To: The New York State House, The New York State Senate, and Governor Andrew Cuomo
End High Stakes Testing for Elementary School Kids!
Stop High-Stakes Testing for Elementary Kids!
* High-stakes testing lowers the quality of education due to “teaching to the test”. It reduces time for the enrichment students need and enjoy, while increasing unhealthy emotional stress in our children.
* Testing results belong to students and families. They should not be used to close schools, retain students or evaluate educators, and they should never be used for commercial purposes nor given to national databases.
* Schools should be safe havens where students feel secure and cared for, not sorted and ranked by test scores. They should not be places where children feel inadequate, stressed and unsuccessful. No nine-year old should be told whether he is on the road to “college readiness”. It is absurd to try to make such predictions.
* All tests and student results should be available to teachers and parents after test administration. They should be used only to inform parents and teachers about a child’s learning and to improve instruction. Tests should exist to serve students not politicians or for-profit testing companies.
Based on the above, we support an immediate moratorium on high stakes testing in the State of New York. Testing exists to serve our students. Our students do not exist to serve testing.
* High-stakes testing lowers the quality of education due to “teaching to the test”. It reduces time for the enrichment students need and enjoy, while increasing unhealthy emotional stress in our children.
* Testing results belong to students and families. They should not be used to close schools, retain students or evaluate educators, and they should never be used for commercial purposes nor given to national databases.
* Schools should be safe havens where students feel secure and cared for, not sorted and ranked by test scores. They should not be places where children feel inadequate, stressed and unsuccessful. No nine-year old should be told whether he is on the road to “college readiness”. It is absurd to try to make such predictions.
* All tests and student results should be available to teachers and parents after test administration. They should be used only to inform parents and teachers about a child’s learning and to improve instruction. Tests should exist to serve students not politicians or for-profit testing companies.
Based on the above, we support an immediate moratorium on high stakes testing in the State of New York. Testing exists to serve our students. Our students do not exist to serve testing.
Why is this important?
My daughter attends 3rd grade in a New York City public school.
At age 8, she has been taking the kind of standardized test I wasn't expected to take until high school. These tests are causing intelligent children like her, as young as 8 and 9, to be stressed out and hate school!
What's worse, the blind, sudden implementation of these tests means that students in my daughter's grade are being tested on material they haven't studied. And teachers are being expected to teach material for which they are not adequately prepared. How is that fair?
Challenging children is a good idea. Setting them up to fail by new and arbitrary tests based on standards with dubious educational efficacy for which children have not been prepared is not.
And causing children to feel they are stupid and hate school is one of the worst ideas for the citizens of New York State.
At age 8, she has been taking the kind of standardized test I wasn't expected to take until high school. These tests are causing intelligent children like her, as young as 8 and 9, to be stressed out and hate school!
What's worse, the blind, sudden implementation of these tests means that students in my daughter's grade are being tested on material they haven't studied. And teachers are being expected to teach material for which they are not adequately prepared. How is that fair?
Challenging children is a good idea. Setting them up to fail by new and arbitrary tests based on standards with dubious educational efficacy for which children have not been prepared is not.
And causing children to feel they are stupid and hate school is one of the worst ideas for the citizens of New York State.