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New York Ed Commissioner: Emperor of Testing

Ohanian Comment: For the New York Times version--with commentary--see:
http://www.susanohanian.org/outrage_fetch.php?id=40

Princeton Review has certainly sold Chancellor Klein a bill of goods on standardized testing as a diagnostic tool.


Students will have to take up to three additional English and math tests a year to determine what they're learning, under a new three-year, $8.2 million online program unveiled yesterday by Schools Chancellor Joel Klein.

Students in grades three, five, six and seven will take 20-question "interim assessments" in October, December and February.

Schools staff will get the results the following day from Princeton Review, the firm hired to design the program.

Fourth- and eighth-graders, who take standardized state exams in February, will take the interim tests at least twice a year.

The new tests will be used as a diagnostic tool to help teachers identify each student's strengths and weaknesses, and whether they need remedial help.

The results won't count on report cards or be published, officials said. But results will be used in teacher training.

"We need to be sure our students are mastering the basics or reading, writing and math," Klein said.

"This groundbreaking interim assessment program will help teachers identify problems during the school year so that they can effectively intervene to address student needs."

Education officials said the $3 million a year to support the testing program comes from the chancellor's reorganization of districts, and requires no new money.

Some critics charged kids are being overtested.

"Where is the balance?" asked Randi Weingarten, president of the teachers union.

"The Department of Education is on the road to become the Department of Testing."


— Carl Campanile
Klein Puts Kids to Test
New York Post
July 17, 2003
http://www.nypost.com/news/regionalnews/806.htm

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