Steinhauer: NJEA far from alone on PARCC concerns

http://www.njea.org/news/2015-01-07/s ... m-alone-on-parcc-concerns

Published on Wednesday, January 7, 2015

Earlier today, nearly 100 people testified at an open hearing of the NJ State Board of Education. Nearly all addressed issues related to high-stakes standardized testing, and nearly all expressed concerns about the rapid expansion and misuse of those tests.

NJEA President Wendell Steinhauer issued the following statement regarding the hearing:

?NJEA?s concerns with PARCC and other high-stakes tests are well-known. Today?s State Board of Education hearing shows that we are not alone in those concerns. Nearly 100 students, parents, administrators, educators and other concerned citizens addressed members of the Board. They shared their concerns about the educational harm those tests are causing, and related stories about the real effects being felt already in classrooms across New Jersey.

?One thing is abundantly clear: people from across the educational spectrum understand that our current course is unsustainable. We cannot continue to treat standardized testing as a Holy Grail that will make every challenge facing our schools magically disappear. We cannot test our students more each year, raising the stakes each time, and expect them to flourish as well-rounded, well-educated citizens.

?Students, parents and educators agree: We need a serious course correction. I urge the recently appointed Study Commission on the Use of Student Assessments in New Jersey to listen to these voices and recommend ways to decrease both the volume of tests and the high stakes attached to their outcomes. Until that happens, out-of-control testing will continue to narrow the curriculum, distort the teaching process and deprive students of the comprehensive education they need and deserve.?

PARCC exams blasted by parents, teachers, students at open forum

http://www.nj.com/education/2015/01/p ... udents_at_open_forum.html

TRENTON ?When Colleen Martinez took a practice version of New Jersey?s new standardized math test for third-graders, she said she was stumped.
Martinez, a Montclair parent, couldn?t determine the answers for all of the questions on the new Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers assessment. And for the ones she did figure out, she didn?t know how to properly enter her response on the computerized test.

Wearing a customized black shirt with ?Opt-out? in yellow letters, Martinez told the state Board of Education on Wednesday she?s so worried about how students will respond the test that she won?t let her daughter take it.

?How else would a child feel besides dumb?? Martinez said.

Parents and teachers flooded Wednesday?s open public testimony session to complain about the new tests, which will be administered to all students in grades 3-11 in March and again in May. Some held ?No PARCCING? signs. Others pulled their children out of class to have them testify.

Marie Corfield, a teacher in Flemington, said the combination of the new Common Core standards and the implementation of PARCC tests has teachers ?overwhelmed, stressed to the breaking point.?

I feel like I?m living in a bad dream and can?t wake up,? Corfield said.

Some schools have downsized or closed their libraries to make room for more computers that can be used for testing, said Arlen Kimmelman, president of the New Jersey Assocation of School Libraries.

While the addition of more technology may seem beneficial, students don?t know how to use it if the libraries aren?t open for them to meet with librarians, Kimmelman said.

?The testing shouldn?t be squeezing out school library sources that are need for students to be college and career ready,? Kimmelman said.

The state board holds open public testimony sessions a few times each year, giving teachers and parents an opportunity to speak on issues. Groups like the New Jersey Education Association, the state?s largest teachers union, advertise the open sessions and encourage members to attend.

Michael Mannion, an English teacher at Central Regional High School in Bayville, suggested the state is transitioning too quickly to the PARCC tests.

Department meetings and in-service workshops previously devoted to discussing teaching techniques now focus more and more on assessments, he said.

?As a teacher, I advocate raising standards and exploring new approaches to the way we do things to education,? Mannion said. ?But these rapid changes haven?t led to focusing on higher standards in my districts. They have led to anxiety and uncertainty.?

Jacob Hartmann, a freshman at Toms River High School South, said he doesn?t feel teachers are truthful about the importance of the tests, which are planned to eventually become a graduation requirement.

Some teachers have said PARCC tests aren?t important, but others have told students their performance will impact their future.

?I?m more than positive that if I do decide to attend Princeton, they will not be asking about my PARCC scores,? Hartmann said.

Skyler Alpert, a sixth-grader from Mt. Pleasant Middle School in Livingston, told the board she isn?t planning to take the exams. PARCC takes time away from classes that teach students to be creative, original, intelligent and brave, she said.

?Unfortunately testifying in front of the State School Board isn?t all fun and games, because I will now have go write up a report about my experience here today and present it to my social studies class,? Skyler said. ?There are no standardized answers for this kind of education. "

In an interview before the open session, Education Commissioner David Hespe said schools must educate parents about the value of the PARCC exams, which should provide more robust information about student performance than prior exams.

The value of the exams is that they focus more on critical thinking and strategies rather than content, state board member Dorothy Strickland said.

Adam Clark may be reached at adam_clark@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on twitter at @realAdamClark. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

Raisa, a 7th grader, testified why she opposes the PARCC test.

https://www.facebook.com/SaveOurSchoolsNJ

Parent Workshop ? Common Core State Standards and Testing

January 7 at PS #3

January 14 at MS #40

January 26 at PS #16

January 28 at PS #34

March 5 at PS #38

April 13 at PS #8

All workshops will begin promptly at 6:30 PM

The Common Core State Standards, adopted by the New Jersey State Board of Education in 2010, define grade-level expectations from Kindergarten through high school for what students should know and be able to do in English Language Arts (ELA) and mathematics to be successful in college and careers.
Learn more about grade level expectations and the newly adopted PARCC state assessment.

CHILD CARE WILL BE PROVIDED

Jeb Bush education foundation played leading role in mixing politics, policy

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/e ... pisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1

An employee of Jeb Bush?s education foundation was unequivocal when New Mexico?s top schools official needed someone to pay her travel costs to Washington to testify before Congress: The foundation would give her ?whatever she needs.?
When Maine?s education commissioner, Stephen Bowen, lamented that he could not persuade the state legislature to expand online learning in schools, a foundation employee assured him that Bush ?will probably want to engage Governor [Paul] LePage directly to express our support for efforts to advance a bold agenda.?

The exchanges, revealed in e-mails from 2011 and 2012, illustrate the leading role Bush?s Foundation for Excellence in Education has played in many states since its creation in 2008, following the Republican?s two terms as governor of Florida.

The foundation has forged an unusual role mixing politics and policy ? drafting legislation and paying travel expenses for state officials, lobbying lawmakers, and connecting public officials with industry executives seeking government contracts.

It also has sustained, and even expanded, Bush?s influence in the years since he left office and would no doubt be a focal point of his likely presidential campaign ? one in which he would portray himself as a candidate with intellectual heft and a record of reform on an issue that affects millions of Americans.

Jeb Bush through the years
View Photos With announcement that he is exploring a 2016 presidential run, Bush becomes the Republican frontrunner for 2016
But the foundation, from which Bush resigned as chairman last week as part of his preparations for a possible White House bid, has been criticized as a backdoor vehicle for major corporations to urge state officials to adopt policies that would enrich the companies.

The foundation has, for instance, pushed states to embrace digital learning in public schools, a costly transition that often requires new software and hardware. Many of those digital products are made by donors to Bush?s foundation, including Microsoft, Intel, News Corp., Pearson PLC and K12 Inc..

The foundation has helped its corporate donors gain access to state education officials through a committee called Chiefs for Change, composed of as many as 10 officials from mostly Republican-led states who convene at the foundation?s annual meeting. The meetings include private two-hour gatherings with the officials and company executives.

Patricia Levesque, the Bush foundation?s chief executive, said the group does not endorse donors? products or get involved in sales, saying that ?we promote policies? but are ?neutral on the providers.? She said the foundation raises money from corporate donors like any other nonprofit organization.


?There are businesses who sponsor our event just like they sponsor any other event, whether it?s board gatherings or teachers-union gatherings,? she said. ?We have a definite viewpoint on policy, and our sponsors tend to share it.?

Education and 2016
The foundation is likely to become a major point of contention in a Republican primary if Bush runs. The former governor will almost certainly single out the organization as evidence of his dedication to improving public schools, particularly those in poor and minority communities, by fighting what he calls ?government-run, unionized, politicized monopolies? that ?trap good teachers, administrators and struggling students in a system that nobody can escape.?

But many conservatives have become skeptical of national efforts to improve education following the No Child Left Behind Act, championed by then-President George W. Bush, Jeb Bush?s brother, and the widespread adoption of the Common Core State Standards. They may consider Bush?s foundation another example of powerful interests taking classroom decisions away from parents.

Jeb Bush is a rare remaining GOP champion of the Common Core, and his foundation has secured $5.2 million since 2010 from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the primary funder of the campaign to promote the standards.

Bush did not respond to a request through a spokeswoman for comment about his foundation.

Since its creation, the foundation has been largely devoted to exporting the ?Florida formula,? an overhaul of public education Bush oversaw as governor between 1999 and 2007.

That agenda includes ideas typically supported by conservatives and opposed by teachers unions: issuing A-to-F report cards for schools, using taxpayer vouchers for tuition at private schools, expanding charter schools, requiring third-graders to pass a reading test, and encouraging online learning and virtual charter schools.

The foundation?s close collaboration with state officials has been especially strong in New Mexico, where Education Secretary Hanna Skandera has pushed for the ?Florida formula? to be adopted in her state.


Skandera, a Bush protege and co-chairman of Chiefs for Change, drew the ire of Democrats in 2013 for her role in allowing the Pearson company, a foundation donor, to open a virtual charter school. The state?s elected education commission rejected the school, but Skandera overruled the decision and approved it.

Skandera worked in the Florida Department of Education while Bush was governor and later worked at a for-profit online higher-education company that Bush had advised.

In a 2011 e-mail exchange between Skandera and foundation staff member Mary Laura Bragg, also a former education aide under Bush, the two looked forward to reconnecting during an upcoming Chiefs for Change discussion. ?I?ll be on tomorrow?s Chiefs? call ? can?t wait to hear your voice!? Bragg wrote.

Four days later, Bragg wrote to Skandera to ask when New Mexico would be rolling out its A-to-F school grading program. Skandera replied that the state would be developing rules and working with districts in the ensuing months, adding, ?Any chance I can get you out here sometime this fall to help advise us on our literacy initiative??

?I?m at your beck and call,? Bragg answered.

In most of the states where the education chiefs have worked closely with the foundation, K12 and Pearson have established virtual charter schools, in which students take their courses online and tax money flows to the companies.

Jeff Kwitowski, a spokesman for K12, wrote in an e-mail that the company, based in Herndon, Va., donates to Bush?s foundation because it shares a goal of ?expanding opportunities for children and choices for parents.?

Brandon Pinette, a spokesman for Pearson, declined to answer questions about whether the company has benefited from its relationship with Bush?s foundation. He said the company has a ?long, proud history of investing in and across the U.S., and this work includes a sponsorship of a variety of education organizations focused on improving learning.?

Bowen, who resigned as Maine?s education commissioner in 2013, said in an interview that donors to Bush?s foundation did not have ?unusual? access to state decision-makers. But he acknowledged that the intertwining of policy and corporate interests is a reality of how education policy is crafted.


?You can?t throw a rock in Washington without hitting some association,? he said. ?And they all have financial support and all provide resources and access to folks who they?re there to support.?

Donald Cohen, executive director of the liberal group In the Public Interest, said the arrangement allows companies the opportunity to influence public officials without disclosure.

?If companies want to go and directly lobby officials, they should go do that,? said Cohen, who used public-records requests to obtain thousands of e-mail exchanges between the foundation and top state education officials and posted them online in 2012. ?But using a 501(c)3 and Jeb Bush?s cachet in the name of good government and good policy in a move that will expand their market share is not okay.?

As a nonprofit, Bush?s foundation is not required to disclose its donors. It reported $10 million in income in 2012, according to tax documents. The group?s Web site lists most donors, with their contributions included in ranges. The site was updated Friday to list every donor that contributed last year.

Among the top donors in 2014, giving $500,000 to $1 million, was News Corp., which owns a company called Amplify that markets tablets, software and data analysis to school districts. News Corp. chief executive Rupert Murdoch delivered a keynote speech at the Bush foundation?s annual meeting in 2011, when Amplify rolled out its tablet, saying it was time to ?tear down an education system designed for the 19th century and replace it with one suited for the 21st.?

The donor lists show that the foundation has drawn funding from a wide range of sources, including Bloomberg Philanthropies, the charity arm of former New York mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (I), and the Walton Family Foundation, a major backer of charter schools.

The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust gave the foundation $2.3 million in 2013, primarily because of its advocacy for digital education and Common Core, said Rich McKeon, the trust?s education program director.


?When we did work in New York City, we visited low-income schools and found students couldn?t take the AP course they wanted because it wasn?t offered,? he said. ?The Foundation for Excellence in Education is doing a lot of work around digital learning, and some of it is really focused on how to make sure students have access to courses online that they may not be able to get in their school.?

