In response to questions I’ve had from multiple teachers, this is my attempt at summarizing the landscape that will affect our classrooms over the next few years:
CCSS – The Common Core State Standards were written for English/Language Arts and Mathematics by a collection of academics, teachers, parents, and policymakers. Michigan adopted these in June of 2010. To date, 47 states have adopted these standards with districts creating their own implementation plans. As you can imagine, every publisher and PD consultant is renaming their product or service to be “aligned with the Common Core”, even as we are all learning what that means together.
Standardized Tests – There are two consortium groups creating computer-based tests to measure the standards nationally, the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) and the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium. Michigan, with 24 other states, is a member of the latter (Smarter Balanced). PARCC has 23 states participating. Both groups are fed by the U.S. Department of Education’s Race to the Top program, to the collective tune of $360 million.
MEAP – The Michigan Educational Assessment Program (MEAP) is the state standardized test upon which many decisions are made from school funding dollars to real estate values. The plan is to replace this test with an online version that matches the CCSS, created by Smarter Balanced, by Spring of 2015, changing Michigan’s current fall testing schedule. This may or may not mean double testing that year, fall 2014 and spring 2015.
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Smarter Balance – Until Smarter Balance is fully implemented, MEAP will continue to test on Michigan Grade Level Content Expectations (GLCE’s). Conventional wisdom seems to be leading districts to begin working with and teaching CCSS as the overlap is nominal and the endgame is a CCSS curriculum assessed by Smarter Balance testing, which will not be limited to the single annual high-stakes test, but is rumored to also include formative and interim assessments, the results of which can all be stored in one data warehouse, making individual student data on these national standards portable across districts and participating state boundaries.
Recently, Smarter Balance has been considering a full-length online assessment ranging from 4-6 hours of computer time per child to an abbreviated version ranging from 3-4 hours of seat time. Immediate implications of this as a teacher are obviously the technology skills children will need for 21st century testing, the technological infrastructure districts will need to test this way, and then the validity and reliability questions of different levels of testing, knowing that we are in a state that is struggling economically and a shorter, lighter assessment may be the default deciding factor.
All testing arguments aside, online learning and deeper, more pragmatic thinking are core (pardon the pun) to the CCSS movement. As we navigate these waters together, it should never be our intent to teach to a test, but to help students learn the skills of success, which we will continually redefine through great conversations about the standard of coherence.
An assessment at the end of a learning cycle is welcomed and absolutely necessary to receive fair data about our students’ learning. It is insane to ask our most at risk students to retain information in and out of a school year and across a twelve-week, far too long, summer. Thanks, Walt, for your easy explanation.
Agreed! I don’t know why Michigan ever thought an October testing window provided value. Perhaps MDE thought they could get results back before March, but I haven’t seen that happen and schools aren’t currently wired to analyze and respond to such data that quickly. If they can get us good data by June from a Spring test, even the traditional calendar schools can use it to help students more effectively.