The school board of the San Diego Unified School District voted 5-0 to urge Congress to eliminate the federal mandate of annual testing, Read their full statement below.
Remember that one of the crucial elements in the grassroots movement to roll back the tide of high-stakes testing started in Texas, when school board after school board voted to oppose high-stakes testing, and eventually more than 80% of the state’s school boards voted against high-stakes testing. The legislature heard the voters, and pulled back from a proposal to require 15 tests for high school graduation.
This is how a movement grows. Congress is rewriting NCLB as you read this. It is said to be on a fast-track for reauthorization in both the Senate and the House. Almost all the D.C.-based interest groups have joined to demand that YOUR children and YOUR students be tested annually. The best way to stop this out-of-control train of failed policies is to organize, speak up, speak out, demonstrate. Urge your school board to adopt a resolution akin to the one passed unanimously in San Diego. Visit the offices of Senator Patty Murray, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Senator Al Franken, and all the Congressmen and Senators who are about to pass legislation keeping NCLB intact for another seven years. Make your voice heard.
The resolution adopted by the school board of the San Diego Unified School District on February 10:
SAN DIEGO UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT
RESOLUTION IN THE MATTER OF SUPPORT
TO REMOVE THE ANNUAL TESTING REQUIREMENT FROM THE ELEMENTARY
AND SECONDARY EDUCATION ACT (ESEA)
AND MAKE OTHER MODIFICATIONS AS CONGRESS CONSIDERS REAUTHORIZATION OF ESEA (NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND) )
RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), currently known as the “No Child Left Behind Act of 2001,” was due for reauthorization in 2007, and the U.S. Congress has not reached a bipartisan agreement that will ensure passage to streamline existing federal requirements and allow states and local educational agencies to develop and implement policies that will best support students; and
WHEREAS, there are several significant aspects of ESEA that should be amended during the Act’s reauthorization, including the elimination of sanctions and unintended consequences; granting states and local educational agencies greater local flexibility; the elimination of federally mandated, annual standardized testing; and maintaining provisions of ESEA that support its original intent of supporting students with the greatest needs; and
WHEREAS, the nation’s future, social well-being and economic competitiveness relies on a high- quality public education system that prepares all students for college, careers, citizenship, and lifelong learning; and
WHEREAS, the over-reliance on high-stakes standardized testing in state and federal accountability systems is undermining educational quality and equity in U.S. public schools by hampering educators’ efforts to focus on the broad range of learning experiences that promote the innovation, creativity, problem solving, collaboration, communication, critical thinking and deep subject-matter knowledge that will allow students to contribute and thrive in a democracy and an increasingly global society and economy; and
WHEREAS, it is widely recognized that high-stakes standardized testing is an inadequate and often unreliable measure of both student learning and educator effectiveness, and the over-reliance on standardized testing has caused considerable collateral damage in many schools, including narrowing the curriculum, teaching to the test, reducing student’s love of learning, pushing students out of school, driving teachers out of the profession, and undermining school climate; and
WHEREAS, the San Diego Unified Vision 2020, long-term strategic plan, Quality Schools in Every Neighborhood, supports and provides for quality teaching, access to broad and challenging curriculum for all students, closing the achievement gap with high expectations for all, and is committed to using multiple formative measures of success that go beyond standardized achievement tests; and
WHEREAS, the ESEA Discussion Draft repeals the long-standing Title I Maintenance of Effort (MOE) and the Title IX General Provisions MOE requirement, and without them, state and local education funding could be lowered by states with no consequences to the state’s ongoing receipt of federal aid; and
WHEREAS, the ESEA Discussion Draft freezes funding for reauthorized programs for Fiscal Year 2016 through Fiscal Year 2021, eroding the investment of federal funding for public education that would result in reductions in services to student subgroups that require additional investments and support systems, including low-income, English learners, and students of color; and
NOW, THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED, that the Board of Education of the San Diego Unified School District calls on the U.S. Congress and the Obama Administration to overhaul the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, currently known as the “No Child Left Behind Act,” eliminate the federally- mandated, annual testing requirement in each of Grades 3 through 9, and at least once in Grades 9 through 12; promote multiple forms of evidence of student learning and school quality in accountability; and not mandate any fixed role for the use of student test scores in evaluating educators; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Board of Education of the San Diego Unified School District calls on the U.S. Congress to reinstate the current Maintenance of Effort requirements in ESEA to protect the integrity and benefits of federal ESEA programs; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Board