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Are All Editorialists Standardistos?

Increasingly across the country, reporters report ugly facts about mandated state tests. Columnists write heartfelt columns about the students who are harmed. But editorialists keep rolling along. Here is a Standardisto editorial from the Seattle Times And reistance leader (not to mention candidate for State Superintendent of Public Instruction) Juanita Doyon's reply.

Notice the "It has been decided. . . " in the editorial. Who decided? Could it have been mere mortals?

Editorial
Get going on WASL

In the Legislature's understandable rush to accommodate Boeing, a bill to get the public schools ready for high-school graduation tests was left on the table. The schools will simply have to move ahead without this bill, because there is no time to wait for it.

It has been decided already that students who graduate in 2008 will be required to pass the 10th-grade WASL, the Washington Assessment of Student Learning tests. Those tests will be given in the spring of 2006. But by that time, there has to be in place a system, and money, for retaking the test.

Retakes are crucial. The whole point of testing in the 10th grade rather than the 12th is to give an incentive for the failing student to buckle up and succeed. The experience of other states demonstrates this. In Massachusetts, the pass rate on the 10th-grade tests for the class of 2003 was 68 percent. After three retakes, it was 90 percent.

This state will also have to get to 90 percent. A pass rate much lower than that will not be acceptable.

One safety valve will be a project of some kind as an alternative to the tests. The bill that failed in the Legislature set out a timetable for developing this graduation project. It will have to be developed without the bill.

Most urgent is preparing the class of 2008. This spring, that class took the seventh-grade WASL, the last such test before the 10th grade. The seventh-grade test identifies students who are already behind. Schools need to give these students individual attention now rather than let them slide until the spring of 2006.

Terry Bergeson, state superintendent of public instruction, promises to keep moving. "There isn't anything in that bill that I can't do," she says.

That is the right attitude, but it has to be shown by a lot more than the superintendent at the top. Says Bergeson: "People are still procrastinating."

Educators need to move ahead. So do legislators, the next time they collect themselves in Olympia. The year 2008 seems a long way off. But it is the end of a process that requires work now.

The Seattle Times
To the Editor:
Re: Get Going on WASL

It is interesting that the editors of The Seattle Times claim, "It has been decided already that students who graduate in 2008 will be required to pass the 10th-grade WASL," when the state board committee to determine WASL validity and reliability as a graduation requirement has recently turned in a final report calling for somewhat massive changes to the test, the system, and the graduation requirement itself. In case the editors would like to do their homework on the issue, please read this final report in its entirety, including position statements of serious concern from the members of the committee who work most closely with our students. The report can be found at
http://www.sbe.wa.gov/reports/CoM%20Final%20Report.htm

As for the 90% senior pass rate from Massachusetts, which is so frequently touted as a goal for Washington, it is 90% of the remaining senior class, after 30% of entering freshmen have been misplaced (i.e. pushed or dropped out). Is this what we want for Washington? I think not.

Indeed, it is time our schools took it upon themselves to do something about WASL. I would suggest boycott! For taxpayers, it's time to ask our representatives just how much this WASL monster is costing in precious educational resources of time and money.

People are not "procrastinating," as the current state superintendent claims. We're resisting, refusing, and revolting against a proposed system that is wasteful, flawed, and ridiculous.

Juanita Doyon
organizer, Mothers Against WASL
candidate, Superintendent of Public Instruction, 2004

— Editorial
Get Going on WASL
Seattle Times
June 3, 2003
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/editorialsopinion/135154869_tested03.html

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