Janet Barresi, the dentist who is Oklahoma’s superintendent of schools, has decided to withdraw from the PARCC testing consortium because of the state’s disastrous experience with online assessment this past spring. Oklahoma’s not ready, she says, doesn’t have the technology, and can’t afford it.
The corporate reform group Stand on Children is disappointed. How will people compare children in Oklahoma to children in Maine if everyone writes their own tests?
Educators in the state are perplexed.
Is Common Core about common standards or common tests?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It should be nothing more than are you competent and at grade level in the required subjects and that is all. How you get there is why it is not a national system I guess besides there being no U.S. Constitutional authority. Whether students can do a certain level of math, read and comprehend language at a certain level should be universal. How to get there, just get there. It is all about management and that means the board, superintendent and administrators must be competent. If not, a mess. The Fish Rots from the Head. Hopefully, with a new board at LAUSD, there will be no more rotting fish and then soon at many others also. Let’s make it happen. This is “The Art of the Possible.”
Stand ON Children? I’m sure that’s a Freudian slip and not a typo. I’m glad the dentist-cum-superintendent had the wisdom to extract OK from the PARCC. I would give my eye teeth if CT followed suit.
Diane: It seems to me that Common Core is more about common tests for test publishers & common concepts for textbook publishers than improving educational outcomes.
CORRECT!!!
It is the idolization of data that is driving all RttT reforms. Reformers have put their faith in a false idol. All testing results are flawed and high-stakes use of test results should be legislated as illegal. This misuse of student data … this miserable nightmare … must end.
As an Oklahoma educator, I am glad to see the move but I also know that Baressi is on the board for PARCC. I think there is something interesting happening here. Unfortunately, she is using our schools for her personal gain?
Yes, Stand On Children’s Throats…
The state of Oklahoma can’t afford the technology, no surprise there.
The core and the tests are a black hole for money. File it away in the history books with star wars space shield or a colony on the moon.
I’m really worried about the cost of the tech upgrades and then the tests. We’re a rural district, our governor has cut money to public schools in order to expand charter schools and vouchers, and now reformers want to put in a whole new testing scheme?
Who is going to pay for this? What (further) sacrifices are public schools supposed to make to comply with reform initiatives?
I haven’t seen a single benefit to our schools in 13 years of complying with these “innovations”?
“Reform” is ALL downside for kids in traditional public schools.
Baressi withdrew from PARCC and blamed the inefficiencies of the SCHOOLS for the problem. Never mind that Statewide we had thousands of students whose tests crashed repeatedly. These students were supposed to sit idly for as long as an hour then resume the test. Many more had incomplete tests close and then those scores were counted. Just a pure farce. What is not mentioned in the article is Baressi saying The OK State Dept Of ED., Herself and McGraw Hill would work together to publish new tests just for Oklahoma students. So NO it is not an end of testing. It is an opportunity for McGraw Hill to bill the State millions of dollars to develop tests specific to Oklahoma. I am certain Baressi will be rewarded with a large campaign donation for her upcoming Primary contest.