of Education of the San Diego Unified School District supports a ESEA reauthorization bill that provides states and local educational agencies with additional flexibility to design their own accountability systems, including how states identify schools that are under-performing and determine appropriate interventions or technical assistance to support student growth and achievement, and support the use of multiple measures and growth models of academic achievement that reflect a well-rounded education necessary for success in the 21st century; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Board of Education of the San Diego Unified School District supports a ESEA reauthorization bill that provides school districts the flexibility and resources needed to respond to the educational challenges in local communities, and provides greater local flexibility in the use of ESEA funding for Titles I, II and III as states and school districts are in the best position to make spending decisions to facilitate local innovation and student achievement, without placing undue burdens on districts that would adversely impact effective governance; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Board of Education of the San Diego Unified School District supports an ESEA reauthorization bill that eliminates the inflexible sanctions and prescriptive actions that currently result in more schools being identified as Program Improvement if one or more student subgroup misses Annual Yearly Progress, as without the sanctions, districts would have more flexibility to use Title I funds to develop and/or implement programs and services that have evidence of improving student outcomes and advancing academic progress of all student subgroups; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Board of Education of the San Diego Unified School District calls on the U.S. Congress to remove the funding freeze for reauthorized ESEA programs that would severely cut services over the next six years, and urges the passage of a modernized version of ESEA that is fully supported by federal investments in Title I, which has been woefully underfunded for decades.
Adopted and approved by the Board of Education of the San Diego Unified School District at the regular meeting held on the 10th day of February 2015.
Are they talking about the Common Core tests (smarter balance and parrc)? So, if schools in San Diego do not take these tests then what happens to the Common Core standards? I live in Vista (25 minutes north of San Diego) and up here the core is alive and well, including assessing kids like crazy. Just because SD votes to get rid of federal testing doesn’t mean they won’t test. I’m sure they will develop or purchase their own versions of testing the “core.”
Momoffive, you are mixing apples and oranges and confusing the issue. The No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) is a United States Act of Congress that is a reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which included Title I, the government’s flagship aid program for disadvantaged students. NCLB supports standards-based education reform based on the premise that setting high standards and establishing measurable goals can improve individual outcomes in education.
The Act requires states to develop assessments in basic skills. To receive federal school funding, states must give these assessments to all students at select grade levels. The Act does not assert a national achievement standard. Each individual state develops its own standards. NCLB expanded the federal role in public education through annual testing, annual academic progress, report cards, teacher qualifications, and funding changes.
So, having quoted that from Wikipedia for you, it is incumbent upon you to discern how Common Core fits INTO the NCLB Act.
Here is the information that tells you how the PARCC and SBAC tests, hence the Common Core, are now embedded in the Elementary and Secondrd Education Act.
The PARCC and SBAC tests are intended to replace state assessments now required by the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. It is not clear yet whether the current timeline will be tossed in the reauthorization of ESEA–now being considered in Congress.
To see the timeline with state-specific dates for the phase-in of PARCC and SBAC tests—based on requests and approvals of ESEA waivers granted or pending by the Secretary of Education’s office–see https://www2.ed.gov/policy/…/esea-flexibility/eseaflexstchart614.doc
NCLB mandates testing.
Eliminate the hazing mandate and you deal a death blow to CCSS and its conjoined twin, high-stakes standardized testing. And at least make future iterations of this incarnation of $tudent $ucce$$ very difficult to pull off.
From Dr. Frederick Hess of the American Enterprise Institute:
[start quote]
In truth, the idea that the Common Core might be a “game-changer” has little to do with the Common Core standards themselves, and everything to do with stuff attached to them, especially the adoption of common tests that make it possible to readily compare schools, programs, districts, and states (of course, the announcement that one state after another is opting out of the two testing consortia is hollowing out this promise).
But the Common Core will only make a dramatic difference if those test results are used to evaluate schools or hire, pay, or fire teachers; or if the effort serves to alter teacher preparation, revamp instructional materials, or compel teachers to change what students read and do. And, of course, advocates have made clear that this is exactly what they have in mind. When they refer to the “Common Core,” they don’t just mean the words on paper–what they really have in mind is this whole complex of changes.