Corporate donors also include Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, a large testing company, and the Educational Testing Service, which administers advanced-placement and English proficiency tests and has $43 million in contracts to develop tests connected to Common Core. Another donor, McGraw-Hill Education, sells math and reading programs and classroom materials aligned to the Common Core standards, among other products.

A close relationship
Foundation staff members say they have helped mold education policy in 28 states. The foundation lobbied Florida to require that every high school student take an online course before graduating, and similar laws have been passed in Arkansas, Georgia and Virginia.

Levesque said the organization seeks to provide support for state officials, focusing on ?everything from the policy development to actually helping to get bills passed to implementation.?

The foundation has showcased Bush education policies that he says promote civil rights. At its 2014 meeting in November, Bush was introduced by Denisha Merriweather, a young African American woman from Jacksonville, Fla., who said Bush ?gave me the chance to change my life? by enacting a tax credit scholarship that paid her $5,200 tuition at a private Christian high school. When the former governor took the stage, he presented the foundation?s work as part of a ?big political fight.?

?Abundant choices for parents, a 21st-century teaching profession and the full embrace of digital learning will require changes in laws, rules and regulations,? he said, adding later, ?Monopolies don?t go quietly into the night.?

The e-mails between the foundation and state officials describe a symbiotic relationship.


In biweekly conference calls and in-person meetings, all funded by the foundation, state officials relied on the technical expertise of the foundation while it parlayed its connections to state leaders into policy victories.

The foundation even paid for Skandera, the New Mexico education secretary, to perform some of her official duties. When a House committee invited her to testify on Capitol Hill in 2011 about the education policy changes she implemented, the foundation paid for her flight, hotel, meals and incidentals.

?Hanna has been asked to testify in front of congress,? Levesque wrote to her staff at the foundation on Sept. 7, 2011. ?She needs us c4c [Chiefs for Change] to pick up costs. I told her we would. Can u reach out to her and her Asst to help with whatever she needs. Tnx.?

Through a spokesman, Skandera declined requests for an interview.

In Maine, the foundation drafted a 2012 executive order, signed by Gov. Paul LePage (R), directing the state to develop a plan to expand digital learning. LePage wrote that the policy should adopt the ?10 Elements of High Quality Digital Learning? ? a creation of Bush?s foundation that called for the elimination of legal and regulatory barriers to online education.

Foundation staff members celebrated the move, telling Bowen in e-mails that Maine was ?the first to issue an executive order on the 10 elements, which is spectacular.?

Bowen said that Chiefs for Change was just one organization among many that help states craft education policy. ?As a policymaker, you?re always looking for good ideas, some other state that?s tried something, some other governor or legislator or state ed chief that has a good idea,? he said.

The foundation also helped at least one of its chiefs make political connections. Soon after Tony Bennett was elected Indiana superintendent of public instruction in 2009, he joined Chiefs for Change and went about implementing the Bush formula, creating an A-to-F school grading system and a reading requirement for third-graders while instituting vouchers for private schools, expanding charter schools and embracing Common Core.


At the foundation?s national summit in 2011, the chiefs? schedule included a fundraiser for Bennett at a bar across the street from the host hotel. Bennett was facing reelection in 2012. Several foundation sponsors ? including members of the Walton family, Connections Academy, Houghton Mifflin, K12 and McGraw-Hill ? contributed to his campaign.

Bennett was defeated by a union-backed former teacher who rode a wave of parent anger over Bennett?s agenda.

Bennett was later hired as Florida?s education commissioner but soon resigned amid reports that in Indiana he had ordered a grade changed from a C to an A for a charter school run by a GOP donor.

For anyone who might be interested...

Here is a link to view some of the PARCC practice tests for Language Arts and Math.

http://parcc.pearson.com/practice-tests/

N.J.'s education reforms are more hurtful than helpful: Opinion

http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2 ... than_helpful_opinion.html

By Jim O?Neill

It is disgraceful that the humanistic aspect of teaching has been marginalized or, worse yet, minimized in New Jersey?s new teacher evaluation system. Teachers able to connect with their students and demonstrate they are vested in the students? health, academic and physical well-being have the best chance of being great teachers. The state, however, is unsure pf how to measure or document those traits, and it seems they will not matter -- so says the state Education Department in multiple ways through the sterile evaluation process they are professing to be the savior of 21st century education.

Now, New Jersey is preparing to implement a high-stakes test that has no baseline; will count the first time it is administered (which is contrary to every guideline about valid testing); be offered in a different format (online, not pencil and paper); leave questions about whether the test is assessing what the student knows or how adept they are at computer use; and has a growing community of parents adamantly opposed to the test.

The state has convinced lawmakers that everyone who disagrees with these reforms is stuck in the past and a detriment to education.
We also have students starting at 9 years old who have been told by their parent not to take the test, or have been told something akin to ?I have written to the principal or superintendent and told them you will not be taking the test.? The state Education Department tells school districts there is no ?opt-out option? and that educators must ask a student if he is refusing to take the test. How far are we going to push this cold, impersonal style of education which is purported in high places to be better than the old? As far as I am concerned, this is a bridge too far. I will not ask teachers to say to an elementary student, ?Do you want to take the test or do what your parents told you to do??

The state has convinced lawmakers that everyone who disagrees with these reforms is stuck in the past and a detriment to education. From testing to the teacher evaluation system and more, how many blunders does the state Education Department have to make before the powers that be realize we should admit when we are wrong, regroup and go in a different direction?

After hundreds of reforms, thousands of directives, millions for testing and billions of public dollars spent hastily we have more anxious students, demoralized teachers, overextended administrators and disgruntled parents. What is the answer to this dilemma? How could anyone believe there is not a better way?

Jim O?Neill is interim superintendent for Livingston Public Schools.

Ten Common Core Promoters Laughing All The Way To The Bank

http://thefederalist.com/2015/01/05/t ... -all-the-way-to-the-bank/

The people who wrote and pushed Common Core on the nation are making bank while the nation?s kids, teachers, and parents writhe in the grip of their curriculum contraption.

NPR recently came out with an image-repair article profiling one of Common Core?s five coauthors, former Bennington College professor Jason Zimba. Moms and dads tearing hair out at their kids? math homework and Environmental Protection Agency regulation reading assignments (yes, that?s really Common Core-recommended) should feel sorry for him, because it says Zimba was frequently up until 3 a.m. devising their family torture device. Somehow, I?m not that surprised or sympathetic to hear Common Core has mysteriously not improved math instruction at Zimba?s daughter?s school. Because it hasn?t improved it much of anywhere else, either.

Even as Zimba and his colleagues defend the standards against cries of federal overreach, they are helpless when it comes to making sure textbook publishers, test-makers, superintendents, principals and teachers interpret the standards in ways that will actually improve American public education, not make it worse.

Like McCallum, Zimba agrees with the North Carolina dad that the question on his son?s Common Core-labeled math quiz was terrible. But as long as Americans hold to the conviction that most of what happens in schools should be kept under the control of states and local communities, the quality of the curriculum is out of his hands. ?Like it or not, the standards allow a lot of freedom,? he said.

The real problem with Common Core is that it?s not prescriptive enough! I?m so sorry, fellow Americans, but there?s this little thing standing in the way of applying my education omniscience to all children?it?s called ?truth, freedom, and the American way?!

It?s now clear that everyone but the people who wrote and thrust Common Core upon the nation will bear the blame for its failure. First on the list of bumbling idiots: Teachers. Second: Curriculum developers. Neither apparently can understand what Common Core wants them to do. One wonders if it?s written in English? Because, you know, we use language to communicate? It can actually be very precise. Ah, right, even a quick look at Common Core will reveal that it is not, in fact, written in English. Design flaw? No, no: Blame the teachers who can?t read non-English!

Common Core Coauthor Jason Zimba
Zimba

To the point: NPR further reveals that Zimba gave up his professorship to devote his time to writing Common Core curriculum through an organization he co-founded with two other Common Core coauthors. How much does Zimba make through his public service through this nonprofit? Well, its 2012 IRS form 990 (the latest available?I?ve been through a lot of these babies, and they are usually quite outdated) says he made a cool $332,263. That?s probably not his entire annual income, as he travels to show teachers how to do Common Core right.

Zimba isn?t the only person making a lot of money from constructing a disaster. In fact, everywhere you look, people intimately involved with creating or pushing Common Core are making a lot of money despite having demonstrated exactly zero proven success at increasing student achievement. How convenient for them.

David Coleman, Zimba?s Partner in Crime
ColemanDavid Coleman is another of the five Common Core coauthors, and he and Zimba go way back. They were both Rhodes scholars. Zimba worked at the college Coleman?s mother runs. They started Student Achievement Partners(SAP)?the nonprofit where Zimba now works?together. They wrote a report calling for national curriculum mandates that got them noticed and hired by education nationalizers to write Common Core, for a still-undisclosed sum and under still-undisclosed conditions (apparently, NPR?s reporting only goes so far as the material Zimba and Coleman wish to feed them).

Apparently, NPR?s reporting only goes so far as the material Zimba and Coleman wish to feed them.
Anyway, the 2012 SAP 990 says Coleman earned $271,392 from it that year. But he also transitioned in 2012 to president of the College Board. You know, that tiny nonprofit that runs the SAT and Advanced Placement classes and has locked in millions in taxpayer dollars through state contracts and federal grants? That one. Well, College Board?s 990s are no more recently filed than SAP?s, but its 2012 document gives some clues to Coleman?s compensation. His predecessor earned a cool $1,848,009 that year. Coleman only began on October 1, and for his three months of work that year earned only $117,518. I?m not sure I could feed my kids on that, but when you multiply it out using non-Common Core math to cover a full year, that would bring his total annual College Board pay to $470,072.

Either College Board got Coleman cheap because of the black Common Core mark on his record, they paid him a prorated rate as he worked alongside his predecessor, or he?s got to work up to that $1.8 million per year. Or something. But, hey, I wouldn?t complain at a cool $470,072 per year. I think I could finally take the kids to Europe with it. Maybe after saving up for a few weeks.

Former New York City Schools Chancellor Joel Klein
Tech Crunch / Flickr
Tech Crunch / Flickr
Talk about golden parachute. Joel Klein left his quarter-million annual salary as New York City schools chancellor to run News Corp.?s then brand-new education division, which bets Common Core would give its high-tech products instant access to a nationwide market. His new base salary: $2 million annually, plus stock options, and the possibility of at least $1.5 million in annual bonuses, according to Bloomberg News. He also got a $1 million signing bonus. In the meantime, he made time to coauthor Common Core-supporting op-eds in the Wall Street Journal.

It kind of makes the six-digit earnings of all these other Common Core money-makers look wimpy. Klein, however, has yet to turn a profit, which he has to do by persuading thousands if not millions of individual people to buy his stuff. Most of the other folks only have to persuade a few gullible, deep-pocketed donors.

Former New York Education Commissioner John King
King

After essentially blowing up New York State?s education system, state Education Commissioner John King parachuted to the U.S. Department of Education (USDOE), where he will become the No. 2.

Spectacularly fail at government work, and you get promoted. Are you paying attention, kids?
King?s ties to Common Core are long and strong. He committed New York to Common Core months before it was written, which earned him a $700 million reward from USDOE, courtesy of the nation?s future taxpayers. Subsequently, King introduced ?Common Core tests ahead of most states and before many schools had updated their textbooks? and spent a large portion of the federal grant creating Common Core curriculum.

Last fall, angry New Yorkers demanded answers from King about why their kids suddenly couldn?t do math and why school counselors? offices were suddenly overloaded with nervous, twitchy kids. So he scheduled a series of public forums. But when he showed up, he refused to answer parents? questions and told them that essentially no matter what they said, New York would not alter course on Common Core. The thousands of parents packing that forum got angrier, and shouted for him to answer. So he canceled the rest of the planned forums and has been hiding out ever since.

As commissioner, King earned $212,500 per year, reported the New York Times. He hasn?t been paid from the federal treasury yet, but colleagues at similar levels make about the same. Assistant Secretary Danny Harris makes $179,655; Deputy Secretary Jim Shelton makes $177,000. That?s their base salaries before benefits, so probably King will earn about the same from national taxpayers as he did from those in New York.

Spectacularly fail at government work, and you get promoted. Are you paying attention, kids? Flunking to the top: It?s the Common Core way.

Joanne Weiss, Common Core?s Federal Donkey Driver
Weiss

As chief of staff to Education Secretary Arne Duncan, Weiss made $179,700 in base pay in 2012. While there, she directed the Race to the Top grants that weaseled 41 states into promising to adopt Common Core before it was written. In fact, as the Washington Post reported four years after the fact, Duncan had originally put Common Core directly into the grant requirements by name. For political reasons, they decided to be a little more deceptive in the final version and instead use a definition of what was acceptable so narrow that it to this day only includes Common Core. And Weiss?s own website says she ?was responsible for designing the [Race to the Top] policy to maximize its impact? and ?writing the regulations.? So it?s not a stretch to imagine she wrote that requirement with her own hand. At the very least, she was fully aware of and participated in the decision to do so.

