A question on the (MCAS) test

By D. R. Bahlman 18 September 2024

WILLIAMSTOWN — Whenever I had to take a standardized test, I’d replay in my head a skit from “Beyond The Fringe,” a comedy revue written and performed by four British actors, including the late Dudley Moore.

The popular show played in London’s West End for a year or two in the early 1960s, then moved to the John Golden Theatre on Broadway from October 1962 to May 1964. It was recorded on a 10-inch vinyl disc, which my parents bought and I played — repeatedly — on our monaural Magnavox “hi-fi.” I got to know it by heart, and to this day I sometimes discreetly recite selections from it under my breath in certain situations. In my youth, one was these was the run-up to, and the taking of, a standardized test.

Titled “Why I’d Rather Be A Judge Than A Miner,” the skit features a coal miner recounting how he came to be in that line of work. “I could have been a judge,” he declares, “but I never had the Latin. ... I never had the Latin for the judgin.’”

This unfortunate deficiency was exposed by the “very rigorous” testing required of those seeking a career on the bench, where, the narrator notes, working conditions would have been far superior to those in a coal mine. Indeed, he observes, “the absence of falling coal” is an oft-touted feature of (courthouse) life. “You get judges remarking on it: ‘Hello, not much coal falling today ... “

Eventually, our raconteur lowered his sights and sat for the miners’ exam. He recalls that “they only ask you one question: Who are you? ... I got 75 percent on that.”

The skit came to mind with the arrival in last week’s mail of a booklet containing “Information for Voters” from the Massachusetts Secretary of Commonwealth’s office.

Among other proposed measures, it describes Question 2 on the Nov. 5 election ballot: elimination of MCAS as high school graduation requirement. A “yes” vote on the question, which was placed on the ballot by initiative petition, signifies approval of eliminating the requirement, enacted in 2003, that students pass the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System tests in order to graduate from high school.

A “no” vote would retain the requirement.

In the years since MCAS was created in 1993, I’ve heard many teachers and school administrators criticize the test. I have come to believe that they’re on target with their portrayal of MCAS as a “one-size-fits-all” exam that takes no account of many important factors in evaluation of students’ academic competence.

These include, according to the supporters’ statement in the pamphlet, “GPA, coursework, and teacher assessments in determining if a student is allowed to graduate.”

Almost unanimously, the teachers I’ve discussed MCAS with allege that their hands are tied by the system’s inherent requirement to “teach to the test.” Virtually no allowance is made for employment of teachers’ skills as motivators, mentors or guides to advanced scholarship in fields in which individual students may develop an interest. Teachers are, essentially, required to “teach to the test,” especially in the later grades. There’s little or no time to do otherwise.

“Voting ‘yes’ will allow schools and teachers, together with parents and students, to focus on the the most important skills and knowledge to help students succeed in life, rather than having to focus only only those skills that can be measured by a standardized test,” reads a statement from the petition’s sponsor, the Massachusetts Teachers Association.

From here, opponents’ arguments to the effect that eliminating the MCAS graduation requirement would be unfair to students and increase inequality by awarding diplomas to “kids who aren’t ready to graduate” appears to be more of a description of a problem than a practical approach to addressing it.

That goal stands a far better chance of being achieved if individual school districts were allowed to regain their authority over the design and implementation of methods of “demonstrating mastery of the competencies contained in the state academic standards in mathematics, science, technology, English and other areas determined by the (state) Board of Elementary and Secondary education.”

Let teachers do the jobs for which they were trained — and for which taxpayers pay them.