Lee County's school board is opting out of state testing. How many districts will follow?
Lee County’s school board became the first in the state Wednesday night to decide district students would no longer take statewide exams, according to the Fort Myers News-Press.
What happens next in uncertain.
State law requires school districts to participate in the statewide testing program. Those scores are used to determine grades for public schools, student promotions, high school graduation and teacher evaluation scores. Federal rules also require annual testing.
Lee County superintendent Nancy Morgan said she was concerned about the decision. The district’s attorney said school board members could be removed from office. From the News-Press story:
While the news was met with jubilation, Superintendent Nancy Graham said she was deeply concerned about the board’s decision.
“This will hurt children. There is no way around it,” Graham said while the audience booed. “I am gravely concerned about the decision that was made tonight, and I’ll try to make sense of this. It’s an interesting time to serve as the leader of this district.”
The meeting adjourned without discussion regarding what test – if any – will now be used in place of the state tests. The board members did not address if the decision will include charter schools.
Keith Martin, the board’s attorney, was not sure that there were any “immediate, clear” consequences to the action. He said it was possible the Governor could remove the school board members from their positions of power.
Gov. Rick Scott says he's giving the U.S. Department of Education 30 days to change their mind about testing requirements for students learning English or the state could head to court.
Gov. Rick Scott is ready to take the federal government to court over testing rules for students learning English.
The U.S. Department of Education says Florida must count those students’ results after one year in school. Scott and Florida educators want to give students two years to learn English.
Scott said Education Commissioner Pam Stewart will send a letter asking the U.S. Department of Education to reconsider testing rules for students learning English. If they don’t change their mind in 30 days, Scott said the state could go to court.
“We believe federal officials haven’t properly scrutinized their decision,” Scott said. “If they refuse, we will begin reviewing every legal option that is available to us.”
It was a tale of two coast Tuesday. On the east coast, voters defeated incumbent school board members. While incumbents largely survived along Florida's Gulf Coast.
Voters turned out two leaders of the Florida School Boards Association in campaigns contested on school choice and Florida’s new math and language arts standards. But incumbents mostly won reelection across Florida Tuesday night, or advanced to a November runoff.
The incumbents viewed the races as proxy battles over the school boards association’s plans to challenge a private school tax scholarship program in court. School choice advocacy group the Federation For Children — which shares leadership with the non-profit which oversees the tax credit scholarship program — bought advertising targeting the incumbents in both races.
But on the west coast of Florida, incumbent school board candidates largely won reelection. Sarasota voters rejected two candidates in a race largely shaped by the debate over Florida’s Common Core-based math and language arts standards. From the Sarasota Herald-Tribune:
Some Florida school boards are considering opting the entire district out of state testing to send a message.
A handful of Florida districts are talking about skipping state-required tests this year, including the new Florida Standards Assessment replacing most of the FCAT.
But the district better be prepared to pay the price of skipping the new exam — quite literally. Skip the exam and the state is likely to withhold money.
“The ramifications could be pretty dramatic for a district that wanted to do this,” says Florida Department of Education spokesman Joe Follick. “This is uncharted waters. No districts have done this.”
Follick added the state could withhold state funds, grants and lottery money. Lawmakers could decide on additional sanctions, he said. Most K-12 public school operations are funded through the state.
School board members say opting out an entire school district is unlikely.
“I believe in assessment,” Palm Beach school board member Karen Brill said last week. “I believe in testing that’s used for measurement, not punishment. I believe that we as a district need to research opting out from the new Florida Standard Assessments.
“Sometimes it takes an act of civil disobedience to move forward.”
Brill and other school leaders, teachers, parents and students have complained Florida has attached too many consequences to the results of state tests.
Results from Florida’s statewide test form the basis for the A-through-F grades issued to most public schools each year. Teachers are rated — and paid — based on the test results of their students. And some students are not allowed to advance a grade or graduate from high school unless they pass state tests.
But Follick says many educators find the statewide test results valuable. He noted school districts trumpet positive results on the test.
“Students who are not having the opportunity to show what they have gained in a year of school are going to be at a disadvantage,” Follick says. “It’s going to be difficult for parents to know how well their student has done that year.
“I think when they weigh the pros and the cons I think they will understand this is definitely to the benefit of the students.”
Gov. Rick Scott and former Gov. Jeb Bush tour a Homestead manufacturing facility earlier this month. Scott want to review Florida's academic standards and local testing.
Gov. Rick Scott says he wants to review testing in Florida schools and the state’s new Common Core-based standards. It’s part of Scott’s latest campaign trail education proposal, released Monday.
