Jersey Jazzman does his customary digging to show what is happening in Montclair, New Jersey, long considered one of the state’s best districts.
Reform means more testing.
Reform means excluding the views of patents, students, and the community.
Reform means that the town has a superintendent trained by the unaccredited Broad Academy and determined to raise test scores.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Wow….sounds exactly like the kind of reform the Sumter School District is experiencing.
Yes, for years I have been waiting for the district I work in (Paterson NJ) to approach education like Montclair. I wanted for my students, what my own children had. It is so discouraging that the opposite has now occurred and Montclair is changing it’s approach to mirror the education system in Paterson. How is this happening?
It’s actually a complex story, Marcella. I’ll have a follow up soon. Thanks for reading. And, as always, thanks Dr. R for reposting!
It is becuase many education reformers Don Katz, Chirs Cerf, Bambrick and others live in Montclair. Leslie Larson is married to Don Katz and she is on the Montclair BoE. The BoE in Montclair is appointed by the mayor. Given the radical actions to dismantle Montclair’s progressive and innovative school system, an unelected board means that it is not accountable to parents, community, and possibly not even to town politicians. Penny MacCormack comes from Trenton-Cerf. And in true Broad Academy style, she is not even certified for NJ. These are radical deforms–these people practice their corporate testing approach in true ideological style. Montclair parents have organized and have their own FB page, Montclair Cares about Schools.
I am a Montclair Parent, an educator and an outspoken critic of the Montclair Super on other issues. I also have followed Diane Ravitch for many years and read much of her work. That said, having researched as much as I can on the “testing” issue (in Montclair at least), I question the adamant criticism of this plan. I have not read any in depth information explaining the foundation of the criticism, other than “testing is bad”, “we have enough testing”, etc. I also have not hard from or read any responses to the issue from the teachers in Montclair. The Montclair Super/ BOE Strategic Plan states that teachers within the schools will be the ones creating these new tests. If this is the case (and I am certainly a wait and see person), what is their perspective. Everything I have read suggests that these proposed new tests will be designed as formative assessments, and therefore, not anything provocative, excessive, or out of line. A great many teaching programs in this country trains its student teachers in the importance of formative assessments and how to design, administer, and grade them. Formative assessments can be critical to understanding how and if students are learning material. Formative assessments very often take the form of short, non-standardized tests that relate directly to the material the teacher is presenting, and not necessarily to a State mandated Core Curriculum.
Before we all get too far into this effort of dismantling the process, let’s hear from the very teachers we respect and support – the ones who are teaching our kids.
Keith Adams