Weiss directed the Race to the Top grants that weaseled 41 states into promising to adopt Common Core before it was written.
Before the Obama administration, Weiss was the chief operating officer and a partner at the NewSchools Venture Fund. The 990s for her time there are no longer available (the IRS only requires nonprofits to post the three ?most recent? years? records), but in 2011 partners earned something near $200,000, give or take a few ten thousand.

Now, Weiss is one of those ubiquitous DC consultants, and she?s got deep-pocketed clients. Her website says they include the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation?of course, since Bill funds everything Common Core and his foundation has more money than every other?the Council of Chief School Officers (one of the Common Core incubators), and for the Charles & Lynn Schusterman Family Foundation. These all pay her for her Common Core expertise. For two, ?Joanne is currently an Expert in Residence at the Harvard i-Lab and a visiting lecturer in education policy at Princeton University?s Woodrow Wilson School.? I bet she?s pretty comfortable.

Tom Luna, Idaho?s Republican Common Core Cheerleader
Luna

Idaho state Superintendent Tom Luna has spent the past four years as Common Core?s fiercest champion in a red state where voters rebuked his tech-heavy education agenda in a 2012 referendum. As Idaho superintendent, Luna makes $101,150 per year. He?ll get a boost when he moves on to Project Lead the Way, a curriculum development company that got a boost from Common Core making it suddenly a fit for nearly every school in the nation.

Common Core is good to lots of people. Just not the children whose faces they trotted out to get it passed.
No word yet on Luna?s salary, but fellow vice presidents at the nonprofit make between $110,000 and $127,000, according to its latest 990. As a resident of Indiana, where PLTW is headquartered, let me assure you that?s a comfortable income for these parts.

It?s not just higher-ups like Luna using Common Core advocacy as a springboard into very well-padded futures. Stephanie Zimmerman, a mother of eight who is Idaho?s grassroots Common Core watchdog, reports that ?Common Core has been good for members of our State Department of Education.? Her post details more from in-state. This is happening all across the country, not just in Idaho. Common Core is good to lots of people. Just not the children whose faces they trotted out to get it passed.

Former Education Secretary Bill Bennett
Bennett

Oh, and by the way, former Education Secretary and Common Core-nik Bill Bennett is a senior advisor to Project Lead the Way. Since, as he told Politico when they reported he was paid by a public relations firm for a Wall Street Journal op-ed praising Common Core, ?I?m compensated for most of the things that I do,? it?s fair to assume Bennett makes some money from Common Core curriculum, too, besides getting paid for his advocacy. That makes him essentially a paid spokesman, which is fine?but that should be disclosed to people reading and listening to him. So far as I know, it?s not.

The conflicts of interest involved with Common Core exist for essentially every person and organization that has publicly backed the project. Still believe it?s not a special-interest boondoggle?

Dane Linn, One of Common Core?s Many Misty Shepherds
Linn

Dane Linn?s bio says he ?co-led the development of the Common Core State Standards? back when he worked for the National Governors Association. It?s unclear what exactly that means, as we know other people did the actual writing, but it is clear that he was in some sort of management capacity. So probably he rode herd on the, well, herd of people whose names are attached to Common Core but about whom the public has been not only told little but given no role in choosing. If you care to find out more, you can read his paper about it for the American Enterprise Institute.

Although we the public are not to know what Linn earned for his work on Common Core, we can make an educated guess about what he earns now as a vice president for the Business Roundtable, which along with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce rides herd on Republican politicians so they won?t see there?s anything wrong with Common Core a little campaign cash can?t fix. The Roundtable?s latest 990 fills up as many slots as it can with the uncompensated members of its board, so there?s no room left to report Linn?s compensation. But it does report the compensation of one other vice president: Maria Ghazal earns $393,535.

Susan Pimentel, Yet Another Common Core Coauthor
Pimentel

We?re almost to the end of Common Core coauthors. Second on the English team was Susan Pimentel, the third Student Achievement Partners, er, partner. In 2012, Pimentel earned $335,367 from SAP. She does other consulting, too, and has a personal nonprofit from which she made similar amounts, but since the Common Core gig it seems to be largely an empty shell.

Bill McCallum, Still Another Common Core Coauthor
McCallum

The fifth of the five Common Core coauthors is William McCallum, head of the University of Arizona?s math department. At the university, public records say McCallum earns $155,000 a year. NPR says McCallum has also started a nonprofit curriculum company to generate materials for Common Core: Illustrative Mathematics. Its 990s aren?t available yet, but the Gates Foundation?s website says the foundation gave Illustrative Mathematics a three-year grant of $3,416,901 in 2012. Illustrative Mathematics also received a mere $75,000 from the Hewlett Foundation in November 2014 ?for development of a strategic business plan.?

Making Money Isn?t the Problem: Cronyism Is
Before I close out, let me be clear (for real, unlike that other fellow who likes to use this phrase): I have no problem with people making lots of money. I?m not against profits or earnings. If Klein can earn $3.5 million a year making widgets people freely buy, good for him. I sincerely hope he has a good life with all that money. So I?m not trying to make an envy-based critique that people making more money than me must be evil, or that just because Common Core?s supporters are typically rich elites using their excess money to manipulate public opinion there?s anything wrong with that. Ahem.

Common Core?s supporters are typically rich elites using their excess money to manipulate public opinion.
There are two fairer and broader points. First, we have an obvious conflict of interest problem here. People deserve to know when a prominent official or self-proclaimed ?expert? who is testifying before state legislatures or writing op-eds is making money from their persuasive efforts. It means their judgment is not entirely independent, even if they feel it so. Basic ethics requires someone with a financial or personal stake in the outcome of a public decision to recuse himself from participating in that decision. That has not been happening.

Second, it indicates rampant cronyism, which is a form of political and social corruption. We see that Common Core is infested with essentially the same set of people rewarding each other with taxpayer dollars and huge private grants, decades before there can be any proof that all this money laundering produced a genuine public good. Common Core is a giant experiment, remember. Bill Gates says he won?t know if his ?education stuff? worked for ?probably a decade.? Former public officials (or semi-public officials, which is what I label the Common Core coauthors, because while we did not elect them we all must live with their decisions) are amply rewarded for doing what the rich and powerful wanted with sweet compensation packages following their ?public service.?

The short of it is that there is a lot of money to be made from national curriculum mandates and tests, regardless of their effectiveness. The financial statements of curriculum companies are not detailed enough to flesh this out for them as I have for people who sit on the boards of smaller nonprofits, but they are making millions in government contracts. For example, Pearson, the world?s largest curriculum and testing company, has gotten millions from the federal government and its proxies to write and deliver portions of Common Core tests. And it?s set to have ongoing revenue from its role in these tests: ?Pearson will earn a minimum of $138 million in the first year? of Common Core testing. That?s 2015. Pearson will also make millions from selling Common Core curriculum, which NPR says Common Core coauthor Phil Daro is helping write.

Millions of dollars and an exciting career are huge attractions for people to do well by themselves. But we yet have no proof that any of this has been doing well by the kids. In fact, the evidence suggests Common Core will spectacularly fail children and society. Shouldn?t people earn money only for demonstrated success, instead of promised success? In a free market, they would. But we all have to buy Common Core, whether we like it or not, and we have no ability to demand proof that it works before the sale. These sweetheart deals are only going one way, and it?s not ours.

Photo Tech Crunch / Flickr
Joy Pullmann is managing editor of The Federalist and an education research fellow at The Heartland Institute.

Koch Brothers Do Common Core

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/alan-si ... ommon-core_b_6417240.html

Koch (sounds like coke) is highly addictive. In this case, not the powder or the crystals, but the money. Bloomberg News puts the combined wealth of right-wing financiers and "do-badders" Charles and David Koch at over $100 billion. The Koch brothers like to throw their money at everything to buy influence and goodwill, and just about everybody seems anxious to take some, no matter what the consequence to society, their organization, or their souls.

At least thirty-six colleges and universities including prestigious schools like Harvard and MIT receive Koch dollars, as do major American cultural institutions such as Lincoln Center, the American Museum of Natural History, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and Smithsonian Institute in Washington, D.C. Liberal friends of these schools and institutions somehow are comfortable socializing with the astronomically wealthy brothers who also fund right-wing think tanks and advocacy groups fighting against social policies they claim to believe in.

Koch money is behind the Heritage Foundation, the Manhattan Institute, the Federalist Society, Americans for Prosperity, and of course, ALEC, the anti-union, public education, environmental protection, gun control, government regulation, and health care American Legislative Exchange Council. Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, one of the last liberals holding high office in the United States, charged, "The Koch brothers are worth $85 billion. You might think that's enough to get by, leave a couple of bucks to your kids. But apparently they feel an obligation to destroy Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid."

In Tennessee, the Koch brothers, operating through Americans for Prosperity (AFP), have launched a major battle to stop implementation of the national Common Core standards. Last summer, AFP spent a half a million Koch dollars to elect anti-Common Core candidates to local office. Nationally, Koch-backed organizations and foundations are at the forefront of the anti-Common Core campaign, which is not surprising.

What is surprising is that Koch money is going to the other side in the Common Core war as well, as the Koch brothers try to cover all bases buying up American advocacy groups. Bill Bigelow, an editor at Rethinking Schools and co-director of the Zinn Education Project, documented Koch influence at the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) annual conference through one of their front groups, the Bill of Rights Institute. According to Bigelow, "In its materials for teachers and students, the Bill of Rights Institute cherry-picks the Constitution, history, and current events to hammer home its libertarian message that the owners of private property should be free to manage their wealth as they see fit." Its goal is to infuse Koch anti-government propaganda into the school curriculum.

The NCSS has generally been supportive of Common Core, fighting to expand it to include citizenship education and social studies, what they call the C3 curriculum (College, Career, and Citizenship), rather than opposing it for marginalizing content and conceptual learning. However, the group's latest bulletin, Teaching the College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework (NCSS Bulletin 114), was a basic sell-out of all principles. Desperate for Koch dollars to subsidize its convention and publications, the NCSS actually had agents for the seemingly anti-Common Core Koch brothers design one of the fifteen Common Core aligned lessons.

The Bill of Rights Institute (BRI) Common Core aligned lesson for grades 9-12 is on the "necessary and proper clause" of the Constitution (39-46) and its goal, rather than to promote inquiry, is to convince students that the current interpretation is too broad because it allows a national health insurance plan and the regulation of companies like Koch Industries that destroy the environment in the name of profit. Its phantom civic action is a debate "Resolved: The Necessary and Proper Clause is not necessary or proper because it makes the principles of federalism and limited government obsolete."

The lesson, developed by the anti-Common Core Koch brothers team at BRI, mirrors all of the Common Core proposed classroom practices. It is adapted from an advanced placement American History lesson on the McCulloch v. Maryland case decided by the United States Supreme Court in 1819. The original lesson is available on the Bill of Rights Institute website.

The NCSS version of the lesson starts with typical Common Core standards performance indicators for students based on close reading of text. The indicators include "determining the kinds of sources that will be helpful in answering compelling and supporting questions," considering "multiple points of view," developing "claims and counterclaims," and constructing "explanations using sound reasoning."

The lesson itself focuses on Bill of Rights/Koch questions and a reading designed to call into question the use of the "elastic clause" provision in Article 1 Section 8 of the United States Constitution that makes it possible for the federal government to respond to a changing world by building highways, supporting public education, providing health insurance, and regulating rapacious companies like Koch Industries.

The lesson provides the primary reading material for students on the McCulloch v. Maryland case. It is a secondary source without attribution so I can only assume it was written expressly for this lesson by the BRI. The final paragraph makes the points the Koch brothers presumably want included, that the unanimous Supreme Court decision placing federal interests above state interests and allowing the federal government to stretch its authority in order to insure its mandated responsibilities, "was not a blank check for assertions of federal power," that only "legitimate" means and ends are "within the scope of the constitution," and that the "proper scope of the federal government's authority continues to be a subject of serious debate."

As a final summation document before the debate whether to end federal overreach, students read an excerpt from a Supreme Court minority opinion written in 2010 by right-wing activist judge Clarence Thomas and supported in part by another right-wing judge, Antonin Scalia, although in the bulletin and on the website, their names are inexplicably left off of the document. In their dissent Thomas and Scalia assert that while the power of the federal government is sharply limited by the Constitution, the power of states is not similarly constrained. In their view, and evidently that of the Koch brothers, "no matter how 'necessary' or 'proper' an Act of Congress may be to its objective, Congress lacks authority to legislate if the objective is anything other than 'carrying into Execution' one or more of the Federal Government's enumerated powers."

In other words, as the Koch brothers read this the decision, since the Founding Fathers did not know about the Keystone pipeline, Canadian tar sands, or Common Core, the federal government cannot regulate Koch operations or impose national educational standards. In Koch world Common Core is used to trump Common Core so the Koch brothers can do anything they want and nobody can stop them. Apparently, even for people who fundamentally oppose what they stand for, Koch (sounds like coke) money is very addictive.

