, the Chancellor of the Board of Regents, and shared with the media:
June 3, 2013
RESOLUTION REGARDING OVERRELIANCE ON STANDARDIZED TESTING
A CALL TO THE GOVERNOR OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK, THE NEW YORK STATE COMMISSIONER OF EDUCATION, THE NEW YORK STATE BOARD OF REGENTS AND OTHER POLICYMAKERS TO STOP THE OVERRELIANCE ON STANDARDIZED TESTS AS A MEASURE OF STUDENT PERFORMANCE AND PRINCIPAL/TEACHER EFFECTIVENESS.
WHEREAS, every student deserves a quality public education dedicated to preparing engaged citizens, creative and critical thinkers and lifelong learners ready for college and careers; and
WHEREAS, the decline in state aid and support for public schools has forced our district to reduce programs and limited our ability to fully implement new programs mandated by the State such as the Common Core standards thereby creating an uneven rollout of the standards among school districts around the State; and
WHEREAS, while the implementation of the Common Core standards will ultimately help students, teachers and the teaching and learning process, the growing reliance on, and mismanagement of, standardized testing is eroding student learning time, narrowing the curriculum and jeopardizing the rich, meaningful education our students need and deserve; and
WHEREAS, there has been a reliance upon the Common Core standards in the development of state testing despite the fact that students have not been exposed to these standards for a sufficient amount of their school experience; and
WHEREAS, despite the fact that research recommends the use of multiple measures to gauge student performance and teacher effectiveness, the State’s growing reliance on standardized testing is adversely affecting students across all spectrums and the morale of our educators and is further draining already scarce resources; and
WHEREAS, the Federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act’s testing policies fail to appropriately accommodate the unique needs of students with disabilities and English language learners in assessing their academic achievements which results in test scores that do not accurately represent a true measure of the impact of teachers and schools; and
WHEREAS, it is time for policymakers to reconsider the number, duration and appropriate use of standardized tests so that our schools can refocus their efforts on improving student learning outcomes; now, therefore be it
RESOLVED, that we call upon Governor Andrew M. Cuomo, State Education Department Commissioner John B. King, Chancellor of the Board of Regents Merryl Tisch, Chair of the Senate Committee on Education John Flanagan, Senator Jack Martins, Chair of the Assembly Committee on Education Catherine Nolan, Assemblywoman Michelle Schimel and other policymakers to reduce the use of, and overreliance on, standardized testing.
Good for Great Neck and its belief in “Real Education.” We need more who work on an ethical and “Best Practices and Proven Methodology” not fantasy and ideology along with max profit.
An impressive display of strength and moral righteousness. It makes me glad to see. But GN is a top-rated district with something like a 98% graduation rate, in a neighborhood where the tiniest 3-br house is $500K+. Those are some pretty empowered people already, methinks. Let’s see Syracuse do this; then I’ll stand up and cheer. Loudly.
Long Island, New York is starting to step up to the plate. More and more districts are passing resolutions. Bravo to the ones who are leading the way!
The pendulum is swinging back, just as I knew it would.
Bethlehem Central School District in upstate NY , Albany County also did!!!
They are bringing it to the capitol on Saturday!
This is exciting news. I hope to see a domino effect!
Uh, did anyone see the propaganda here?
“WHEREAS, every student deserves a quality public education dedicated to preparing engaged citizens, creative and critical thinkers and lifelong learners ready for college and careers; and”
Okay ” help too many tests!” well goody, they dont want tests, but if you read the thing and all its pivot words and slogans, they want common core and all its odious
unesco collectivism. Great hegel. Bad news.
So did Rockville Center 🙂
Send me the Rockville Center resolution.
http://liherald.com/stories/Hundreds-opt-out,47249?content_source&category_id&search_filter=Opt+out+of+testing&event_mode&event_ts_from&list_type&order_by&order_sort&content_class&sub_type&town_id
I read about this in April after the Board was upset by the large number, 20%, of students who opted out.
Deer Park, NY passed a similar resolution last month.
If your district passed an anti-high-stakes testing resolution, send it to me.
Diane, what is your email?
Here is a link to Deer Park’s Board of Ed. minutes. Click on the April 23, 2013 minutes. It’s on pages 6 and 7 of the minutes: http://www.deerparkschools.org/boardofeducation/
The Ossining UFSD up in Westchester County passed a similar resolution.
I believe that Central Islip, Comsewogue, Deer Park, Middle Country, Sayville and West Islip on Long Island may have also passed similar resolutions.
Diane, here’s a list of NY schools that I know of that have passed similar resolutions. I will add Great Neck to the list. Any others missing, please let me know. Some I found links for resolutions and others not yet. http://wp.me/p3pStf-l
Can you confirm Rochester?? I was scanning the list to look for urban school districts, NY’s so called “Big Five” (Syracuse, Buffalo, Rochester, Yonkers, NYC). My theory (as I mentioned earlier up top) was that the well-to-do and very successful school districts (by conventional rubrics) would be more likely to feel empowered and emboldened enough to rebel, whereas the more beleaguered school districts would be more in a position where they felt forced to allow themselves to be exploited (for a variety few reasons).
If Rochester were throwing down, that would be a SERIOUS victory…
I see ?? marks next to the city’s name though on that list you posted. Clarify?
Sorry this is a bit off topic, but I wanted to jump from NY to NJ so folks are aware of what’s happening there. The state Board of Ed is about to put a new teacher evaluation code in place, basing 30% of the evaluation (for grade 4-8 math and English) on standardized test results. There’s a 2-month comment period, and a final decision due in September. If folks here don’t like this, please weigh in against it while there’s still time. For more info, see this local Op-Ed I wrote in Montclair and the links there.
Does this mean that those districts will actually go back to teaching next year instead of doing all the core curriculum and teaching for the test our kids got crammed down their throats this year? Are they ‘opting out’ now as a district? This simply says they ask the state to reconsider. What do they actually plan to do? If they do decide they are going back to teaching the way it was meant to be done, I’m ready to sell my house in St. James and move there. If not, what was the point in the resolution?
Los distritos no tienen cojones para no hacer esas locuras.
As I’ve said since the beginning of NCLB, nothing will stop this madness until the wealthy districts are affected. It (districts starting to stand up to the edubullies) just took about five more years than I envisioned.
Speaking of the NY State Regents, can anyone explain why it is that a group of non educators are the decision makers for education in NY State? I know it’s been that way for a very long time but that’s not an explanation. I’ve flown in planes; should I be a final decision maker for Boeing? The idea that the regents, the self professed education experts (Gates, Broad, the Waltons, Cuomo, Arne Duncan…) are the deciders about education by virtue of their wealth, their business acumen (better double check Windows 8, Bill), and political connections is a guarantee that decisions about education will be based on economics and politics, not on what is good for children.
I agree, I often wonder how many of these people who are deciding the fate of education ever stepped foot in front of a classroom and really understand that education is not a business. Anyone out of a classroom for more then five years, is out of touch with reality of running a classroom.
Our Board signed the resolution over a year ago and Texas signed even before us!
We also did not sign on for RttT like almost the rest of Flori-DUH did.
Palm Beach County Flori-DUH does not believe in RttT, NCLB or anything else that takes away education from our Children.
We need to go back to basics………………..!