Texas PTA sending resolution concerning high stakes testing to local groups

From Texas Association of School Administrators - TASA - Click Here

Submitted by arivas on May 1, 2012 

 

"The Texas PTA is appealing to local PTAs through an e-newsletter to encourage local PTAs to adopt a family-focused version of the Resolution Concerning High Stakes, Standardized Testing of Texas Public School Students. 

"Texas PTA seeks to communicate through this resolution PTA families' concerns about high stakes testing. Acknowledging the need for rigorous instruction and assessment, Texas PTA seeks to support a needed transformation in Texas public schools - one that fosters innovation, creativity and a thirst for learning with new, more meaningful, assessment and accountability measures. Texas PTA seeks a partnership between schools and families to achieve these goals," the newsletter reads in part.

Texas PTA's suggested timeline asks local PTAs to adopt the resolution by the end of this school year or at the beginning of the 2012-13 school year, and share the resolutions with Texas PTA, their local school board and state lawmakers."

Florida school district adopts testing resolution

408 Texas school districts have adopted the Resolution as of 4-25-12

From EduSlate - Texas Association of School Aaministrators (TASA) - Click Here

Wednesday, April 24, 2012

 "The Palm Beach County School Board in Florida became the latest group outside of Texas to pass a resolution similar to the Resolution Concerning High Stakes, Standardized Testing of Texas Public School Students.

School board members for Palm Beach, the 11th largest school district in the nation (app. 174,000 students), say they're not advocating for the removal of standardized tests but, like many Texas school leaders, believe the over-reliance on standardized testing is counter productive.

"As a board and a district, we need to mitigate the damage of this obsession with high-stakes testing," board member Karen Brill said in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. "We need to create well-rounded students; we need to nurture creativity; we need to find balance so that our teachers have the freedom to exercise their talents and bring out the best in our students."

As of Wednesday, 408 Texas school districts representing roughly 2.2 million students had confirmed they'd passed the resolution. That's 40 percent of all Texas districts. If your district has passed the resolution but isn't on TASA's list, please send me an email so we can include you in the count."

Text of the Resolution 

WHEREAS, our nation’s future well-being relies on a high-quality public education system that prepares all students for college, careers, citizenship and lifelong learning, and strengthens the nation’s social and economic well-being; and

WHEREAS, our nation’s school systems have been spending growing amounts of time, money and energy on high-stakes standardized testing, in which student performance on standardized tests is used to make major decisions affecting individual students, educators and schools; and

WHEREAS, the over-reliance on high-stakes standardized testing in state and federal accountability systems is undermining educational quality and equity in U.S. public schools by hampering educators’ efforts to focus on the broad range of learning experiences that promote the innovation, creativity, problem solving, collaboration, communication, critical thinking and deep subject-matter knowledge that will allow students to thrive in a democracy and an increasingly global society and economy; and

WHEREAS, it is widely recognized that standardized testing is an inadequate and often unreliable measure of both student learning and educator effectiveness; and

WHEREAS, the over-emphasis on standardized testing has caused considerable collateral damage in too many schools, including narrowing the curriculum, teaching to the test, reducing love of learning, pushing students out of school, driving excellent teachers out of the profession, and undermining school climate; and

WHEREAS, high-stakes standardized testing has negative effects for students from all backgrounds, and especially for low-income students, English language learners, children of color, and those with disabilities; and

WHEREAS, the culture and structure of the systems in which students learn must change in order to foster engaging school experiences that promote joy in learning, depth of thought and breadth of knowledge for students; therefore be it

RESOLVED, that the School Board of Palm Beach County, Florida, calls on Governor Scott, the Florida Department of Education and the state legislature to reexamine public school accountability systems in this state, and to develop a system based on multiple forms of assessment which does not require extensive standardized testing, more accurately reflects the broad range of student learning, and is used to support students and improve schools; and

RESOLVED, that the School Board of Palm Beach County, Florida, calls on the U.S. Congress and Administration to overhaul the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, currently known as the “No Child Left Behind Act,” reduce the testing mandates, promote multiple forms of evidence of student learning and school quality in accountability, and not mandate any fixed role for the use of student test scores in evaluating educators.

