Cambridge Chronicle, October 27, 1999

Parents, students bash MCAS

By PAUL HOFFMAN
Chronicle Staff

Students who boycotted last spring's state-mandated
MCAS test drew repeated rounds of applause at a
citywide parents forum on the test last Thursday night.

More than 100 parents, educators and students attended
the forum at Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School,
where they gave the standardized test failing grades in
every category.

"I think the MCAS test is very bad for our children's
education," said Jackie Dee King, a parent with two sons
in the Graham-Parks Alternative School. "It is excessively
long, ambiguously worded and poorly defined. It narrows
and dumbs-down the curriculum and makes teachers
teach to the test."

King and other parents called the test the heavy hand of
the state coming down on local school districts.

"The problem, especially at the high school, is that the
ninth grade curriculum has been changed and the quality
has been lowered as a result," said Josiane Hudicourt
Barnes, a parent with one high school student at CRLS
and two grammar schoolers at Graham and Parks. Barnes'
son boycotted the test last year when he was in the
eighth grade.

"The MCAS is very wide in scope and very shallow in
content," Barnes said. "For example, several years ago a
student could take a course that focused on a single
author or a period of time. In the past few years the
literature course has become very general."

Barnes points out there used to be a course at CRLS
focused on Shakespeare, which has been replaced by a
course on world literature.

"Students used to go into the ninth grade and take a
course called biology and now it's general principals of
science," Barnes said. "Instead of teaching one thing
well, they try to teach everything at once and as fast as
possible. That's what MCAS is giving our students."

"It is also simply unfair," King complained. "It represents
a real barrier for poor students, special needs students
and ELS students."

The consensus at the meeting was parents are opposed
to any single paper and pencil test being used for high
stakes decisions like promotion and graduation. They
plan to call for multiple assessments including classroom
participation, parental involvement and overall student
portfolios.

The forum has launched a petition campaign insisting
local and state officials suspend the use of the MCAS test
and fulfill the sprit of the 1993 Educational Reform Act by
replacing the test with multiple assessment tools.

Parents took dozens of petitions to copy and circulate in
schools, churches, workplaces and sports leagues.

Organizers of the forum, which was sponsored by the
Cambridge Parents against the MCAS and the Coalition
for Authentic Reform in Education, said they would reach
out to similar groups in other communities to build a
statewide network of parents in opposition to the test.

Janet Axelrod, who has a son in the Agassiz school, said
she is not yet angry, but she could easily get there.

"The ultimate goal is to do away with this kind of
testing," she said. "We will do it on a school level, on a
citywide level and hopefully on a statewide level. We are
organized and we know what to do."

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