A standardized-testing graduation requirement won’t be missed at Cambridge’s public high school, though opinion seems more mixed among students than teachers.
A measure decided Nov. 5 opposed state high school students needing to pass the MCAS test to graduate. It was funded by the Massachusetts Teachers Association, which spent more than $15 million on ads, campaigning and outside contractors under the slogan “High Stakes, Not High Standards.” Nearly 2 million Massachusetts voters approved the ballot question, giving it a 59 percent majority.
Teachers at Cambridge Rindge and Latin School overwhelmingly supported the ballot measure, Cambridge Day found in a series of discussions held on campus.
For physics teacher Kristin Newton, the ninth-grade physics Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System was impossible to fully teach to. “We were just racing from one topic to the next every day,” she told. Another physics teacher for first-year students, Tal SebellShavit, explained that teaching to the MCAS was as taxing as it was unhelpful: “There’s always the question of breadth versus depth,” he said. “If I want you to get a deep understanding of something, that takes time, and you have to give up some of the MCAS test points.”
Cambridge students generally perform well on the MCAS; many lower-income districts struggle. “At the school my friend teaches at, they have to cut things like art and music in order to prepare for the MCAS,” history teacher Rachel Otty said. “The students are denied the classes that wealthier school districts have to offer.”
Alicia Roth, a CRLS teacher of English as a second language, believes the graduation requirement widened the gap between native and nonnative English speakers as well. “Some of my students are prevented from graduating because it’s impossible to learn enough English in only a year or two,” Roth said. “We can do MCAS prep, like how to turn around a prompt and make it an answer, but obviously their vocabulary is so limited.”
Students who arrive in the U.S. in the 12th grade can graduate without passing the test, but they get a special diploma. “It’s not as good as a diploma that says you passed the MCAS – it’s not the caliber of diploma that colleges are looking for,” Roth said. The math MCAS, too, is hard for ESL students. The section can be translated into Spanish, but not any other languages.
Eugene Lee, a senior at the high school, had a very different experience. Lee, who immigrated from Korea to the United States four years ago, found the test to be a useful benchmark. “I think it’s a helpful opportunity to have a specific thing to intensively study English for,” he said.
Others, though against the MCAS, are in favor of a different standardized statewide graduation requirement. Sophomore Gareth Flandro would like to see an adaptive test similar to the i-Ready Diagnostic, a test that gets harder the more questions students answer right, and easier the more they get wrong. Most Cambridge students take the i-Ready every fall and winter from third to eighth grade.
Another sophomore, Eleanor Younger, doesn’t know what a better replacement for the MCAS would look like – perhaps, she said, a portfolio model – but believes that not having a standardized requirement at all is a mistake. “The proposed initiative has not included sufficiently specific language or foresight that will serve to protect the integrity of the public education system in Massachusetts and prevent fragmentation among school districts in the state,” she said. “The blunders made have certainly caused supporters to lose my vote.”
Newton, the physics teacher, agreed that the MCAS requirement helped ensure education quality across schools. “Standardized data does hold a school accountable for teaching all students, not just the high-performing ones,” Newton said. “When I taught in this district before the MCAS was a requirement, I think we paid a lot less attention to all of the different subgroups.”
Between 2002 and 2003, when the test became a graduation requirement, the number of 10th graders who failed the test nearly halved. Seven hundred students annually, or 1 percent among Massachusetts’ senior classes, fail to graduate because of the MCAS.
Still, SebellShavit believes students might do better on the test now that the requirement is removed. “I think some people do worse under stress,” he said. Tenth grader Eve Berube agreed, saying, “the MCAS brings a lot of anxiety, causing scores to suffer.” Langdon Rivas, a ninth grader, is glad to see the requirement go: “I feel like a big stress is off my shoulders.”
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https://www.thecrimson.com/widget/2024/11/1/ballot-question-2-spending/ I wish it was a debate about an alternative requirement rather that a campaign focused on misinformation about kids being held back. Kids who need standards most lose. I hope Cambridge day is following the work to replace the graduation requirement. Presently , attendance is not allowed to be a factor is grading. Yes Attendance violations are prohibited from being used in final grades. There are other requirements like community service that are nit enforced either. “ equity” has become pass everyone at CRLS. I am sure Lexington high will be fine without MCAS as a graduation requirement. Cambridge not so much.
A test is not a standard. And the MCAS had become an over-emphasized metric to the detriment of deeper learning. 59% of voters realized that.
If former Senator Galluccio wants to talk about funding for ballot initiatives, then people should also look at how a few billionaires (who don’t send their kids to public schools) drop millions into Mass campaigns: https://www.masspoliticsprofs.org/2024/10/31/bloomberg-reframes-q2-on-mcas-it-is-oligarchy-v-teachers-union/