NJ Education Report

This tweet represents NJEA’s campaign to end New Jersey public schools’ decades-long tradition of annual standardized tests and switch to “grade span testing,” or assessing student proficiency once in elementary school, once in middle school, and once in high school. Sounds good, right? Less pressure on teachers and students, less investment in technology, less classroom interruption. “Just say no,” chief union evangelist Diane Ravitch urges, to “annual testing.”  

Currently New Jersey students take standardized tests every year from 3rd-8th grade and then again 11th grade. The teacher union backed plan would reduce the number of standardized test a student takes between K-12 from the current seven down to three.  

So, a thought experiment: what would happen if New Jersey adopted this plank of the anti-PARCC PAC and only tested students with standardized assessments three times during a student’s elementary and secondary education?

Read the rest here.