MORE: Koch Brothers Common Core American Legislative Exchange Council College and Career Readiness Supreme Court

State board to hear more on state monitoring and likely an earful on coming PARCC tests

State Board of Education Meeting, January 7, 2015 9:00AM

New Jersey Department of Education, 1st floor conference room, 100 River View Plaza, Trenton

What they are doing: The State Board of Education will continue its discussion of the state?s monitoring system for schools, known as QSAC, and also hear from the superintendent of the state-controlled Paterson schools, Donnie Evans. But much of the drama will come in the public testimony in the afternoon, where nearly 100 people from the general public have signed up to speak, most about the state?s new testing regimen.

QSAC, the sequel: Two months ago, the state board asked state Education Commissioner David Hespe and his staff to make presentations on QSAC, which stands for the Quality Single Accountability Continuum.

At the meeting last month, the administration presented an overview of the system and announced streamlining for districts that consistently fare well. This month, it will delve into the details of what the state is doing for districts that fall below the required thresholds.

Not just the usual suspects: While most of the attention goes to some of the state?s larger urban districts, scores of districts across the state fail to meet the state?s requirements that they meet at least 80 percent of criteria in five key areas, from instruction to personnel to fiscal controls.

Often, it is the instructional programs -- and specifically their test scores -- that trip them up. Of the six districts that completed the process over the last month, three of them ? Burlington City, Hainesport and Pine Hill -- are below 80 percent in the instructional area.

Paterson annual report: Every year, the board hears a report from the superintendents of the four state-controlled districts. Newark and Camden school officials gave reports over the last month, and next up is Paterson Superintendent Donnie Evans.

Public action and reaction: Much of the meeting?s drama may come in the afternoon public testimony. A big crowd has signed up to testify in what is an open-topic format. For most of them, though, the topic will be the state?s upcoming PARCC testing, which has been drawing more and more protests over its high stakes and long hours.

Code business: The board will also go through some routine matters in reviewing and adopting new administrative code and regulation. This month, special education code is on the agenda, although it is largely keeping to status quo as a governor-appointed task force looks at ways to improve special- education services statewide.

http://www.njspotlight.com/stories/15 ... esting-to-top-discussion/

http://assets.njspotlight.com/assets/15/0105/2129

http://assets.njspotlight.com/assets/15/0105/2130

http://www.njspotlight.com/stories/14 ... tate-monitoring-red-tape/

PARCC leads N.J. schools to cancel midterms, finals

http://www.nj.com/education/2015/01/p ... _finals.html#incart_river

tudents at some New Jersey high schools can rest easy this winter without having to worry about midterm exams.

But spring will bring an even bigger challenge: The new state standardized test that promises to consume a lot of classroom prep time.

A growing number of schools are canceling traditional exams to regain instructional time they say is being lost to the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers, the state?s new standardized assessment to be administered this spring.

Livingston High School, among other schools, has scrapped midterms. Millburn students wont have to take finals. And Glen Ridge is doing away with both.

?PARCC is taking too many days, all of which results in the loss of instructional time,? said James O?Neill, superintendent of Livingston Township School District.

New Jersey?s previous state assessment test for high school students, the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA), was administered only once and only to 11th-graders, superintendents said.

The new computerized test, aligned to Common Core standards, will be given twice, once in March and once in May, to all students in grades 3-11. High school students are likely to finish the tests in about seven or eight hours, according to the state, but the testing periods are spread out across several school days.

?All of the sudden we have injected more testing into the high school schedule,? said James Crisfield, superintendent of Millburn Township School District. ?We have a lot of PARCC when we used to have a little bit of HSPA.?

In many high schools, midterms and finals were traditionally administered over the course of four or five days and teachers spent several class periods reviewing during the week before the exam. With the introduction of PARCC, Millburn parents worried students would be spending too much time in testing or test-prep, Crisfield said.

?Frankly, I was very sympathetic to those concerns,? he said.

The value of midterms

The impact of eliminating midterms and finals is a mixed bag, said John Mucciolo superintendent of Glen Ridge School District.

If approached correctly, midterms allow students to draw connections between seemingly unrelated lessons they have learned in class, Mucciolo said. But all too often students are simply cramming, he said.

Glen Ridge High School has seventh and eight grade students, who also will take PARCC exams, and the additional testing time across five grade levels worried both faculty and administration, Mucciolo said.

?Sometimes we need to examine our assumptions,? he said of the value of midterms. ?The PARCC testing has prompted us to do this.?

Reducing test anxiety created by midterms and finals will be beneficial for students, said Maureen Connolly, an assistant professor of education at The College of New Jersey.

Though the tests have been a staple of a high school education, they are losing value as schools focus more on what skills students need after graduation, she said.

?Do you do something that is assessing what you have been doing for the past four months in your job?? Connolly said. ?What would be the equivalent of (a midterm) in life outside of school??

Even before PARCC, some teachers believed that midterms and finals took away too much instructional time, said Anthony Rosamilia president of both the Essex County and Livingston education associations.

But Rosamilia, speaking only on his own behalf, said he is skeptical about eliminating the teacher-designed tests.

The PARCC tests are significant because they are high-stakes assessments for school districts and certain teachers, whose evaluations are partially based on their students? performance. But unlike a midterm, teachers won?t see PARCC results in time to give students meaningful feedback, Rosamilia, a history teacher, said.

?If a student gets a certain grade on a midterm we can give accurate information to parents and to this student about where they are,? Rosamilia said.

Replacing traditional tests

Schools that eliminate a diagnostic test, like a midterm or final, should replace it with another method of analyzing student learning, said Steve Wollmer, spokesperson for the New Jersey Education Association, the state?s largest teachers union.

That?s not always easy, some educators said.

Bernards Township School District eliminated midterms and finals a few years ago in an attempt to maximize instructional time, Superintendent Nick Markarian said.

It replaced those tests with quarterly exams, given on days when students had their seven other classes for abbreviated 20-minute periods. The stress of a special test in the midst of regular classes was distracting for students, Markarian said.

?If you were meeting for 20 minutes with seven of your classes and then in your eighth class you had a quarterly exam, how much are you really focusing on regular classes?? Markarian said.

Bernards eliminated the quarterlies this year.

Verona High School, which is abandoning midterms, won?t replace them with new smaller tests, said Charles Miller, the district?s director of curriculum and instruction.

Instead, the school has focused on bolstering its unit tests by adding questions that have more than one answer or require students to cite evidence to support their answer. Those tests should push students well beyond traditional recall in the way midterms have in the past, Miller said.

The New Jersey Principals and Supervisors Association believes more schools will consider changes to midterms and finals in the wake of the PARCC exams, spokesperson Dan Higgins said. School leaders should have meaningful conversations with parents and community members to work out the best local approach, he added.

State and local tests must work together in a smart, systematic way to give teachers and parents the best possible feedback, said Michael Yaple, a spokesperson for the Department of Education.

?As educators discover the value of the new PARCC assessments, they may find it makes sense to rely less on other tests that are used locally,? Yaple said.
Adam Clark may be reached at adam_clark@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on twitter at @realAdamClark. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

Do you know how to do Common Core math? Confusion over the standards has some calling for their removal. NBC?s Rehema Ellis reports.

Confusion Over Common Core Math is Causing a Stir

http://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/c ... math-causing-stir-n237076

2015: EDUCATION IN NJ WILL SEE THE CONSQUENCES OF EARLIER POLICY DECISIONS

http://www.njspotlight.com/stories/15 ... th-its-earlier-decisions/

PARCC, school funding, teacher evaluations, takeover districts -- it?s going to be an interesting year for New Jersey public schools

At the start of 2014, questions about state education policy centered on whether Gov. Chris Christie?s second term would be as eventful as his first.

At the start of 2015, one of the biggest questions is whether Christie will even be around to finish his second term.

It should be a busy year for education policy and politics in New Jersey, with Christie?s fate -- or at least his intentions -- near the top of the list. But the state also stands at several crossroads when it comes to its public schools.

The following lists several of the big issues, well as a few that are likely to come in under the radar:

PARCC testing is here
Not only will 2015 answer whether New Jersey?s schools are ready for the new PARCC testing, it could also be an important gauge as to whether the public is ready.

The testing, developed by the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness of College and Careers (PARCC), will be most districts? first wholesale experience of online assessments, and concerns have been raised as to whether both the technology and the instruction is ready for the change.

Any new testing often comes with significant impact on results, too, and state officials have been bracing for the likelihood of a drop in scores that could prove a gauge of the public?s confidence in the measures.

In addition, a fledgling but real backlash already exists from families that are pulling their children out of the testing in protest for its longer duration and higher stakes. The administration has played down the protest, but it appears to be growing and becoming only more emboldened as the PARCC tests approach.

School funding on the front burner
It?s a perennial topic: How will New Jersey schools fare in terms of state funding? It hasn?t gone very well the past few years, as funding after steep cuts in Christie?s first year has yet to return to 2009 levels for a vast majority of districts.

But this year brings some new important nuances to the issue.

Christie will present a fiscal 2016 budget this winter in which school aid is the largest piece of the pie, and few expect significant increases for schools -- if any at all -- while the state faces deep holes in its pension liability and its transportation infrastructure costs.

But within that larger context, schools are also feeling significant challenges under the state?s 2 percent property-tax caps, which have left little leeway, especially when it comes to rising special education costs.

A state task force is at work looking at options for how to pay for these programs, and it should bring more attention -- and pressure -- to the issue.

Teacher evaluation faces its consequences
Last year was an important one for the rollout of the state?s new educator-evaluation system, with districts being required for the first time to follow a standardized path for judging their teachers and administrators.

This year will see the first of the consequences.

The 2012 tenure reform law requires districts to bring tenure charges against those with ratings of ?ineffective? for two consecutive years, and two years later, 2015 will be the first test to see if districts will move on the opportunity.

Meanwhile, a segment of teachers -- mostly in elementary and middle schools -- will see for the first time their ratings even partially influenced by how students fare on the new PARCC testing.

Takeover districts tested
The state?s control of the Newark, Camden, and Paterson districts (and partial control in Jersey City) has led to what may be New Jersey?s hottest education debates over the past few years, and 2015 is unlikely to be much different.

But 2015 could prove pivotal to what happens next.

Newark especially may be at a turning point, with embattled superintendent Cami Anderson on notice from the administration that starting in 2015 she will be under yearly reviews of her performance and what has been a stormy relationship with the community.

She also faces her own budget challenges, as well as the end of a labor contract with teachers that was historic for its performance bonuses but far less popular within the district?s rank and file.

In Camden, the newest to the state-controlled class, schools will continue to adjust to the changes brought by state-appointed superintendent Paymon Rouhanifard. It will also be the first full year of the new quasi-charter ?renaissance schools? in the district, with more likely on the way under an extension of the law in 2014.

Christie policies go national
The governor?s education policies have been keenly felt within the state for the past four years, but if and when he decides to run for president in the coming months, those policies will have a national audience as well.

He is sure to play up those that fit his campaign message, especially the bipartisan tenure law of 2012 and the state?s aggressiveness in districts like Newark and Camden.

But others may prove a tougher sell to more conservative elements of the Republican party, including a pension reform gone sour and Christie?s embrace of the Common Core State Standards that have become deeply unpopular on the right.

With former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush looking more and more likely to join the race and compete for the moderate wing of the GOP, it will be interesting to see if Christie tries to distinguish himself by breaking from Common Core or other more moderate policies.

Issues not getting the attention
These are hardly the only issues that will draw attention. The Legislature will again spend a lot of time talking about revisions to the state?s charter school law, but that is becoming a familiar exercise without much tangible result so far.

And Christie?s controversial caps on superintendent pay will continue to be debated, although 2016 will probably be a more pivotal year when the caps technically expire.

There are a few other issues that could have an impact, even though they are not getting as much attention.

Among them will be the expiration of the 2011 health-benefit reforms that have seen school employees paying more for their insurance coverage, which opens the way to negotiations.

Preschool expansion could get a boost with the state securing additional federal funding in late 2014, and early-childhood education is one of the few issues to have support across party lines.

Just to keep things interesting, the New Jersey Education Association, the teachers union, has openly said it will press for reforms in teacher preparation and induction. And others have called for more accountability when it comes to these programs, including the first ratings of colleges and universities for the effectiveness of the teachers they train.

February 25, 2014

TO: Chief School Administrators
Charter School Lead Persons

FROM: Bari Erlichson, Ph.D.
Assistant Commissioner/Chief Performance Officer
Division of Data, Research, Evaluation and Reporting

SUBJECT: Testing Calendar for 2014-2015 School Year

Attached is the 2014-2015 school year calendar for the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC);
High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA);
New Jersey Assessment of Skills and Knowledge ( NJASK) Science (Grades 4 & 8), New Jersey Biology Competency Test (NJBCT),
Alternate Proficiency Assessment (APA),
Dynamic Learning Maps (DLM),
Alternative High School Assessment (AHSA) and the National Assessment Educational Progress (NAEP).
Please review this information carefully.