Lew Blackburn again refuses to allow Board vote on testing resolution approved by TASA, TASB and over 300 Texas school districts

TASA - Texas Association of School Administrators
TASB - Texas Association of School Boards

---

From: Lew Blackburn
Sent: Wednesday, April 18, 2012 1:12 PM
To: Ranger, Carla; King, Alan P
Cc:
Subject: Re: Second Board Agenda Request -- Resolution Concerning High Stakes, Standardized Testing - TASA and TASB

Carla,

I appreciate you bringing the resolution to the Board's attention.  However, after the Briefing discussion, I did not get a sense that there was a consensus for this item to move forward for consideration.  As such, I will not add it to the agenda for the April 26, 2012 Board meeting for discussion and possible adoption.

However, as I indicated during the Briefing, if three (3) trustees request that the resolution be placed on the agenda, I will honor the request.  As of today, you are the only trustee who has made the request.  Please note, the agenda will be approved for posting by 3:00 p.m. Friday, April 20.

 Lew Blackburn, Ph.D.

Ken Zornes: Resolution on testing deserves DISD vote

Dallas Morning News-Click Here

Published: 18 April 2012 10:37 PM

“Imposing relentless test preparation and boring memorization of facts to enhance test performance is doing little more than stealing the love of learning from our students and assuring that we fall short of our goals.”

The above quote is excerpted from a resolution protesting the overuse of high-stakes standardized tests in our public schools. Instead of being lukewarm about signing onto this resolution, as reported by The Dallas Morning News , Dallas ISD trustees should be hot to get all of their names on the document as soon as possible.

Forget the fact that Texas Commissioner of Education Robert Scott believes that Texas’ testing regimen has become “a perversion of its original intent,” or that more than 250 other school boards (nearly 30 of them in North Texas), the Texas Association of School Boards and the Texas Association of School Administrators have finally said they’ve had enough. It’s time to put real instruction back into the classroom.

Dallas ISD board members would be hard-pressed to find even a few — if any — students, parents, teachers or administrators who believe that the current overemphasis on testing is the right path toward preparing our students for post-secondary education and the workforce.

Board President Lew Blackburn suggests that the resolution may not meet legal standards and that he cannot support it as it is written. Nothing in the resolution supports breaking any laws, state or federal. It supports holding our public schools accountable for student performance and merely asks that the Texas Legislature re-examine the current accountability system and develop a system that is more efficient, easier to understand and provides a truer picture of a student’s academic achievement. Nowhere in the resolution does it advocate doing away with testing.

No one can argue that high-stakes standardized testing has played a major role in how we hold our students, teachers and administrators accountable for more than a decade and that we have seen some benefits. However, the misplaced emphasis on these tests has caused many excellent teachers to simply narrow their instruction to preparing students for tests at the expense of preparing them to become productive and responsible citizens.

Much more than they serve students and teachers, high-stakes tests serve the needs of legislators who wish to convince the public that they are holding our public school system accountable and are being good stewards of their tax dollars.

Blackburn is reluctant to place the resolution on the agenda for a vote at the April 26 board meeting, stating that if three trustees ask to have the item on the agenda, he will do so. The board president should assume the leadership role to which he was elected and place the item on the agenda, regardless of how many other trustees want it there.

Having it on the agenda will allow the trustees to find out what teachers, administrators and the public, including DISD parents, think of the resolution. Listening to constituents is never a bad idea.

To read the resolution, go to tasanet.org/sites/tasa/files/gr/2012/sampleresolution.pdf

Ken Zornes is the executive director of the Texas Business and Education Coalition and former DISD board president. He may be contacted at kzornes13@hotmail.com.

Resolution Concerning High Stakes, Standardized Testing of Texas Public School Students

Resolution Concerning High Stakes, Standardized Testing of Texas Public School Students

"
... the resolution drafted by TASA (Texas Association of School Administrators) is a philosophical statement that, among other things, challenges the notion that standardized testing should be the single measure of a district and endorses more engaging student learning experiences. As of Wednesday afternoon, 271 districts had passed the resolution. It has also been endorsed by at least one chamber of commerce, a school board in Queens, New York, and sparked national attention, including coverage from the Washington Post. Our goal is to draw attention to the transformation that needs to happen in Texas public schools and to speak with a clear and unified voice to Texas lawmakers about the concerns - not just of educators but also business leaders, parents and students – regarding the current accountability system." 

EduSlate