Search Results for: node/virginia Schools

The ESEA reauthorization proposals adopted by the U.S. House and Senate and now in Conference Committee contain serious problems that make the plans unfeasible and potentially harmful to efforts to improve public schools. The major problems include: Annual Testing in Grades 3 – 8 Currently, only 15 states test all students in these grades in […]

Status: Archived Subject: K-12 Testing A group of Massachusetts assessment reform advocates have proposed an alternative statewide accountability program that would eliminate the use of the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) test as a high-stakes graduation test and would create a “comprehensive assessment system” marked by multiple means of assessing students and schools. The plan […]

Why “No Child Left Behind” Will Fail Our Children A FairTest Position Statement on NCLB “No Child Left Behind,” the name of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act, describes a worthy goal for our nation. Tragically, the legislation will exacerbate, not solve, the real problems that cause many children to be left behind. • […]

Status: Archived Subject: K-12 Testing Evidence continues to mount demonstrating that high-stakes testing undermines, rather than enhances, efforts to improve education for all children. The picture that emerges from several studies is of a nation severely hurting its educational system while failing to provide help to schools that need it, thereby harming the nation’s children […]

A Critical Analysis of the Citizen’s Commission on Civil Rights report, National Teachers Unions and the Struggle Over School Reform by Monty Neill, FairTest July 14, 2009 The Citizens’ Commission on Civil Rights (CCCR) recently released a report attacking the role of unions in “education reform.” National Teachers Unions and the Struggle Over School Reform […]

Deborah Meier After thirty years of work as a so-called school-reformer, I’m finding myself at odds with a lot what’s now called reform. The inner-city schools I’ve led have been much touted for their extra-ordinary success with ordinary children. We learned some lessons from these schools. We learned, above all, that even “our way” wouldn’t […]

Dear Friends, The U.S. Department of Education (DoE) has drafted regulations for implementing the accountability provisions of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA). The DOE proposals would continue test-and-punish practices imposed by the failed No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. The draft over-emphasizes standardized exam scores, mandates punitive interventions not required in law, and extends […]

Status: Archived Subject: K-12 Testing Education Trust has repeatedly argued that there are thousands of schools that post high test scores despite serving harder to educate low-income children. But a recent report from the Great Lakes Center re-evaluated the accuracy of that claim. Author Douglas Harris looked for schools serving low-income youth that had two […]

Status: Archived Subject: K-12 Testing FairTest Examiner – July 2007 Opinion surveys continue to show that the public increasingly agrees with FairTest that No Child Left Behind (NCLB) needs fundamental change if it is to help and not harm the nation’s students and schools. A recent Scripps Howard – University of Ohio survey confirms that […]

Status: Archived Subject: K-12 Testing School boards in Fairfax County, Prince William County, and Harrisonburg, Va., passed resolutions in late winter opposing the federal requirement that students just beginning to learn English take regular state reading tests. The Virginia School Boards Association (VSBA) sought help from Virginia’s U.S. senators, John Warner and Jim Webb. The […]