New Jersey?s Proposed Testing Calendar 2014-2015
Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC)

Below are the PARCC testing windows when districts must administer the Performance-Based Assessment (PBA) and the End-of-Year (EOY) components of the PARCC assessment.

However, schools will create their own testing schedule based on their technology capabilities and school calendars.
Schools can administer the PARCC assessments in the morning and the afternoon.
Further guidance for schools regarding scheduling within the testing window, block scheduling and the paper and pencil test accommodation will be forthcoming.

At the high school level, the PARCC PBA test window overlaps with the last re-take of the High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA).
Schools will differ in the number of students required to take the HSPA and so the Office of Assessments is providing high schools a choice on when they want to schedule the HSPA re-take and PARCC overlap.
The first option is to have the same PARCC PBA testing window as the grades 3-8 assessment.
The second option is to suspend PARCC PBA testing during the 10 day window of HSPA testing (March 2 through March 13, 2015) to focus on the paper-based administration of the HSPA and then resume PARCC PBA testing March 16, 2015 and continue through April 2, 2015.
If districts choose option #2, districts need to notify the Office of Assessments by written correspondence no later than January 30, 2015. The default high school testing window is option 1.

Performance-Based Component
PARCC (grades 3 March 2, 2015 through March 27, 2015 Computer-Based Testing
through 8)

Option #1
PARCC (High School) March 2, 2015 through March 27, 2015 Computer-Based Testing

Option #2
PARCC (High School) February 20, 2015 through April 2, 2015
(10 day break for HSPA testing ? no PARCC
Testing from March 2, 2015 through March 16, 2015)

End-of-Year Component
PARCC April 27, 2015 through May 22, 2015 Computer-Based Testing
(All grade levels)

High School Proficiency Assessment (HSPA)

The two remaining HSPA administrations are opportunities for all retained-eleventh graders, twelfth graders, retained-twelfth graders, returning students, and adult high school students who have not passed the HSPA. First time eleventh graders will not be administered HSPA.

High School Proficiency October 7, 8, 9, 2014 Paper-Based Testing
Assessment
High School Proficiency October 14, 15, 16, 2014 Paper-Based Testing
Assessment (Make-up Administration)
High School Proficiency March 3, 4, 5, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
Assessment
High School Proficiency March 10, 11, 12, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
Assessment (Make-up Administration)

New Jersey Assessment of Skills and Knowledge (NJASK) -

Science (Grades 4 & 8)
Grade 4 & 8 Science May 27, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
(Regular Administration)
Grade 4 & 8 Science May 28, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
(Make-up Administration)

New Jersey Biology Competency Test (NJBCT)

New Jersey Biology May 26, 27, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
Competency Test (NJBCT) (Regular Administration)

New Jersey Biology May 28, 29, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
Competency Test (NJBCT) (Make-up-Administration)

Alternate Proficiency Assessment (APA) - Science
Alternate Proficiency September 2, 2014 through Portfolio-Based Assessment

Assessment (APA) November 14, 2014
Science (Collection Period 1)

Alternate Proficiency December 8, 2014 through
Assessment (APA) February 13, 2015 Portfolio-Based Assessment
Science (Collection Period 2)
Dynamic Learning Maps (DLM) - Alternate Proficiency Assessment

The Dynamic Learning Maps (DLM) is an adaptive computer-based assessment that will be administered to the one percent of students with the most significant cognitive impairments.

The assessment is aligned to the Common Core State Standards and students will be administered the test in English Language Arts and Mathematics in grades 3-8 and 11.
Below is the testing window in which the summative assessment will need to be administered.
However, schools will create their own testing schedule based on their technology capabilities and school calendars. Further guidance for schools regarding scheduling within the testing window will be forthcoming.
Students in grades 4, 8 and high school will also need to be administered the Alternate Proficiency Assessment (APA) in Science using the portfolio-based assessment.

Dynamic Learning Maps April 6, 2015 through May 1, 2015 Computer-Adaptive Testing
(DLM) (Summative)
Alternate Proficiency
Assessment (APA)

Alternative High School Assessment (AHSA)

Alternative High School January 12, 2015 through February 6, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
Assessment (AHSA) (Testing Window 1)

Alternative High School March 23, 2015 through April 17, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
Assessment (AHSA) (Testing Window 2)

Alternative High School June 15, 2015 through June 26, 2015 Paper-Based Testing
Assessment (AHSA) (Testing Window 3)

National Assessment Educational Progress (NAEP)

National Assessment January 26, 2015 through March 6, 2015
Educational Progress (NAEP)

The department appreciates the feedback it receives regarding assessment scheduling.
If you should have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact the Office of Assessments, at 609.984.6311 or email assessment@doe.state.nj.us.

Thank you.

BE/JBH/2014-15testingschedule

c: Members, State Board of Education
Commissioner Christopher D. Cerf
Senior Staff
Jeffrey B. Hauger
Mary Jane Kurabinski
Meghan Snow
Amy Ruck
Peggy McDonald
Lori Ramella
Laurence Coco
Office of Assessments
Executive County Superintendents
Executive Directors for Regional Achievement Centers
Executive County School Business Administrators
County Test Coordinators
District Test Coordinators
Bilingual/ESL Coordinators
Directors of Approved Private Schools for the Disabled
Directors of College-Operated Programs
Directors of a State Facility
NJ LEE Group
Garden State Coalition of Schools

http://www.state.nj.us/education/assessment/shcedule1415.pdf

Can We, ?Stop Using Tests To Drive Education Reform?

?Stop using tests to try to drive education reform.?

That?s the conclusion from a recent in-depth report examining the pros and cons of new education standards called the Common Core and the standardized tests that accompany the new achievement targets.

The report ?Questioning The Common Core Tests? from American Radio Works, a project of American Public Media, examined the rollout of the new standards, particularly in the state of New York where that rollout has been accompanied by huge controversies over dramatic increases in the failure rates on new state tests.

The reporter, Emily Hanford, casts the new standards as mostly a good thing. She quoted a ?a mom and a former math teacher? who claims the standards have led to changes in her children?s school that encourage them to ?think more.? And Hanford spoke with Carol Burris, an award-winning principal from a high school on Long Island, New York, who ?would like to see students at all schools in the United States get the kind of education that?s laid out in the Common Core standards.?

But Hanford balanced sunny views of the Common Core with the reality of the increased standardized testing that tends to accompany the new standards wherever they go. Indeed, increased testing is now at the heart of ?reform? policies being implemented in every school, with new tests now being rolled, even in kindergarten and pre-school and to children who have severe disabilities.

?Testing is sucking the joy out of learning,? the New York mom Hanford interviewed declared. ?She?s upset about all the class time taken up by the tests. Students in New York sit for up to nine hours of Common Core testing, at the end of the school year, plus interim assessments and practice tests.?

Another parent complained, ?The curriculum has been taken over by ?constant? test prep.? Another said, ?The kids hear all day long and all year long, ?Do it this way so it?ll be right on the test? ? The kids are getting a sense that it?s all about this looming test.?

Principal Burris, Hanford summarized, doesn?t believe any potential good coming from new standards ?will happen as long as there are high-stakes tests attached.?

Given the context Hanford?s report established ? with the new standards seemingly a potentially beneficial ends being undone by a stifling, narrow-minded means ? it?s hard not to reach the same thought she ended with, paraphrasing Burris, that the best idea may be to ?stop using tests to try to drive education reform.?

That conclusion is in fact rapidly becoming the center of the debate over education policy across the country, not just in New York and not just in regards to the roll out of Common Core.

Test Rebellion Grows, Spreads

Indeed, reports about widespread protests against standardized tests are now routine.

Most prominent among them was the recent headline in The New York Times ?States Listen As Parents Give Rampant Testing An F.? The article told of a recent parent meeting in a Florida high school auditorium in which, moms and dads ?railed at a system that they said was overrun by new tests coming from all levels ? district, state and federal. Some wept as they described teenagers who take Xanax to cope with test stress, children who refuse to go to school and teachers who retire rather than promote a culture that seems to value testing over learning.?

The reporter, Lizette Alvarez, noted Florida schools this year will ?dedicate on average 60 to 80 days out of the 180-day school year to standardized testing. In a few districts, tests were scheduled to be given every day to at least some students.?

The overemphasis on testing, Alvarez found, has led to parents and educators across the state ?rebelling.?

Florida, even more than New York, has been a ?model? of ?education reform? other state leaders have been urged to follow ? implementing the Common Core and other ?innovations.? But the changes have brought about the increased emphasis on testing. In response to that emphasis, parents and educator inFlorida, like those in New York, are joining what amounts to ?a national protest,? in Alvarez?s words, against all the testing requirements that invariably accompany the reforms.

As proof of the national scope of the uprising, the Times reporter pointed to the organization Fair Test, the National Center on Fair and Open Testing, which keeps a running tally of test-related news and commentary on its website. Anyone scanning the weekly accounts will quickly learn that the vehement outrage over increased standardized testing has spread to every state and is continuing to increase in intensity.

Last month FairTest released a detailed report on the testing resistance and reform movement. The report found, ?In the spring of 2014, an estimated 60,000 parents refused the tests in New York (5 percent of the state?s students in grades 3-8), more than 1,000 opted out in Chicago, and across Colorado more than 1,400 boycotted. Parents and students opted out in many other states. Meanwhile, people organized to roll back testing in more than half the states, using public forums, social and traditional media campaigns, rallies, petitions and legislative efforts, as well as boycotts. This represents a major expansion from spring 2013; for example, there were 10 times as many refusers in New York this year compared with last.?

Roots Of Test Mania

Where did all the testing come from?

As the Times reporter Hanford noted, ?Common Core does not require states to test students, but the No Child Left Behind Act does. That law, signed by President George W. Bush in 2002, says that in order to get certain kinds of federal education funding, states must test their students every year in grades three through eight and once in high school. The law requires states to publish test results. When the law went into effect, it mandated that by 2014, every student would have to score ?proficient? on those tests. States that failed to reach this goal could lose federal funding.?

Then the emphasis on testing increased dramatically when new requirements for teacher and principal evaluations rolled out under the Obama administration. ?Evaluating teachers by test scores is not part of Common Core,? Hanford explained again, ?but it?s been linked to it because of money the Obama administration gave to states as part of its Race to the Top grant program. To be eligible for that program, states had to adopt Common Core (or similarly rigorous standards and assessments), and they had to put into place teacher evaluation systems that use student test score growth as a ?significant? part of both teacher and school principal evaluations.?

Actually, it?s difficult to find any aspect of the agenda known as ?education reform? that is not inextricably linked to test scores.

Scores on international tests have been used to condemn the American public education system. Test scores are frequently given as chief rationale for state takeovers of local school districts and for closing neighborhood schools. And test scores are now the principal means of determining nearly every value proposition for education ? whether to include art and music in the curriculum, choose charter schools over public ones, add extended hours or new technologies.

As I explained some time ago, education reform advocates took their lessons from financial markets that learned how to ?flip? the value of a commodity with unclear quantitative value ? whether it was the number of hits on a website or the unsecured value of a mortgage debt ? into a specific value in the form of a security to buy and sell on Wall Street.

By decreeing that student scores on standardized tests would define the ?output? schools would be accountable for, reformers ? either unwittingly or intentionally (does it matter?) ? turned student learning ? and by extension, the students themselves ? into a commodity that could be speculated on in the context of all sorts of ?reform? schemes ? from starting charter schools to lowering teacher salaries to closing schools.

Now the true costs of this mindset ? that it might be corrupting, even inhumane ? are becoming clear to people who are most affected by the policy.

Leaders Are Starting To Hear But Do They Listen?

Politicians and public officials are starting to hear the growing chorus against testing.

Recently in Ohio, district superintendents in the northeast corner of the state condemned what they called ?test mania,? calling the state?s new exam schedule ? doubling test time to 10 hours per student ? an ?abomination.?

As the FairTest report cited above noted in its Executive Summary, ?School boards are also resisting test overkill. In Texas, 85 percent of districts passed a resolution condemning testing for ?strangling? education. That set the stage for a 2013 parent-led legislative campaign that rolled back the number of graduation tests from 15 to 5. In New York, about 20 districts refused to administer tests used for the sole purpose of trying out items for the next year?s state exams. Parents prodded the districts and provided legal backing. This fall, the Lee County, Florida, school board voted to opt out of all state-mandated standardized tests. Though it later retreated, that school board and others across the state, together with parent and teacher allies, are pursuing strategies to slash state test requirements, making it easier for districts to reduce their own testing mandates.?

In August, Education Secretary Arne Duncan added to the chorus when he wrote in a blog post that ?testing issues today are sucking the oxygen out of the room in a lot of schools.? Recently, 11 civil rights groups that constitute the Advancement Project told Duncan to drop K-12 test-based accountability system.

