LI educators to oppose emphasis on testing

Educators from Long Island and across the country plan to rally in Washington on July 30 to tell policy-makers what they believe is wrong with public education: high-stakes testing.

The Save Our Schools March and National Call To Action, a movement of parents, teachers and other educators, also is advocating for equitable and sufficient funding for all public schools, locally developed curriculums and a greater voice in national education policy.

Proponents of standardized school and student assessments, with federal contributions tied to performance, say these establish a common, quantifiable playing field for all and provide a basis for comparison of school achievement across the country.

But those planning to attend the demonstration say the federal No Child Left Behind mandates and the more recent Race to the Top initiative place too great an emphasis on testing at the expense of learning. Federal guidelines also have linked test scores to funding, with low-performing schools losing money or being forced to shut down.

Critics of the policies say districts and teachers are being unfairly judged by their students' test scores. Tests, they say, are imperfect and do not accurately measure all that students know.

Sean Feeney, president of the Nassau County High School Principals' Association, said recent state and federal policies leave teachers under attack. The tone of the national debate on education -- which has implied that teachers and administrators are taking advantage of schools through their salaries -- is not productive, he said.

"The things that are being said are eroding confidence in our schools," said Feeney, principal of The Wheatley School in the East Williston school district. "This is destructive, when you start attacking the system we are using, claiming our schools are failing. It is demoralizing to many of us who have spent our lives dedicated to schools."

Carol Corbett Burris, principal of South Side High School in the Rockville Centre school district, recently wrote an open letter to U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, outlining what she called the "punitive evaluation" policies adopted by the state of New York. She said the recent changes have created an atmosphere of distrust between the state and its teachers, and students are the ones paying the price.

"We've started down the slippery slope, and we'll necessarily gather up these unintended consequences along the way -- unless policy-makers restore some sanity to the system," said Burris, who was named the 2010 New York State Outstanding Educator by the state's School Administrators Association.

For instance, she said, local schools for years have been able to "re-grade" Regents exams if a student scored slightly above or slightly below the 65 passing mark. A second look at such an exam allowed teachers to re-evaluate the test to make sure the initial score was fair.

As of this spring, they no longer have this option. Instead, Burris said, schools must send tests to the state and students could wait months for an outcome. "They are now trying to make this whole process as teacher-proof as possible," Burris said.

Liza Womack, Long Island coordinator for the march, said students are being treated as factory-made products and that they should be evaluated not only by tests, but by the quality of their work in the classroom.

"There are many assessments a teacher can use," said Womack, a teacher in the Merrick school district.

Debra Goodman, an associate professor of literacy studies at Hofstra University, said the emphasis on testing has widespread implications. She said poor schools are particularly hard-hit by federal mandates because they're more vulnerable to losing art and music programs.

"The tests have acted to narrow the curriculum and compound the distinctions between the haves and have-nots," she said.

Kim Lowenborg-Coyne, director for music and art in the North Babylon district, said she plans to attend the march to support the arts, which can strengthen students' academic performance.

"I'm afraid that the arts will be the first to go or that some ill-informed person would try to measure what children learn through the arts with paper-and-pencil tests," she said. "The skills kids get through studying art, theater, music and dance are not quantifiable. They are qualitative, not quantitative, but essential nonetheless."