By Frank Mustac, Special Writer
School board members tried to make clear its stance on using the federally supported PARCC standardized test as a requirement for high school graduation.
The Hopewell Valley Regional Board of Education issued a statement in response to an announcement made by the state Department of Education earlier this year.
PARCC is an abbreviation for Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers. It is a consortium of states that collaboratively developed a common set of assessments to measure student achievement in math and English up to 12th grade, and preparedness for college and careers.
The state Department of Education said it is transitioning to the PARCC as a prerequisite for all high school students in New Jersey to earn a diploma by the end of the decade. Until then, test scores from the PARCC exam or from other standardized tests, such as the SAT or ACT, can be used by students to demonstrate they meet one of the requirements for graduation.
The local school board’s statement reads, in part, that the board “unequivocally believes that our students are not defined by a score on a standardized test. We will not use PARCC to determine student course placement nor to demonstrate proficiency needed to advance grades. We have issued a 2016 resolution explaining why passing PARCC is an inappropriate high school graduation requirement.”
Another part of the statement reads that the school board “does not believe that student performance on standardized assessments should be used to evaluate teacher or administrator performance until a normed assessment designed for that purpose is available, We will, however, comply with NJDOE mandates to include such evaluation measures.”
Lisa Wolff, president of the Hopewell Valley school board, said the statement was crafted after board member Bruce Gunther of Hopewell Township pointed out that previous statements or resolutions adopted by the board “could give the public some mixed signals.”
“He made a suggestion at a work session that the school board and Dr. Thomas Smith (the superintendent) come up with a statement for the board,” Ms. Wolff said at the May 16 Board of Education meeting.
She also said that the New Jersey School Boards Association delegate assembly held the weekend of May 14 adopted a resolution recommending “multiple measures for high school graduation” besides just PARCC testing.
“Once again, we were out ahead of that. We had a resolution (in March) saying we disagreed with the PARCC being used as the sole method for graduation. Now, across the state, the NJSBA is saying the same thing,” Ms. Wolff said. “Additionally, in that same amendment, they said that parents should have some input on what their children are doing in school. They should have options on the test.”
According to information published on the NJSBA website, “delegates called for the state to continue to provide alternatives to the current statewide assessment when determining eligibility for high school graduation. New Jersey’s assessment is the PARCC test. The new NJSBA policy does not seek a change in the state assessment, but rather calls for additional measures to be available to determine eligibility for graduation.
“The delegates’ action results in the following policy, addressing the use of the statewide assessment to determine eligibility for high school graduation:
“The NJSBA believes the state should provide alternative methods of achieving state and federal requirements for graduation, not based only on standardized tests, such as the Alternate High School Assessment or portfolio assessment.
“The NJSBA further believes that parents should have input into decisions regarding the methods of assessment used, but that the ultimate authority to decide these methods must rest with local boards of education.”
The resolution was supported by 85 percent of the delegates, according to the NJSBA.
The statement on PARCC from the Hopewell Valley Regional School District Board of Education is available in PDF file format at:http://www.boarddocs.com/nj/hvrsd/Board.nsf/files/A9WJE54C8AB0/$file/51616RegularHVRSDBOEStatement-PARCC5- 12-16%20%282%29.pdf
News about the NJSBA resolution can be found at: http://www.njsba.org/news-publications/press-releases/njsba-delegates- act-testing- compulsory-education- age/