Then in October, leaders of state and large-city school districts announced ?a joint effort to evaluate and improve the quality and quantity of student assessments in public schools across the nation.?

Back to the question, ?Can we stop using tests to drive education reform??

Answering that question will take more than new policy; it will take a new mindset.

As Hanford noted in her Times article, ?New York State Education Commissioner John King believes tests are necessary to get teachers to start teaching the Common Core. ?People do what?s measured,? he said at an education policy breakfast at NYU in the Fall of 2012. ?And measuring the Common Core has to be a part of how we insure successful implementation.??

This is not only an extraordinarily narrow-minded view of human nature; it?s also bad for education. The notion that something as complex as a school system, overseeing something as ill-defined as ?learning,? can be evaluated and governed by specific and isolated ?data outputs,? has always been a really bad way of thinking about public policy. In fact, there?s lots of evidence teachers will try new ideas when they?re not being measured.

Changing this mindset will be harder than changing the policy. As teacher and Education Week contributor Peter Greene wrote on his popular blogsite, when Secretary Duncan criticized the over-reliance on high stakes testing in our schools, he was essentially correct. ? It?s just that his words have nothing to do with the policies pursued by his Department of Education ? Duncan does not welcome an examination of the way in which standardized testing is driving actual education out of classrooms across America.?

What Greene, Principal Carol Burris, and others foresee, unfortunately, is rather than a complete change in mindset, what we?re seeing instead is just a change in jargon in how supporters of reform express their policy proposals.

So we?ve yet to hear a coherent answer to, ?Can we stop using tests to drive education reform?? But any legitimate notion of ?reform? will have to come up with one.

http://educationopportunitynetwork.or ... o-drive-education-reform/

SIX THINGS THE US DEPT OF EDUCATION DID TO DEPRIVE YOUR CHILD OF PRIVACY

http://whatiscommoncore.wordpress.com ... ve-your-child-of-privacy/

he story of Common Core and data mining begins as most stories do, with a huge, unmet need.

Self-appointed ?stakeholder? know-it-alls at the federal level (also at state, corporate, and even university levels) determined that they had the right, and the need, for open access to personal student data? more so than they already had.

They needed state school systems to voluntarily agree to common data core standards AND to common learning standards to make data comparisons easy. They didn?t care what the standards were, as teachers and parents and students do; they only cared that the standards would be the same across the nation.

So, without waiting around for a proper vote, they did it. The CEDS (Common Education Data Standards) were created by the same people who created and copyrighted Common Core: the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO). No surprise.

http://whatiscommoncore.files.wordpre ... /ceds-common-elements.jpg


Because the federal ?need? to control schools and data was and is illegal and unconstitutional ?the federal government ?needed? to do (and did) at least six sneaky things.

SIX SNEAKY THINGS THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION DID TO DEPRIVE YOUR CHILD OF PRIVACY:

1. Sneaky Thing Number One: It bribed the states with ARRA Stimulus monies to build 50 linkable, twinlike State Longitudinal Database Systems (SLDS). This act created a virtual national database.

These SLDS?s had to be interoperable within states and outside states with a State Interoperability Framework. Utah, for example, accepted $9.6 million to create Utah?s SLDS. Think about it. All states have an SLDS, and they are built to be interoperable. How is this not a de facto national database?

2. Sneaky Thing Number Two: It altered the (previously privacy-protective) federal FERPA (Family Educational Rights Privacy Act) law to make access to personally identifiable student data ?including biological and behavioral data? ?legal?.

So now, the act of requiring parental consent (to share personally identifiable information) has been reduced from a requirement to just a ?best practice? according to the altered federal FERPA regulations.

http://whatiscommoncore.files.wordpre ... 0/best-practice-ferpa.jpg

For more information on this, study the lawsuit against the Department of Education by the Electronic Information Privacy Center (EPIC).

The Department of Ed also altered FERPA?s definitions of terms, including what would be defined as ?personally identifiable information?.

http://whatiscommoncore.files.wordpre ... ic-definition-federal.jpg


So personally identifiable, shareable information now includes biometric information, (which is behavioral and biological information) collected via testing, palm scanning or iris scanning, or any other means. Schools have not been told that the information they submit to the state SLDS systems are vulnerable to federal and corporate perusal. Legislators write bills that call for the testing of behavioral indicators? but have they considered how this can damage a student?s lifelong need for, and right to, privacy?

The Department of Education openly promotes schools collecting data about students? personalities and beliefs in the report called ?Promoting Grit, Tenacity and Perserverance.? This document promotes the use of facial expression cameras, posture analysis seats, wireless skin conductance sensors and other measures of students? beliefs and emotions. See page 44.

3. Sneaky Thing Number Three: The US Department of Education partnered with private groups, including the CCSSO (that?s the Council of Chief State School Officers ?copyright holders on Common Core?) to collect student data nationally.

The CCSSO, or ?Superintendents? Club? as I like to call it, is a private group with no accountability to voters. This makes it in-valid and un-American, as far as governance goes. The CCSSO has a stated mission: to disaggregate student data. Disaggregate means to take away anonymity.


http://whatiscommoncore.files.wordpre ... /ccsso-disaggregation.jpg

The CCSSO states that it has a mission to collect data nationally in partnership with the US Dept of Ed: ?The Education Information Management Advisory Consortium (EIMAC) is CCSSO?s network of state education agency officials tasked with data collection and reporting; information system management and design; and assessment coordination. EIMAC advocates on behalf of states to reduce data collection burden and improve the overall quality of the data collected at the national level.

The CCSSO site states that its data collection effort is a USDOE partnership: ?The Common Education Data Standards Initiative is a joint effort by CCSSO and the State Higher Education Executive Officers (SHEEO) in partnership with the United Staes Department of Education.?

(Do you recall voting for this arrangement, anyone? Anyone? ?Me neither! )

4. Sneaky Thing Number Four: It used private-public partnerships to promote data linking among agencies. The Data Quality Campaign is one example. The National Data Collection Model is another example. The Common Educational Data Standards is another example.

What do these ?models? really model?

Example one: from the Data Quality Campaign: ?as states build and enhance K12 longitudinal data systems they continue building linkages to exchange and use information across early childhood, postsecondary and the workforce and with other critical agencies such as health, social services and criminal justice systems.?

Let that sink in: linking data from schools, medical clinics, and criminal justice systems is the goal of the Federal-to-CCSSO partnership. So nothing will be kept from any governmental agency; nothing is to be sacred or private if it is known by an SLDS serving entity (any state-funded, state-accountable school).

Example two: from the National Data Collection Model:

your child?s name
nickname
religious affiliation
birthdate
ability grouping
GPA
physical characteristics
IEP
attendance
telephone number
bus stop times
allergies
diseases
languages and dialects spoken
number of attempts at a given assignment
delinquent status
referral date
nonschool activity involvement
meal type
screen name
maternal last name
voting status
martial status
? and even cause of death.

Proponents point out that this is not mandatory federal data collection. True; not yet. But it?s a federally partnered data model and many states are following it.

5. Sneaky Thing Number Five: The Department of Ed created grants for Common Core testing and then mandated that those testing groups synchronize their tests, report fully and often to the U.S. Department of Education, share student-level data, and produce ?all student-level data in a manner consistent with an industry-recognized open-licensed interoperability standard that is approved by the Department?.

So federally funded Common Core tests require Common data interoperability standards.

Check out that Cooperative Agreement document here.

But, do you think this ?Agreement? information does not apply to you because your state dropped its SBAC or PARCC membership ?as several states have? Think again. There is an incestuous, horrific pool of private and public organizations, all of which are VOLUNTARILY agreeing to Common Core based, technological interoperability and data collection standards!

The Data Quality Campaign lists as its partners dozens of groups? not only the CCSSO and NGA (Common Core creators), not only the College Board ?which is now run by the lead architect of Common Core, David Coleman; ?not only Achieve, Inc., the group that contracted with CCSSO/NGO to write the Common Core, but even the School Interoperability Framework Association, the Pell Institute (Pell Grants), Jeb Bush?s Foundation for Excellence in Education, American Institutes for Research (Utah?s Common Core testing provider) and many other Common Core product-providing organizations.

So virtually everyone?s doing data the same way whether they?re privately or publically funded. This should freak anybody out. It really should. We the People, individuals, are losing personal power to these public-private partnerships that cannot be un-elected and that are not subject to the transparency laws of elected offices.

6. Sneaky Thing Number Six: The Department of Education directly lied to the American Society of News Editors. In a June 2013 speech given to the American Society of News Editors, Secretary Duncan mocked the concerns of parents and educators who are fighting Common Core and its related student data mining:

?A new set of standards ? rigorous, high-quality learning standards, developed and led by a group of governors and state education chiefs ? are under attack as a federal takeover of the schools. And your role in sorting out truth from nonsense is really important? They make.. outlandish claims. They say that the Common Core calls for federal collection of student data. For the record, we are not allowed to, and we won?t. And let?s not even get into the really wacky stuff: mind control, robots, and biometric brain mapping. This work is interesting, but frankly, not that interesting.?

Despite what the state school board and the federal Department of Education claim, corporations do know that Common Core and student data mining are interdependent.

CEO of Escholar Shawn Bay spoke at a recent White House event called ?Datapalooza.? He said (see his speech on this video, at about minute 9:15) that Common Core ?is the glue that actually ties everything together? for student data collection.

And President Obama himself has called his educational and data related reforms so huge that they are ?cradle to career? -affecting reforms. Secretary Duncan now refers to the reforms not as ?K-12? but as ?p-12? meaning preschool/prenatal. These reforms affect the most vulnerable, but not in a positive way, and certainly not with voters? knowledge and consent.

The sneakiness and the privacy invasion isn?t just a federal wrong; there?s state-level invasion of local control, too: to be specific, our state?s robbing parents of the right to fully govern their own children.

When I asked my state school board how to opt out of having my children tracked by the State Longitudinal Database System, I was told that the answer was no. There was no way to opt out, they said: all children registered in any state school system (charters, online schools, homeschool-state hybrid programs) are tracked by the SLDS. Here?s that letter.

http://whatiscommoncore.files.wordpre ... 3/10/the-answer-is-no.jpg

Children are NOT Numbers: National Opt Out Day, January 7th

http://www.pegwithpen.com/2013/01/chi ... numbers-national-opt.html

Teachers, as you plan how to resist corporate education reform and rebuild public schools on National Opt Out Day (Jan.7th) - or any day for that matter - here is one way to do it - do not allow others to refer to children based on their test scores. Children cannot be called "UnSats" or "Partials" or any other label attached to a number.

It is beyond disrespectful and allows teachers to become removed from the actions they are taking, therefore, they/teachers are less likely to wake up to the pain and suffering inflicted on these children from such abusive top down mandates. If children are numbers, rather than individuals with talents, personalities, ideas, heart, pain, and joy, it becomes much easier for corporate education reformers to move forward efficiently with their plan to profit off of these children as they are tallied, divided up and scattered randomly within communities.

When the community reads about the "failing" schools and the large numbers of "unsatistfactories" where does the learner, the person, factor into that message? That story?

The learner does NOT factor into that story. The aftermath of shutting down schools, reshuffling children and destroying communities - routines - consistencies - their feelings of belonging - none of these narratives or feelings exist in those numbers. They don't care about people. People, and the stories people tell, muddy the efficiency of numbers used within the business model being implemented in our public schools

If you hear a teacher call a child an "UnSat" don't allow it, politely ask the teacher to refer to the child by name - that child - that individual - who has a heart - a will - and a desire to grow and thrive as a confident and creative citizen. Ask a question about the child and use the child's name - model the behavior and shift the culture of your school. Teachers have heart and most often will recognize the horror in designating children as numbers, but the harsh truth is that in today's schools it has become part of the culture of schools - it is common place to refer to a group of students as "UnSats." It is a shameful practice, and as a teacher who follows the Declaration of Professional Conscience for Teachers I believe calling a child by his or her name is one powerful, yet simple step, that can be taken in resisting from within the challenging confines of our teaching profession - currently held hostage by corporate education reform.

Resist from within - don't allow a child to be addressed as a number or label. I will continue to add additional ways to resist corporate education reform, but the most simple way is to remember that the child is a beautiful being that needs to be nurtured and supported, not divided, subtracted, and slapped on a data wall. Call the child by name, and upon hearing that name, memories and stories of the child will come forth and remind us to protect the child, that beautiful soul, from those who have no heart.

The 12 Reasons We Oppose the PARCC Test

http://www.saveourschoolsnj.org/blog/

The 12 Reasons We Oppose the PARCC Test


1. PARCC is poorly designed & confusing
?For many of the sample released questions, there is, arguably, no answer among the answer choices that is correct or more than one answer that is correct, or the question simply is not, arguably, actually answerable as written.?

Why?

