MCAS question to grace ballots in November

By Ryan Feyre 20 September 2024

A question regarding whether the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System test should continue to be a high school graduation requirement will appear on Massachusetts ballots during the Nov. 5 general election.

If the question is approved by voters, then the MCAS will not be a graduation requirement for high school students, though the tests will still be given to gather data.

Instead, graduation readiness would be determined by local district’s expectations provided those local expectations are informed by the frame works and standards established by the state board of education and embodied by the current MCAS test.

The ballot question landed on the 2024 election after the Massachusetts Teachers Association gathered over 130,000 signatures across the state from those who support eliminating the MCAS as a graduation requirement. The MTA officially backed the question in an announcement in August 2023.

Throughout their advocacy, the MTA has argued that MCAS is a limiting tool that only measures some of the standards established by curriculum frameworks. According to a document provided by the MTA’s Center for Education Policy and Practice, the 10th grade ELA test does not address any speaking or listening standards and only three out of 10 writing standards are covered.

They also said in their argument for the ballot question that MCAS only covers 43% of the 32 anchor standards in ELA.

Deb McCarthy, the vice president of the MTA and a fifth grade teacher of 25 years, said that the MCAS is an inequitable test that fails to accommodate students with learning disabilities.

“I think there is a disconnect between the intent and impact and an accountability system that was supposed to be about providing equity for all learners in all districts,” McCarthy said.

McCarthy argued that the focus of the education system in Massachusetts should be on facilitating an academically-rich environment rather than on narrowing the focus on one standardized test. She said it would benefit the students and teachers more if assessments were facilitated during the entire school year through different assignments.

“MCAS isn’t a standard, it’s an assessment,” McCarthy said. “And we do assessments all the time, from September through June, and we believe that our students need to be measured on the process of these 10 months and not a one-time event.”

Sarah Woodward, a reading specialist from Hampshire Regional, agreed with McCarthy’s thoughts about the MCAS. A 26-year educator who used to work in New York, Woodward feels that Massachusetts has the hardest requirements in terms of testing.

She also noted the difficulties found within MCAS.

“I work with many kids who are dyslexic or struggling readers who are very bright and will never pass this test,” Woodward said. “I have seen it personally; these are bright people who go all the way through high school to then get there and say you can’t graduate because of one test.”

And although students are allowed to retake the test if they fail, MTA argues that this leads to counselors devoted too much time to reassessments instead of other counseling duties and students who fail are unable to take other extracurricular classes because they have to take MCAS prep courses.

“You can have a student do really well on math and on the ELA, but what we are seeing lately are students who miss the science exam as freshmen by two to three questions, who then, as a sophomore, are being denied the opportunity of taking specialized classes,” McCarthy said.

Despite overwhelming support to eliminate the requirement from largest teacher’s association in the state, there are some opponents of the question, including a statewide broad coalition of teachers, parents, education advocates and business groups called “Protect Our Kids’ Future: No on Question 2.”

The coalition argues that without the MCAS graduation requirement, the basic level of competence educators expect of students would be weakened, resulting in 300-plus “different and unequal” standards for high school graduation across the state.

“If we take away the graduation requirement, we have literally no standardized requirement in which to graduate students,” said Cynthia Argruso, a junior high math teacher in Agawam. “If we do that, then all districts in the state will have their graduation requirements … and that’s not a level playing field.”

Argruso, an educator of over 25 years, said she has worked with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education for many years to approve questions that go on the test. She said that the process in which a question arrives on the test takes two to three years because it goes through many different committees, including a bias and sensitivity committee, to make sure the questions are valid.

“These questions align with the standards that the state has for content,” Argruso said. “So, it doesn’t make sense to me to get rid of this as a requirement.”

According to data provided by Board of Elementary and Secondary Education Vice Chair Matt Hills, approximately 70,000 students in each graduating class, or about 96%, met the state’s “competency determination” for MCAS.

With this stat in mind, and the fact that students have multiple tries to pass the test, the Protect Our Kids coalition argues that meeting the necessary standard for MCAS is not a major obstacle.

They also noted how the state offers accommodations for those who have disabilities.

“It’s a minimum standard; it’s not the SAT, or bar school or a bar exam,” said Dom Slowey, a spokesperson from the Protect Our Kids coalition. “We think that rather than lowering the bar we should be lifting students up, so that they can reach their potential because every student has the potential to reach that standard to reach that bar.”

Slowey said that the test is an important tool to measure how students are doing as they go through the process of taking it each year from third through eighth grade before taking it as the graduation requirement in high school.

“We hear a lot about teaching to the test, but we really think that if the test is measuring what students are supposed to be learning, then in reality, teachers are teaching what kids need to know,” Slowey said. “You’re teaching to the standard, you’re teaching the material that the test is measuring and to us, that’s not a waste of time.”

Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey and Massachusetts Secretary of Education Patrick Tutwiler also oppose eliminating the MCAS test as a requirement.

The MCAS question is one of five ballot questions for this year’s election.