Teachers, Parents Continue to Object to Over Testing Students

It didn't help that the East Providence School Committee meeting started later than advertised last night (January 13th) by half an hour and concluded well after midnight. The committee met for an hour and a half in private executive session to discuss matters of litigation and personnel. No votes were taken during the private session. With no explanation for the delay in start time, the meeting began an quickly turned into a lengthy debate on school assessment testing. The usual small crowd attending a school committee meeting was swollen to several dozen city teachers and parents who were there to signal dislike for the amount of "excessive student testing" by assessment, as many see it.

The issue of mandatory testing has raised the ire of many parents and teachers throughout the nation. East Providence parents have raised the bar in their concerns with these many assessments which measure data but don't count in a student's grade or graduation requirements. "I don't feel that I'm doing what's best for my students," Riverside Middle School teacher Kimberly Maratto told the committee last night. "I stand here tonight and ask everyone to take a long hard look at this issue. I speak about the large amount of assessments, maybe 43, in our middle school. Some of these take as long as 3 days to complete," said Maratto who is also the parent of elementary school age children in the city.

The assessment topic was placed on the agenda by new committee member, Nathan Cahoon. "When we attended orientation meetings for new school committee members statewide, we learned how all of our decisions should benefit kids," he said. "I don't feel we are helping with all of these tests that don't count for a student's grade anyway. Cahoon and Beauchaine said that they were told by Deputy Commissioner of Education David Abbott that "In Rhode Island, we over test and don't use the data." These are very high stakes tests with regard to school classification. It seems backwards, bizarre," added Cahoon.

Another new member, Jessica Beauchaine, also voiced strong opposition to excessive assessment testing. "The school committee has been contacted by many people. Parents and students have an issue with this," she said. "We're not up here to badger you. I want you to know I support education but I represent the public," Beauchaine told school administrators. Superintendent Kim Mercer, Assistant Superintendent Julie Motta and Director of Instruction and Intervention Dawn August were in disagreement with the committee throughout the session. "These tests are helpful, we need them, they support our teaching efforts," said Superintendent Mercer. "There are required tests that we must give (NAEP and PARCC) or we lose federal funding," Mercer told the committee. The committee acknowledged that they couldn't stop required tests but wanted to curtail many of the others.

Long concerned about excessive student assessments, has been member Joel Monteiro. "We are testing some kids that don't need it, they are doing well. This defies logic," he said. "Let teachers teach and students learn. We're spending too much time testing kids," Monteiro said as teachers in the audience nodded in approval. "Why would kids take these tests seriously if they know they don't really count? Sometimes the assessment data isn't released until the next year, the kids are gone," added Monteiro.

However Monteiro and others couldn't sway the Superintendent and her staff. "I've never seen a child say that they're not going to do their best on any test, standardized or local," Mercer maintained. I've never gotten one piece of information regarding results of these tests that my own kids have taken," said Cahoon. The teachers don't think these tests are helping, in fact, they are getting in the way," added Cahoon. There are Federal, state, district, classroom designed and screening/diagnostic tests administered to students. Veteran elementary teacher Mary Texeira also addressed the committee. Texeira has often addressed the school committee or city council on critical issues. Texeira has generally been considered a voice of reason. "This is a conversation that isn't including teachers," said Texeira. "Teachers need to be involved in these decisions. Some of the information is incorrect." Administrators had said earlier that these assessment tests take about 7 to 9 minutes to give. "It takes me 15 minutes per child to give the total test. While I give the test, no new teaching is going on for my other students. I keep them busy, but it isn't teaching," said Texeira. "At least 3 full days of school are non-teaching days. We do way too much assessment. Some day someone has to say this needs to be changed. It's not a good thing. You need to sit down with teachers and come up with a solution. Besides being a teacher I am becoming a record keeper," said Texeira.

When asked by Cahoon how many teachers in the audience felt that these assessments were hurting education and their students, just about every hand shot up high in the air. One teacher said she loses "every Friday teaching to the test."

"In general, a teacher's opinion is not respected. We already know what we need. Please listen to those in the trenches. I'm not here for the money or the glory we know. You can't have this conversation without teachers," added Texeira.

Nathan Cahoon pledged to continue investigating. I know what we can't change but I remain unconvinced for other individual assessments. This is too important to let go."