?The tests consist largely of objective-format items (multiple-choice and EBSR). These item types are most appropriate for testing very low-level skills (e.g., recall of factual detail). However, on these tests, such item formats are pressed into a kind of service for which they are, generally, not appropriate. They are used to test ?higher-order thinking.? The test questions therefore tend to be tricky and convoluted. The test makers insist on answer choices all being ?reasonable.? So, the questions are supposed to deal with higher-order thinking, and the wrong answers are all supposed to be plausible, so the test questions end up being extraordinarily complex and confusing and tricky, all because the ?experts? who designed these tests didn?t understand the most basic stuff about creating assessments?that objective question formats are generally not great for testing higher-order thinking, for example.? i

2. PARCC?s online testing format is very problematic, particularly for younger students
?In the early grades, the tests end up being as much a test of keyboarding skills as of attainment in [English Language Arts or Math]. The online testing format is entirely inappropriate for most third graders.? i

3. PARCC is diagnostically & instructionally useless
?Many kinds of assessment?diagnostic assessment, formative assessment, performative assessment, some classroom summative assessment?has instructional value. They can be used to inform instruction and/or are themselves instructive.

The results of [the PARCC] tests are not broken down in any way that is of diagnostic or instructional use.

Teachers and students cannot even see the tests to find out what students got wrong on them and why. So the tests are of no diagnostic or instructional value. None. None whatsoever.? i

4. Taking and preparing for PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests is replacing learning
Administrators at many schools ?report that they spend as much as a third of the school year preparing students to take these tests. That time includes the actual time spent taking the tests, the time spent taking pretests and benchmark tests and other practice tests, the time spent on test prep materials, the time spent doing exercises and activities in textbooks and online materials that have been modeled on the test questions in order to prepare kids to answer questions of those kinds, and the time spent on reporting, data analysis, data chats, proctoring, and other test housekeeping.? i

5. PARCC will further distort curricula and teaching
?The tests drive how and what people teach, and they drive much of what is created by curriculum developers?Those distortions are grave. In U.S. curriculum development today, the tail is wagging the dog.? i

6. PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests undermine students? creativity and desire to learn
The research on motivation and creativity is very clear: externally imposed punishment and reward systems, like those associated with high-stakes standardized testing, suppress our intrinsic motivation, dramatically undermining creativity and love of learning.

High-stakes standardized tests also suppress motivation and creativity because the endless test preparation narrows the curriculum and creates a boring learning environment, filled with anxiety and fear.

7. PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests have an enormous financial cost
?In 2010-11, the US spent $1.7 billion on state standardized testing alone.? With the Common Core State Standards tests, this cost increases substantially.

The PARCC contract by itself is worth over a billion dollars to the Pearson [Corporation] in the first three years, and you have to add the cost of [the Smarter Balanced Common Core Assessment] and the other state tests (another billion and a half?), to that.

No one, to my knowledge, has accurately estimated the cost of the computer upgrades that will be necessary for online testing of every child, but those costs probably run to 50 or 60 billion.

This is money that could be spent on stuff that matters?on making sure that poor kids have eye exams and warm clothes and food in their bellies, on making sure that libraries are open and that schools have nurses on duty to keep kids from dying. How many dead kids is all this testing worth, given that it is, again, of no instructional value?

IF THE ANSWER TO THAT IS NOT OBVIOUS TO YOU, YOU SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED ANYWHERE NEAR A SCHOOL OR AN EDUCATIONAL POLICY-MAKING DESK.? i

8. PARCC is completely experimental. It has not been validated as accurate & yet it will be used to evaluate students, schools and teachers
?Standardized test development practice requires that the testing instrument be validated. Such validation requires that the test maker show that the test correlates strongly with other accepted measures of what is being tested, both generally and specifically (that is, with regard to specific materials and/or skills being tested).

No such validation was done for [PARCC and Smarter Balanced common core] tests?So, the tests fail to meet a minimal standard for a high-stakes standardized assessment?that they have been independently validated.? i

9. PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests are abusive to our children
Reports of students throwing up during high-stakes standardized tests or inflicting harm to themselves as a result of test stress are already common.

PARCC is an intentionally much more difficult test that will increase students? anxiety and feelings of inadequacy.

PARCC is extra-frustrating to our children because it is entirely on-line, creating additional test-taking challenges not related to the test content.

The combination of the more brutal PARCC tests and the more stressful on-line PARCC testing experience will result in more of our children feeling abused, anxious and afraid.

10. PARCC will worsen the achievement and gender gaps
?Both the achievement and gender gaps in educational performance are largely due to motivational issues, and these tests and the curricula and pedagogical strategies tied to them are extremely demotivating. They create new expectations and new hurdles that will widen existing gaps, not close them.?

PARCC and other Common Core exams ?drive more regimentation and standardization of curricula, which will further turn off kids already turned off by school, causing more to tune out and drop out.? i

11. High-stakes standardized tests fail to improve educational outcomes
?We have had more than a decade, now, of standards-and-testing-based accountability under [No Child Left Behind]. We have seen only miniscule increases in outcomes, and those are well within the margin of error of the calculations. Simply from the Hawthorne Effect, we should have seen SOME improvement!!! And that suggests that the testing has actually DECREASED OUTCOMES, which is consistent with what we know about the demotivational effects of extrinsic punishment and reward systems. It?s the height of stupidity to look at a clearly failed approach and to say, ?Gee, we should do a lot more of them.?? i

12. PARCC and Smarter Balanced Common Core aligned tests are designed to brand the majority of our children as failures
The Smarter Balanced test consortium announced in November that it would use very high cut scores for the test, which would result in more than half of all students labeled as failures.

In third grade, for example, only 38% of students taking the Smarter Balanced test are expected to achieve a proficient score in English and only 39% in math. ii

As numerous testing experts have pointed out, a ?cut score? is ?NOT an objective measure. It is a judgment call, a matter of group opinion, shaped by assumptions, and it can be manipulated to make scores appear higher or lower, depending on what? those in control want. iii

The PARCC test will set its cut scores next summer, but it is very likely to follow the same pattern, creating a false narrative of failure and causing great harm to our children and our public schools.

i Source: http://dianeravitch.net/?/bob-shepherd-why-parcc-testing-i?/
ii Source: http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2014/11/17/13sbac.h34.html
iii Source: http://dianeravitch.net/?/how-pearsons-common-core-tests-a?/

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The Education Activist: From Student to Teacher

A student activist navigating the school reform movement on a journey towards becoming a teacher. Fighting to reclaim public education and occasionally blogging along the way.

http://theeducationactivist.blogspot. ... unswick-board-of.html?m=1

Saturday, December 27, 2014

My Response to SB Superintendent
At the last South Brunswick Board of Education meeting, Superintendent Dr. Jelling came to the podium for about 10 minutes to give a short speech on PARCC, testing, and opting-out. I recorded his short speech, which can be seen below (the link should bring you right to the video). After coming home from the meeting unsatisfied (to say the least) with a lot of what he said, I decided to go through and break down his main points.

Video of speech:
https://fbcdn-video-o-a.akamaihd.net/h ... 01d77124751885894ac85a37d

Breakdown of points:
?Something that we are going to administer to so many students across so many states.?

Blogger Mercedes Schneider has been following the Common Core/PARCC debate closely, and has broken down the PARCC attrition from 2011-2014. I recommend reading her entire piece with detailed explanations here. A main quote to sum up the article: ?PARCC exited the 2011 starting gate with 24 states plus DC. By the close of 2014, PARCC states actually and legitimately contracted with Pearson for its PARCC assessments is less than half the initial 2011 count.?
Here, we then must ask ourselves: why are so many states having reservations about PARCC and common core? Why are so many well-respected academics raising questions about the tests and the standards?

?...criticism in terms of who framed the PARCC, and Pearson is the entity that seems to be credited/blamed depending on your bend... and I think... that?s a specious argument, it just doesn?t hold water. Pearson has been doing business in this district for decades and decades, and the idea that the imposition of private equity and entrepreneurship in education is a bad thing just completely ignores the truth... I absolutely reject that on its face.?

First, just because a company has been doing business for ?decades and decades? doesn?t mean that all of their products are good for students.

Well, look here! A piece written on December 15, 2014 by Alan Singer states the following: ?Pearson Education is closing its foundation; it is under investigation by the FBI for possible insider dealings in the Los Angeles iPad fiasco; the company is being sued by former employees for wrongful termination; and its PARCC exams are losing customers.? Again, absolutely a piece to read in its entirety. Also, another point of clarification: this isn?t private equity. Rather, this is a product sold to districts. If Pearson invested 100 million of its own money into the districts to create personalized exams, that would be a different story, but not the case here.

?It doesn?t impact what we do here on a school level.?

This is completely untrue. Because of the high-stakes association of these tests, teachers are being forced to ?teach to the test,? kids are learning ?test taking skills,? and classroom instruction is being aligned to prep students for the tests. Ask your kids, ask any teachers who are willing to speak on this (search Mark Weber - Jersey Jazzman, Ani McHugh - TeacherBiz, and Marie Corfield for more on this), or do some research about ?teaching to the test.? You will find things like art, music, social studies, science, and even recess being cut because they aren?t tested, and that time is needed for test prep.

Save Our Schools New Jersey, ?a grassroots, all-volunteer organization of parents and other public education supporters who believe that every child in New Jersey should have access to a high-quality public education,? recently released a guide titled, ?12 Reasons We Oppose the PARCC test.? Some of their main points include the following:

1. PARCC is poorly designed & confusing
2. PARCC?s online testing format is very problematic, particularly for younger students
3. PARCC is diagnostically & instructionally useless
**4. Taking and preparing for PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests is replacing learning
Administrators at many schools ?report that they spend as much as a third of the school year preparing students to take these tests. That time includes the actual time spent taking the tests, the time spent taking pretests and benchmark tests and other practice tests, the time spent on test prep materials, the time spent doing exercises and activities in textbooks and online materials that have been modeled on the test questions in order to prepare kids to answer questions of those kinds, and the time spent on reporting, data analysis, data chats, proctoring, and other test housekeeping.? i
5. PARCC will further distort curricula and teaching
6. PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests undermine students? creativity and desire to learn
7. PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests have an enormous financial cost
8. PARCC is completely experimental. It has not been validated as accurate & yet it will be used to evaluate students, schools and teachers
9. PARCC & other high-stakes standardized tests are abusive to our children
10. PARCC will worsen the achievement and gender gaps
11. High-stakes standardized tests fail to improve educational outcomes
12. PARCC and Smarter Balanced Common Core aligned tests are designed to brand the majority of our children as failures

Read the entire document with detailed points of research under each point here, and explore around their website for more information and resources.

?This is the way we will glean data on our children.?

As I commented on the original video, many people know that these tests are not going to tell us anything we don't already know. About anything. There is no point the district can make for these tests other than "collecting the data." Sorry, but I don't view my kid a data point for anyone to "data mine." The teacher knows my student best, and there is no data that will tell them what they don?t already know - where students strengths are, where they need improvement, etc. Teachers spend all day with them, and through authentic, teacher-created assessments, teachers can see how individual students, as well as the class as a whole, are understanding and further demonstrating their understanding of the material.

?What do you think about PARCC? I?m agnostic.? - then later: ?I am pro-compliance, and I?m pro data.?

The contradiction here comes when Dr. Jellig says he is pro-data & then goes on to say, "Well, if it doesn't work out the way they say then we will question." So, are we okay with not validating the tests work before we experiment on kids? He should be saying "show me the data before you try out your test on our kids." - especially with high stakes associations for students, teachers, & schools; not the other way around.

?This test has flexibility...?

Later on, Dr. Jellig states, ?There wasn?t a menu given to us as there was with AchieveNJ. PARCC is what?s for dinner! The state said here is your assessment, administer it well.? So in all honesty, I?m struggling to see where the ?flexibility? - in either the tests themselves or the administration of the tests - is to be found.

?We get 24 million from the state. I don?t want to give it back.? Dr. Jellig then goes on to say he doesn?t want to suggest that the failure to comply might result in backlash from the state, but then adds, ?it could happen, but I don?t expect it to happen.?

This is more of a clarification point. FairTest recently released a guide called ?Why You Can Boycott Standardized Tests Without Fear of Federal Penalties to Your School.? Here are some main points:

NCLB says that 95% of students must take the test or the school will fail to make ?adequate yearly progress? (AYP) and then suffer sanctions. However, this provision is now essentially irrelevant.

First, schools that do not receive federal Title I funds are exempt from sanctions under NCLB. Those schools are labeled as not making AYP, but NCLB does not require a state to do anything to them.

Second, 41 states (plus DC and Puerto Rico) have waivers from the U.S. Department of
Education (ED) that have eliminated the sanctions imposed on most schools that fail to make AYP. The basic message is that in waiver states, a school not in or close to the bottom 5% likely has nothing to fear from a boycott. However, a school that is at or close to the bottom 5% would be advised to proceed with caution ? parents may not want to increase the likelihood of severe sanctions (staff firings, turning it into a charter school) by having both very low scores (or, depending on the state, low rates of score increases) and many opt outs.

