Taking on the 'Climate Denier' Anti-PARCC Mob

With all due respect, 14 states still makes PARCC bigger that all previous K-12 summative assessments.   Not DOA.  I would ask everyone to be careful about overstatements and misstatements of facts.  I felt at times at the public forum at the library like I was at a West Virginia meeting of climate deniers discussing global climate change.  There was a looseness with facts that belie the thoughtful discussion about discussion we should be having.

From my perspective, while the decision whether to switch to PARCC a year earlier or to wait a year is a relatively small, technical decision that should be based on technology readiness, speed for return of results, and logistics, there are broader issues which I’d urge people to get involved with.

For example, the district is planning on utilizing EdWin, the state’s new Instructional Improvement System, to deliver interim benchmark assessments across the district next year.  There are other interesting assessment options (more MAPS, The Achievement Network, IXL) This decision will have much greater impact on our kids instruction than MCAS vs PARCC.  I would love to see the School Committee focus fall public forums on the comprehensive topic of assessment and not get overly distracted by a small, less consequential decision.

I guess what I am asking all members of our community, particularly on-line, is to elevate the discussion to our highest aspirations for our kids and schools and avoid the downward spiral of cynicism.

We have a new School Committee and will have a new Superintendent a year from now.  We have an opportunity to build on some very impressive gains in core academic performance, a great staff, safe and attractive buildings and a great mix of kids.  We are poised to become an ideal community for urban education.  Let’s stay focused on our broad goals and topics.

g.

From: somerville-4-schools@yahoogroups.com [mailto:somerville-4-schools@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Frank Kelly kellyfj@gmail.com [somerville-4-schools]
Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2014 6:56 AM
To: somerville-4-schools@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [somerville-4-schools] Re: School Committee discussion on PARCC and MCAS

 

Of the original 23 states who joined PARCC - 9 have dropped out

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PARCC

Time to admit that PARCC is DOA when less than one third of US states will adopt it.

Time also to admit that top-down Governmental efforts that bundle Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana with Massachusetts into the same bucket are doomed to failure. 

How about a plan that unleashes the creativity and passion of our teachers rather than encasing them in more and more laws?

Sadly our lawmakers cannot legislate that :-\

-Frank

LA and PARCC

Louisiana Commissioner of Administration Kristy Nichols today said she would suspend the state’s approval of a contract that the education department intended to use to purchase the PARCC Common Core exams and launch an investigation into whether it should have been put out for competitive bid.
The move adds another twist to — and intensifies the political infighting over — Gov. Bobby Jindal’s move today to pull the state out of PARCC and repeal the Common Core.
State Superintendent John White has said that the governor has no legal authority to pull out of PARCC or seek new bids on for standardized testing. He said he planned to proceed with full implementation of Common Core and the PARCC exams.
But tonight Nichols said that White appeared to have no authority to purchase and administer the PARCC tests using an old consulting contract dating to 2003. The contract, with the testing company Data Recognition Services, has been amended multiple times, most recently in 2013, to allow the firm to continue to administer each new annual iteration of the state’s tests. White planned to amend that contract again to administer the PARCC Common Core tests, Nichols said.
But she said that introducing the new type of exam, potentially with different subcontractors, was beyond the scope of the original contract. White’s plan, she said, appeared to “circumvent procurement laws.”
“If that’s the intention,” Nichols said, “… yeah, we’re going to have a problem with it.”
Nichols served as Jindal’s deputy chief of staff before taking on her current role.

Nichols said she would send the state education department a letter this evening demanding that they provide justification for using the existing contract for the new exams. Once she hears back, she said, her office will review the contract and the department’s reasoning and determine whether to allow the contract to proceed or require an entirely new process. In the meantime, she has suspended payment to the company named in the contract.

PARCC Contracting

The PARCC consortium originally planned to have every participating state use the same testing company to write items, administer and score the new Common Core exams — and expected states to adopt the pricing models set forth in a model contract developed by New Mexico. But that vision may have to be overhauled due to the brouhaha over the Common Core in Louisiana, a spokesman for the consortium said tonight.
PARCC let the state of New Mexico request bids from testing companies for several years of Common Core assessments. Pearson was the sole bidder and won that contract. Other states in the consortium were then expected to adopt the same contract — without seeking other bids — for their own Common Core assessments, spokesman David Connerty-Marin said.
But in Louisiana, state Superintendent John White was planning to use an existing contract with Data Recognition Corporation to deliver the Common Core tests, according to his spokesman, Barry Landry. White told POLITICO that the state does not have a contract with PARCC, but planned to use PARCC content nonetheless, apparently through the vehicle of the existing contract with Data Recognition. Earlier tonight, however, the state commissioner of administration put a big crimp in that plan, announcing that it appeared to circumvent state procurement laws. The commissioner, Kristy Nichols, suspended the contract with Data Recognition immediately, pending an investigation.
PARCC had been unaware of White’s plans and was taken by surprise by Nichols’ statement, Connerty-Marin said. But he said the consortium was “committed to working with John White… to figure out a solution that works for Louisiana.”
“The original vision of the PARCC consortium was, and is, based on item security and comparability,” Connerty-Marin said. “The best path forward for those two things is a single administrator for the tests and a single scoring approach” across all participating states, he said.
“However, that said, sometimes politics happens,” Connerty-Marin said. “So if there is another way that will make this work for Louisiana, I think our governing board will certainly look at that.”
PARCC’s original plan was already in jeopardy before the contretemps in Louisiana, because a rival testing company had protested New Mexico’s bidding process, complaining it was rigged in favor of Pearson. A judge has ordered the state purchasing agent to investigate that complaint; both sides are currently filing briefs. There is no timetable for the decision. In the meantime, the contract in New Mexico is on hold and no other state can adopt it.
One more wrinkle in the saga: Pearson’s bid in New Mexico was based on the understanding that all the other PARCC states would adopt the same contract. It priced the tests accordingly.  If states instead pick their own vendors to administer and score PARCC questions, that could upend the economics for Pearson. “It’s just too early to say,” Connerty-Marin said. “We just don’t know the details.”

A contract to administer Common Core tests in all PARCC states would be worth billions of dollars over the next several years.