Education Officials Criticize MCAS

WORCESTER--School board members from across the state strongly criticized the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) yesterday and called on state education officials to stop requiring the test for graduation until "critical issues" have been resolved.

In the annual meeting of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees, representatives from more than half of the state's school governing boards took a middle ground, leaving open the possibility that MCAS could be used as a graduation requirement in the future.

By a137-30 vote, they adopted a resolution calling MCAS--a battery of standardized tests given state-wide to fourth, eighth and tenth graders--"seriously flawed."

But they defeated a stronger resolution that would have asked for a permanent prohibition on MCAS as a graduation standard.

The more moderate resolution passed easily after more than an hour of passionate--but not contentious--debate. The resolution said that MCAS is unfair to students in special and vocational education programs and to bilingual students. The resolution also said students' graduations should be determined by many other criteria, like projects and portfolios, and not just by the MCAS tests.

"No single pencil and paper test should decide a student's future," said E. Denise Simmons, vice-chair of the Cambridge School Committee. Simmons represented Cambridge at the meeting and voted in favor of the resolution.

This year--for the first time--tenth graders statewide will have to pass the MCAS to graduate. If they fail in tenth grade, they can try again in eleventh and twelfth grades.

Simmons said she worries that the fear of failing MCAS could drive students who are struggling in school to drop out altogether.

School officials in Cambridge estimate that more than one-third of high school students will be unable to pass the MCAS test--and thus be unable to graduate. Last year, for example, 39 percent of tenth graders failed the math test.

Cambridge Superintendent of Schools Bobbie J. D'Alessandro has been critical of state education officials for using MCAS as the sole requirement for graduation. She said last night she has "mixed" feelings on MCAS and supports the resolution's call for other kinds of evaluations.

"I've used the MCAS as a valuable assessment tool. I use it to look at data on my students," she said. "However, I would like alternative assessments."

The resolution passed yesterday had been circulated throughout the state prior to the meeting, and its passage had been expected.

The resolution is only a statement of association's position and has no legal force. Only the state Department of Education can make the decision. Nevertheless, delegates said the resolution sent a strong message to state education officials.

"Before we hold the kids accountable, we will hold the adults accountable for an MCAS that is fair and equitable," said Barbara C. Goodman, a member of the Arlington School Committee.

State education officials contend that MCAS is essential to ensuring that school districts are held accountable under the Education Reform Act of 1993, which doubled state funding of public schools.

"This was part of a deal," said Alison Franklin '90, an aid to Senate President Thomas F. Birmingham '72, who has been one of the strongest champions of education reform.

"The state would double funding for local schools...and in exchange, there would be accountability at the local level for the performance of local schools," she added.

Proponents of MCAS say education reform has spurred important changes in curriculum, like a new focus on writing and analytical thinking.

Along with MCAS, the Education Reform Act created standardized curriculum guidelines. Now, school districts are scrambling to update their curriculum.

"The pace of change has picked up rapidly over the last three years," said Andrew Calkins '79, a school committee member from the Hamilton-Wenham school district. "There's a lot of activity happening now that wasn't happening before."

After they passed the Arlington resolution, delegates rejected a more strongly worded resolution that would have urged the "prohibition" of MCAS as a graduation requirement, rather than calling for its suspension until other assessments are developed. The margin was closer, 43-85.

Some delegates said they were surprised the stronger resolution was not passed. Others said they had decided to support both resolutions because they did not see much difference between them.

But many delegates said they worried that ruling out MCAS would be going too far. The Arlington resolution sent a strong enough message, they said.

"To insult them by saying we don't want any part of your MCAS is to say we're afraid," said Sam Poulten, from the Nashoba Valley Vocational-Technical high school.

Opponents of MCAS were pleased with the outcome of the meeting.

"We're thrilled with this," said Jacqueline Dee King, a Cambridge parent who supports the state-wide Coalition for Authentic Reform in Education, a group that opposes MCAS.

"This was not a vote to delay the requirement for a short time while they tweak the test," she said.