Scott’s proposal would also increase the bonuses paid to teachers who win state and district teacher of the year awards. He also wants to double state funding for school technology to $80 million.
Teachers get a number score with the state's value-added model.
I finally know my worth as a teacher—and now that the “value-added model” scores mandated by our state legislature are public, everyone else knows, too.
I’m a 37.5.
But, I have no idea what that number means.
Along with my 37.5, I was told I’m “highly effective” and given a $230 bonus. In case you’re wondering, that’s about half what the average teacher spends of his or her own money on school supplies per year.
Even though I don’t understand my 37.5, I do know a lot more about than I did last year about value-added formulas. I left the classroom and I’m currently in a doctoral program in education.
I have access to many of the statisticians who create these kinds of models for their research. The funny thing is, many of these experts say that the formulas shouldn’t be used to make decisions about teacher performance—the very thing we’re using them for.
That’s right: Many researchers think value-added models can’t accurately measure a teacher’s performance in one year. And studies have shown that the same teacher may get a high score one year and a low score the next, and that neither number may actually tell us much about their teaching.
Pablo Ortiz with the Miami-Dade education transformation office says district schools are improving and they are working to make sure the least-experienced teachers aren't concentrated in the district's high-poverty schools.
Washington, D.C.-based NCTQ looked at student and school data by school board district at the request of the Urban League of Miami. The group focused on district 1, an area along the county’s northern border which includes Miami Gardens and Opa-locka, and district 2, an area north of downtown including Little Haiti and Liberty City.
Those school board districts have the highest percentage of black students and the highest poverty, as measured by percentage of students receiving free or reduced-price lunch, in the school district.
Of the 60 schools which received a D or F on the state’s grading system for public schools, 70 percent were located in school board district 1 or 2. And poor students were less likely to pass the state’s standardized tests.
At a town hall meeting at the Urban League of Miami, NCTQ researcher Nancy Waymack said districts across the country struggle to place top teachers in high poverty schools.
“This is not a secret,” she said, “but, when we see data like this it’s time to redouble our efforts.”
Last year, two-thirds of Americans said they had not heard of the standards. This year, more than 80 percent said they know at least a little about Common Core.
And they don’t like what they hear — 60 percent of those surveyed said they oppose Common Core. The most common reason given was concern Common Core would limit teachers’ classroom decisions.
“Given the increased media coverage this year, we were not surprised that an overwhelming majority of Americans have heard about the Common Core State Standards, but we were surprised by the level of opposition,” PDK CEO William Bushaw said in a statement. “Supporters of the standards, and educators in particular, face a growing challenge in explaining why they believe the standards are in the best interest of students in the United States.”
The annual Education Next poll finds support for Common Core is declining among Republicans and teachers. But the poll found people generally support the idea of common education standards.
Just over half of the general public — 53 percent — said they support Common Core. That’s down from 65 percent in 2013. And just 46 percent of teachers said they support the standards. Last year, more than three-quarters of teachers said they supported Common Core.
The standards outline what students should know at the end of each grade but have been facing rising political opposition for more than a year. A handful of states — Indiana, Oklahoma, South Carolina — have repealed the standards and other states are studying whether to rewrite or repeal Common Core.
“Opinion with respect to the Common Core has yet to coalesce,” poll authors Michael B. Henderson, Paul E. Peterson and Martin West wrote. “The idea of a common set of standards across the country has wide appeal, and the Common Core itself still commands the support of a majority of the public. But proponents probably need to clarify their intentions to the public if they are to keep support from slipping within both the nation’s teaching force and the public at large.”
Jessica Gaspar was born in the U.S. and grew up speaking English at school — but at home, she speaks Q’anjob’al.
That’s the Mayan language spoken by her Guatemalan parents.
She said she and her brother struggled to practice their English once the school day ended. It’s why Gaspar volunteers at a community center on a back street lined with body shops in Lake Worth.
Miami-Dade schools.
More than 100 Honduran students have enrolled in Miami Jackson Senior High School the past two years. Principal Carlos Rios says the school must make sure their basic needs are met.
She’s helping new, young immigrants at the Guatamalan-Maya Center learn the basics – the ABCs and colors. She’s helping them get ready for school in Palm Beach County.
“I just want them to feel like they’re wanted and not to be afraid or anything,” Gaspar says, “and hopefully in class they won’t be put aside because ‘Oh, they’re behind.’”
Monday is the first day of school in many Florida school districts. Schools are expecting hundreds – if not thousands – of Central American students to enroll in the coming weeks.
And schools across the country are expecting as many as 50,000 immigrants from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. This year more than 3,000 children have already been released to sponsors in Florida.
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