The Craziness!

Public schools in all 50 states administer some type of benchmark testing. I don't know about the rest of the states but my particular state has some pretty ridiculous requirements.

The one that is the most frustrating to me is how the special education population is treated. Every student in my building (5th and 6th grade) is held accountable to scoring at the proficient level in reading and math. A student that reads at the 3rd grade level (or lower) is required to test on the same material as students reading at grade level or higher. In addition, if the percentage of special education students that score proficient does not meet the state requirements, our school is put on "probation" by the department of education and according to their policy - our school is in danger of being taken over by the state. Even though our school as a whole far exceeds the state requirements, if the less able students don't meet the requirements, our school will suffer the consequences. GRRRRRRR!!

The next thing is mostly an annoyance! The department of education sends 80-95 page booklets for every teacher that assigns them a very specific scripts to be read for each test session - Ok, that's reasonable. This "Test Administration Manual" is available online before the test and for years after the test. Even so, they REQUIRE that I shred every page of all 50 manuals they sent! Crazy!!! FYI here is the link that gives anyone access - no login or password needed. So if they keep it posted online, WHY DO I HAVE TO SHRED THEM?

Last of all, was their "rule" about when the counselors in my state were permitted to open the packages of student test booklets. They were delivered to us on the Friday before testing began, but we had to work on Sunday because if we opened the packages before Sunday, it would be a breach of security!! I had over 500 test booklets in shrink wrapped packages of 10!! I had to open the, inventory them, and divide them up for each teacher to pick up Monday morning.

There's so much more, but I'll stop here!!

BTW - I did hang my diplomas and license in my office today. It really felt good.

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