Third, in states without a waiver, every school must now have 100% of its students score ?proficient.? As a result, almost all schools are ?failing? and face possible sanctions. But if a school is already failing, there is no additional danger from a boycott.

In addition, the 95% rule does not pertain to any tests other than reading and math exams mandated by NCLB. Separate tests used to judge teachers in other subjects as well as other state or district-mandated tests are not covered by this requirement.

There may be some risk for some schools due to the 95% rule. But for the great majority of schools, including Title I schools, the risk is non-existent or minimal and should not be a reason to avoid boycotts.

Here is the entire guide. Their website has incredible resources on these topics, and I encourage you to explore around.

?I will also tell you that when the first cut of data comes back... we will take our time and thoughtfully digest and reflect every aspect of what we receive to determine its usefulness.?

Cut scores are not yet set. So discussing how all of this data is going to be the best data we ever retrieved or all of the amazing things we are going to do with this data makes no sense. We don?t even know what ?passing? on the PARCC test is, and the state is not going to set this ?cut score? - passing score, possibly what proficient is (again, we don?t know how this will be scored) - until AFTER the first test. So essentially, the state will look at the test from March/May of this year, and then over the summer decide how many kids fail, and how many pass. There should be absolutely no high stakes - for students, teachers, or schools, attached to this test. As Mark Weber, public school teacher and part time doctoral student in education policy at the Rutgers Graduate School of Education (who blogs as ?Jersey Jazzman?) writes, ?Why are we attaching high stakes to PARCC before we have even seen how it works when it is fully implemented? The fact is that we just don't know how it went, or whether it will go well in a year. We just don't know. We need to properly assess this field test, then run a no-stakes administration across the state with data and results open to the public so the PARCC can be properly vetted.? See more here.

?But to do that now (?reach out and say this test isn?t what was promised?)... I feel like there?s almost a bullying mentality going on. We don?t know PARCC; we don?t anything about it because it hasn?t actually happened.

Saying there?s a ?bullying? mentality is a far reach. The current ?reform? culture in education is extremely oppressive to students and teachers, where top-down mandates are employed in a ?do what you?re told or else? system. Bullying doesn?t work from bottom up; it?s called resistance - and clearly there is a reason for it. Concerned parents, teachers, and students are asking the questions and raising concerns that impact THEIR education and educational experience. If we don?t know anything about PARCC - which we don?t - why are putting so much faith in another high stakes test? Why are we putting our faith in the same reforms that have so-to-speak ?failed? education in the past? Why are we allowing such high stakes associations be tied to a test that is untested and unproven? Read here about what happened in New York after they implemented a common core aligned Pearson test.

Here you may say, ?We?ve had standardized testing for so long, what other alternatives are there?? Well, there are. Read the following:

?What?s wrong with standardized tests??
?The Limits of Standardized Tests for Diagnosing and Assisting Student Learning?
?The Dangerous Consequences of High Stakes Standardized Testing?
?Authentic Assessment and Accountability?

?Lastly, with regards to opt out, which has been a topic of conversation... there is no opt out. The state laid out no opt out and we don?t tend to either.?

Just to point out - wording is important. Notice how Dr. Jellig continually says "no opt-out." He is correct that there is no opt-out law *in New Jersey (As Choose to Refuse NJ (https://sites.google.com/site/chooseto ... enj/volunteer-information) states, ?l) California is the only state that has official ?opt out? policies. Therefore, it is likely that unless you live in California (or Pennsylvania using religious exemption to opt out) if you write a letter requesting to ?opt your child out? you will receive a letter stating they cannot honor your request because there is no opt out clause. Make sure to state that you are REFUSING to allow your child to participate in the testing.?) But parents have a legal right TO REFUSE THE TEST. REFUSE. Wording is important. Parents have a right to choose to not to have their children be guinea pigs for essentially Pearson?s untested and unproven tests. The state may have no policy on opt out, but they also can't force a kid to take a test. Parents have a right to refuse. Many letter circulating with information, groups like "United opt-out" (because some states use that language).

According to the U.S Constitution, specifically the 14th Amendment, parental rights are broadly protected by Supreme Court decisions (Meyer and Pierce), especially in the area of education. The Supreme Court has repeatedly held that parents possess the ?fundamental right? to ?direct the upbringing and education of their children." Furthermore, the Court declared that ?the child is not the mere creature of the State: those who nurture him and direct his destiny have the right coupled with the high duty to recognize and prepare him for additional obligations.? (Pierce v. Society of Sisters, 268 U.S. 510, 534-35) The Supreme Court criticized a state legislature for trying to interfere ?with the power of parents to control the education of their own.? (Meyer v. Nebraska, 262 U.S. 390, 402.) In Meyer, the Supreme Court held that the right of parents to raise their children free from unreasonable state interferences is one of the unwritten ?liberties? protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. (262 U.S. 399). in recognition of both the right and responsibility of parents to control their children?s education, the Court has stated, ?It is cardinal with us that the custody, care and nurture of the child reside first in the parents, whose primary function and freedom include preparation for the obligations the State can neither supply nor hinder.? (Prince v. Massachusetts, 321 U.S. 158).

Here are further resources and sample letters.

The members of our district deserve to know the truth, and deserve to see the full picture when making educational decisions for their - our - children.

John Eppolito's Presentation on Common Core

John Eppolito is a former K-12 teacher, he has four children in public school. John has been researching Common Core (CC) since August 2013. This is probably the best, and most thoroughly researched, teacher created, anti-CC presentation to date.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5w4xD7nzLD8

Practice Tests


Want to see PARCC items in action? Would you like to know how PARCC is different from previous tests?

http://parcc.pearson.com/practice-tests/

N.J. fourth grader to board of ed: The PARCC exam 'stinks,' report says

http://www.nj.com/essex/index.ssf/201 ... he_parcc_exam_stinks.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0hTl638Exg

MONTCLAIR ? A 10-year-old township fourth grader is getting national attention for a speech she made at a board of education meeting this week detailing what she hates about the new PARCC exam.

According to a NorthJersey.com report, the Montclair board is considering a resolution to allow parents to have their children opt out of taking the new state test, which reflects the Common Core standards and is administered entirely on computers. The board is set to vote on the measure next month, the report said.

At a meeting Monday night, Elizabeth Blaine addressed the board of education with her feelings on the exam, based on practice tests she and her fourth grade classmates have been taking. The Washington Post ran a video the girl?s mother shot of her speech.

?I love to read. I love to write. I love to do math. But I don?t love the PARCC. Why? Because it stinks,? the report cited Blaine saying. ?I am glad my mom and dad are letting me opt out, because I don?t want to deal with this nonsense.?

Blaine cited several examples of what she does not like about the PARCC exam, including being tested on computers, the math section containing questions on concepts she hasn?t learned about, and the Language Arts section containing questions that are ?very confusing and extremely hard,? the report said.

The Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers test has been the subject of an ongoing debate across the state. Schools are set to administer the exam officially for the first time this spring, and it will replace the NJ HSPA as the graduation requirement in 2019.

Blaine seems to have gathered some support for her anti-PARCC position. The YouTube video of her speech, which her mother posted Monday night, already has over 71,000 views.


Jessica Mazzola may be reached at jmazzola@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @JessMazzola. Find NJ.com on Facebook.

NJDOE Can't Get Its Story Straight on Standardized Tests

http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/201 ... straight-on.html?spref=fb

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdghzEwpEwU



What is the purpose of standardized testing?

Why is it so important for every one of New Jersey?s (and the rest of the nation's) students in Grades 3 through 8 ? and a whole host of high school students taking the new end-of-course assessments ? to devote an enormous amount of their instructional time to taking standardized tests? Why should their teachers rewrite their curricula to align with these tests? Why should taxpayers spend a boatload of money on these tests, rather than put the funds into our children?s classrooms?

And why shouldn?t parents have the option to opt their children out of these tests if they don?t believe they are in the best interests of their children?

On the day before Halloween, NJDOE Commissioner David Hespe released a memo that spelled out his reasoning for why it is so very important that New Jersey?s students take the new PARCC (Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers) tests coming out this year. To paraphrase Hespe, the primary reason that kids should take these tests is because it?s the law. His references to both federal and state regulations are, to my reading, little better than thinly-veiled threats against schools and parents: get your kids in front of their screens on testing day ? or else.

But in an effort to give an educational reason for this massive testing regime, Hespe also tries to put a happy face on the PARCC:
In speaking with parents and students, it is perhaps most important to outline the positive reasons that individual students should participate in the PARCC examinations. Throughout a student?s educational career, the PARCC assessments will provide parents with important information about their child?s progress toward meeting the goal of being college or career ready. The PARCC assessments will, for the first time, provide detailed diagnostic information about each individual student?s performance that educators, parents and students can utilize to enhance foundational knowledge and student achievement. PARCC assessments will include item analysis which will clarify a student?s level of knowledge and understanding of a particular subject or area of a subject. The data derived from the assessment will be utilized by teachers and administrators to pinpoint areas of difficulty and customize instruction accordingly. Such data can be accessed and utilized as a student progresses to successive school levels. [emphasis mine]
All you parents and teachers and taxpayers and students who are complaining about the PARCC just don't understand: this is for your own good! The tests are ?diagnostic"! They are going to be used to ?customize instruction?! Everyone agrees about this!

Everyone, that is, except Hepse?s own Assistant Commissioner and Chief Performance Officer, Bari Erlichson:


CHRIS TIENKEN, ASST. PROF. OF EDUCATION ADMINISTRATION, SETON HALL UNIVERSITY: So I think it's important to note that, based on the psychometric literature on testing and how you use tests, for a test to be diagnostic -- that means, truly helpful to a teacher, truly able to tell you where a student is with a specific skill -- there needs to be at least 25 items for that specific skill to reach a reliability where you can make a decision about what an individual student knows.
Now I haven't been lucky enough to see the PARCC. So I guess I'm going to ask the question: are there 25 questions per specific skill on the PARCC test, so teachers and parents really have an understanding of what kids know at the specific skill level?
MODERATOR: You can answer that if you wanted to real quickly.
BARI ERLICHSON, ASST. COMMISSIONER CHIEF PERFORMANCE OFFICER, NJDOE: So, the word "skill" here is hard to sort of parse and try to understand...
TIENKEN: OK, inferential comprehension. Let's take that. Are there 25 questions on inferential comprehension?
ERLICHSON: In terms of testing the full breadth and depth of the standards in every grade level, yes, these are going to be tests that in fact are reliable and valid at multiple cluster scores, which is not true today in our NJASK. But there?s absolutely a? the word "diagnostic" here is also very important. As Jean sort of spoke to earlier: these are not intended to be the kind of through-course ? what we?re talking about here, the PARCC end-of-year/end-of-course assessments ? are not intended to be sort of the through-course diagnostic form of assessments, the benchmark assessments, that most of us are used to, that would diagnose and be able to inform instruction in the middle of the year.

These are in fact summative test scores that have a different purpose than the one that we?re talking about here in terms of diagnosis.

TIENKEN: So they?re not diagnostic at the individual level, and so it?s going to be difficult for teachers to look at these scores, especially when they get them back in September and October from kids who are no longer in their class, to get fine-grained information about specific skills or standards or sub-clusters ? whatever we want to call them ? there?s just not enough questions on the test to do that. Thank you.
Oh, dear?

Bravo to Chris Tienken for getting right to the heart of the matter; maybe now we can all drop the spin and talk honestly. Government-mandated standardized tests are not and were not ever supposed to be used to ?diagnose? students and "inform instruction.? The only purpose of standardized tests is to impose accountability measures on teachers and schools.

Since the passage of No Child Left Behind, no child takes a standardized test as a diagnostic tool, intended to help her teachers differentiate her instruction. The stated reason for these tests is so those in positions of authority can use the scores to justify any number of consequences for schools that are "in need of improvement,? including closure, restructuring, and charter conversion (all measures, incidentally, that have little to no research to support them). Since Race To The Top, the tests are also used in ways that are innumerate and inappropriate to assess teacher effectiveness.

These are the only reasons for these tests. Bari Erlichson is smart enough and honest enough to admit it; too bad her boss doesn?t understand what she does.

Of course, since there is no diagnostic value to the PARCC or any other standardized test, there?s no reason for every child in so many grades and courses to have to take them. We would be much better off using sampling methodologies: it would be far more appropriate, far less intrusive, and far less costly.

I know I?m rough on NJDOE, but this time I am going to give Bari Erlichson her due for speaking the truth in contradiction to the company line. She is absolutely right: there is no diagnostic value in the PARCC. It is not intended to inform instruction; it is not useful for a child?s teachers. Which begs a question:

If the PARCC isn?t going to help students, why should they spend so much time taking it, and why should so much of their instruction revolve around it?