It appears standardized tests will return in spring
In a normal school year, many teachers and administrators would be turning their attention around now to standardized tests. Getting students prepared for the state tests and organizing for the elaborate demands of administering the tests are central events in the school year.
What about in this highly-not-normal school year?
As of now, tests are still on for this spring and the guidance to schools from the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction is: Get ready.
We’ll pause here for a moment to allow lots of people involved in schools to groan and comment on what a bad idea that is.
The final word on this has not yet come. But it needs to come soon, and it presumably needs to come from the incoming U.S. secretary of education, Miguel Cardona, or perhaps directly from his boss, President Joe Biden.
Before we get into the current reality, a bit of history.
Standardized testing has been around for decades. But the modern era of testing began with the passage
of the No Child Left Behind federal education law in late 2001. In short, federal funding of education had expanded since the 1970s, but many politicians felt they were not getting much result.
Approved with large bipartisan majorities, No Child Left Behind created an elaborate system intended to hold schools accountable for improving, including closing gaps in the success of students by income and race. The law also, for the first time, set expectations for educational progress for students with special education needs.
To see what was happening and, ideally, to motivate success, the law required annual testing nationwide in reading and math for third through eighth grade students and 10th graders.
The law was basically a failure when it came to driving improvement. But it did lead to tons of annual data on how students were doing. To this day, when anyone asks about student performance in a school, school district or state, the answer is often based on those mountains of scores.
In 2016, No Child Left Behind was (at long last) killed off by Congress in a rare bipartisan moment. A new education law, called the Every Student Succeeds Act, substantially reduced the federal role in education accountability. But annual testing stayed. The state DPI points out that it is also a requirement of Wisconsin law.
That brings us to last spring, when schools abruptly shut down as the pandemic hit. One result: The U.S. Department of Education issued a nationwide waiver for testing. And this year?
On the one hand, even in school situations that most resemble normal, things aren’t really normal. And then you have the huge number of kids who have been attending school all year virtually or who have simply disappeared from the system. Does it make any sense to go about testing when there’s a strong argument that no one should be held accountable for this year? Maybe all the time that would be spent on testing would be better spent on helping kids catch up on what they’ve missed.
On the other hand is the argument that there is an important need to get a handle on how kids are doing. That way, better decisions might be made on how to help kids rebound. And, after all, it’s the law.
On Jan. 8, the Wisconsin DPI sent information to school districts saying they should plan for tests. That follows a document DPI sent in December, titled “Strategies and Considerations for InPerson Assessment During a Pandemic.”
One part of that title caught my eye: “In-Person.” What about school districts or individual students that continue to be all-virtual? (Milwaukee Public Schools is the biggest example. The Milwaukee School Board is scheduled to discuss Tuesday night whether to return in some form to in-person schooling in coming months.)
DPI spokesperson Beth Tomev answered: “Federal and state legal testing requirements apply to all students, including those who are virtual. Remote (virtual) testing options are not available for statewide assessments. The assessment vendors for the Wisconsin Statewide Assessments are not offering any remote assessment options.”
Wow. This could spell a major problem. Could tens of thousands of kids go untested because their district is virtual or their parents want them home? Or might schools reopen just for testing?
Or maybe this strengthens the case for another testing waiver this spring.
The decision needs to come soon. There is lead time for starting up testing and the schedule for giving tests statewide calls for some to be given in February, the main body of tests for high school students to be given in March, and the Forward tests for third through eighth graders to be given between March 22 and May 14.
People, especially teachers and students, love to hate state tests. There are legitimate debates over what weight test scores really deserve and what testing does to the quality of a child’s education. But some educators see testing as essential to motivating work on closing the always-shocking achievement gaps.
A one-year break in testing isn’t serious, some experts say. A two-year break would be more serious in terms of losing continuity in understanding how kids are doing.
And after two years off, would testing ever get back on track? Whether they hope or fear that would be so, people involved in testing have been asking that. Related trends — fewer colleges requiring tests scores for admission and, just a few days ago, the announcement that the structure of SAT admission tests will be trimmed — suggest the tide may be turning on testing.
So what will the Biden administration do? Cardona, the pick to become the new secretary of education, headed the Connecticut school system previously, where he was neither a big proponent nor a critic of tests.
Now he will be at the center of picking a route for testing that will have impact across the country, including just about every student and educator in Wisconsin.