Andre Green is the new executive director of FairTest.

ANDRE GREEN TO BE NEW FAIRTEST EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR
WHEN DR. MONTY NEILL RETIRES THIS SUMMER

The National Center for Fair & Open Testing (FairTest) has announced that Andre L. Green will become executive director of the country’s leading assessment reform organization. Dr. Monty Neill, FairTest’s long-term leader, is retiring this summer.

As the grandson of sharecroppers, the child of a single mother, a product of Louisiana public schools, and the first person in his family to earn a bachelor’s degree, Andre Green knows the power of a quality education. He brings almost 20 years of experience in education policy, operations, technology, data analysis and advocacy to FairTest.

After graduating from Bard College at Simon’s Rock, a test-optional school, at age 19, Andre moved to Somerville, Massachusetts to teach fifth grade. After teaching, he was a juvenile detention center case manager. He then worked at YouthBuild USA, helping disadvantaged young people earn high school credentials while developing job skills.

Most recently, he was the first Political Director at MASSCreative, Massachusetts’ statewide arts advocacy group, serving as its primary liaison to elected officials. For the past year, he has consulted with FairTest on development of a new strategic plan.

Andre was elected to the Somerville (MA) School Committee in 2015 and currently serves as its Chair. He was the lead author of a resolution calling for a three-year moratorium on high-stakes testing.

Andre is a past champion on the television game show “Jeopardy!” He lives in Massachusetts with his wife, Jessica, and daughter Madelynn.

On Thursday evening, November 8 , 2018, FairTest will sponsor a special event to honor Monty Neill and welcome Andre Green. The program will take place at the Multicultural Arts Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts from 6:00pm to 8:30pm. FairTest will present its “Deborah W. Meier Hero in Education Award” to Dr. Neill for his decades of work for assessment reform. Details about the event will be posted at http://www.fairtest.org.

Founded in 1985 and based in metropolitan Boston, FairTest runs campaigns for assessment reform policies such as test-optional college admissions. It also opposes misuses of standardized exams in making educational decisions.

Green wrote the following letter to Education Week, in response to their assertion in an article that test resistance is slowing down or dying:

Assessment reform movement is alive, strong — and winning – at the state and local level. When it comes to public education, it has always been state capitals and local governments where key decisions are made, not Washington, DC. With ESSA the law of the land, the fight to make real progress in reducing standardized exam misuse and overuse will take place in state legislatures, boards of education and school committees.

And we’re making that progress; not “slowing to a crawl.” The number of states that require an exit exam to graduate has dropped from more than two dozen to 12–with Indiana eliminating their test just this summer. We’re seeing interest in reducing state testing from the new Governor of New Jersey, and from gubernatorial candidates in states like Georgia. Several states, such as New York, New Hampshire and Massachusetts are piloting alternative assessments that may prove to be national models. Organizations like the NAACP are speaking out more strongly about the need to replace flawed tests.

Make no mistake, when a future President and Congress take up ESEA again in several years, testing reformers will be there. And we’ll be joined by allies from school districts, states and community groups where better assessment policies have already been adopted and implemented.

Andre Green
Executive Director, FairTest