[end quote]
To access the original blog entry by Dr. Hess and for much valuable contextual information, go to—
Link: https://deutsch29.wordpress.com/2013/12/28/the-american-enterprise-institute-common-core-and-good-cop/
And remember that the above is by a charter member of the self-proclaimed “education reform” establishment…
😎
You are the best… wish I was going to the NPE and we could meet.
If you wish to email with me, go to my author’s page at oped news, where you can message me with your email, and I will respond in an email.
http://www.opednews.com/author/author40790.html
Cross-posted at http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/San-Diego-School-Board-Vot-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Diane-Ravitch_School-150212-87.html#comment533153
where you can get the many embedded links…I wrote
The schools were doing fine until failure was invented so this collapse could be made to happen.
Now, there is a place where you can follow the people who are devoted to public education. The Network for Public Education (NPE) whose president is Diane Ravitch, will keep you up to date with briefs on what can be done, what is being done to end the Duncan rant and the deform movement.
Dr. Ravitch’s blog, offers the insight and the details missing around the 50 states, and the 15,880 districts that are under attack by big money. USE THE SEARCH FIELD HERE and put in “charter schools,” to see the ‘corruption’, and the plan to replace public education with failure.
Put in Koch Brothers , to see how the curricula can be made to re-write history in North Carolina, or put in “Common Core,”and read the truth about what a curricula IS NOT —how Gates nand 28 non-educators wrote these plans to end critical thinking lessons by professionals in their own practice, and replace these lessons with ‘reading for information,’ so kids could pass tests.
Ravitch condemned the NCLB in her book, “The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education”. In “Reign Of Error” she “dispels the clouds of reform rhetoric to reveal the destructiveness of the privatization agenda.”
Thanks to Bush and his NCLB plan to rate schools, the ‘fix’ for public education reform became:test, test, test; and thus, as more and more schools failed, they could be replaced by vouchers and charter schools, which offered little except profits for the privateers, using taxpayer money…or what little of it was funding public schools as austerity robbed the people of everything they need.
The NCLB is about to be -re-authorized. Read what Ravitch wrote to Lamar Alexander about this.
Dark Money behind the scenes paid for the media attacks on anything and everything the robber barons want… and so began the Duncan narrative about ‘bad teachers’ and praise for testing and evaluation as the reform, no evidence required, and the public is bamboozled
If SD board RELLY wants to make a difference
– then inform parents that the tests are psychometric (personality testing) with data gathered/stored/shared with many suppliers.
– Tell the parents how 557 principals in NY have advised parents to opt out because of the damaging affects of the tests (defecating, vomiting, self mutilation) http://scfeeney.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/anopenlettertonewyorkparents_7apr14.pdf
– Then let the parents know how to opt out: http://www.pacificjustice.org/california-common-core-data-opt-out-form.html
High stakes testing under any name is damaging to public schools and our students; TRUST your teachers to know how well or poorly your student is doing; GO to school and talk to teachers and weigh in with local school boards; demand the madness STOP
Once again, I refer here to the genuine National Standards research by Pew in the 90s, on the Resnick (at Harvard) thesis THE 8 PRINCIPLES OF LEARNING.
The 4th principle was CALLED AUTHENTIC ASSESSMENT AND GENUINE EVALUATION, and it was PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT to be accomplished by the TEACHER, for the purposes of planning to meet the needs of each child. NOWHERE in the real standards was there anything about standardized tests and even the word ‘tests’ was absent as a noun.
The NCLB act buried the real standards and made TESTS the core of the mandate so the schools could be rated as failing, and could be fixed by giving taxpayer money to charter schools. The NCLB act buried the role of the professional, and silenced the voice of the teacher so the liars in chief like Cuomo and Duncan could take the bully pulpit.
Exactly what the NEA wants. No measurement, no standards, just trust us. After years of decline we are heading back to the days when the education mafia rules the roost. They resist any kind of measurement, incentives for doing a good job, and therefore, improvement. Just trust us, we know what’s best for you.
Woo- that is harsh! High stakes tests show what teachers already know about many of their students. Their results may serve a purpose when assessing a student’s needs and growth, but their purpose has clearly been extended too far. There are other forms of assessment and measurement that provide feedback that is more useful when planning instruction/intervention.
If you want to measure a teacher’s performance, develop a fair measurement. Do not use high stakes student tests impacted by variables more numerous than teacher performance.
The casualties of this political war are clearly those students in most need, as well as good teachers worn down by the fallout..