[gitmo]

Summer,
We have similar testing in NC. You cannot graduate certain grades without passing the tests. The teachers tell me that the "gateway grades" spend the entire year preparing for these tests, and doing nothing else.

After last year's test, the teachers were really down, saying that the test didn't cover the topics they were told, and consequently the students were being tested on subjects they had never covered. The results were high failure rates, and now the scores required for passing are being lowered.

[summer]

RE: "the topics they were told" -- Yes, I agree: NOT adequately informing the teachers what is on the test will most certainly result, eventually, in depressed teachers, and low test scores of students.

The information that will be tested should be communicated, clearly, to teachers, and if it is not, the teachers should loudly complain. Some teachers really work hard preparing students for these tests.

BTW, see my post below. :)

[summer]

Scroll down and download this 3-page FL Dept of Ed document, "FCAT Myths vs. Facts" after CLICKING HERE.

[summer]

now the scores required for passing are being lowered.

But, I do not agree with that solution: lowering the bar. The correct answer to this problem is: better communication between (1) state/and school administrators; and (2) teachers.

[js1138]

The teachers tell me that the "gateway grades" spend the entire year preparing for these tests, and doing nothing else.

That would be because the previous grades did not teach stuff that would be tested.

I my (private) high school 40 years ago, we were given nationally standardized tests in every subject every semister. It did not affect our grades, but it affected the teacher's prospects for raises. A couple of teachers let standardized test scores above the 90th percentile substitute for the final exam. and why not?