Statement of Carol LePrevost, Lee School Committee
President, Massachusetts Association of School Committees
September 9, 2003

BEFORE THE JOINT LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION, ARTS, AND HUMANITIES

On behalf of the Massachusetts Association of School Committees, I am Carol LePrevost of the Lee School Committee. I am grateful for the opportunity to address you today in support of legislation to defer the MCAS graduation requirement until several critical questions can be addressed. They include the appropriateness of a single, high-stakes test as the means of measuring competency for graduation, the impact upon students in vocational/technical schools, students who are limited in their English proficiency and young people who are clients of special education services.

Let me be clear about one area about which we agree on MCAS testing. We support MCAS as having enormous potential to help us devise strategies to improve levels of achievement. We see MCAS as helpful in determining what may work successfully. We see the potential to use MCAS fairly and objectively toward measuring progress in student learning. When used appropriately and in a constructive way, MCAS can be of great help.

However, we believe more research is required before we can fully support any high stakes testing requirement. By that we mean credible research - developed by people who have no financial interest in the outcome.

There is now a new reason to question the part of an MCAS accountability system that uses a high-stakes component. The new Reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, so called "No Child Left Behind" imposes a much more rigid set of assessments, but none of the heavy sanctions that penalize students that we find represented by the MCAS high stakes component.

In fact, there is no graduation requirement at all in the federal law that, instead, imposes the sanctions on teachers that are deemed unqualified, schools that are labeled as underperforming, and school districts whose students fail to meet what is called "Adequate Yearly Progress" in a proscribed way.

These "dueling" and complicated accountability systems have caught us all in the middle – especially students. I think it’s safe to say that there aren’t a dozen people in the state who fully understand the implications. However, we believe it would be a good strategy to study carefully how MCAS and No Child Left Behind impact each other; to look at possible areas where they work at cross purposes; and, if so, to determine the best overall course of action to advance Education Reform.

In conclusion, I also call upon the committee to consider carefully the appropriateness of the graduation requirement on students in non-traditional settings and at risk – students who are studying but deploying their academic skills in different ways such as those in vocational/technical schools; students who have not yet mastered English; and students with learning disabilities for some of whom the MCAS test has been nothing less than a vehicle for humiliation and branding them as failures.

We are eager to work with you to find alternatives to the high stakes test and channel our efforts toward more positive and appropriate uses of the MCAS test, including diagnosing learning problems and identifying appropriate strategies to improve them, or researching through an enhanced MCAS program which academic, social, geographic, economic, or environmental factors that add value to student achievement.
Thank you again for this opportunity.

MASC will also provide you with extended written comments.