From the Palm Beach Post's editorial board
Florida parents take note: If your child comes home from school and says teachers have identified him or her as a student brimming with "future" potential, it might be time to start worrying.
Speaking in Palm Beach County last week, Florida Education Commissioner Gerard Robinson was busy defending the FCAT - nearly a full-time job for him these days - when he said that, to him, the letter "F" stands for "Future."
We're betting that "future" wasn't the first F-related word students and parents thought of when results from this year's Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test starting coming out last month. So many kids got a "Future" on the writing FCAT that the state board of education took a quick trip into the past and reverted to lower standards. Instead of just 27 percent of fourth-graders passing the writing FCAT, the state pretended that 81 percent passed.
Mr. Robinson has been in Florida less than a year. He got his job not because he's familiar with Florida schools but because - like the politicians who dictate state education policy - he believes that charter and voucher schools are the future of education.
Mr. Robinson wasn't around during the past decade while those politicians twisted the FCAT into a tool to bring about a future in which traditional public schools wither. Labeling public schools as "failing" based on FCAT results was a key feature of the strategy. It backfired when parents blamed politicians and education bureaucrats for putting too much weight on standardized testing.
Mr. Robinson insists that the state is sticking with the FCAT-based school grading system. But what good is a standardized test when the education commissioner resorts to platitudes to explain away poor results? If the state doesn't use the FCAT regimen for its original purpose - to identify areas where students need help - it doesn't belong in Florida's future.
Jac Wilder VerSteeg
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/opinion/editorials/its-the-fcat-thats-failing-2384941.html?cxtype=rss_editorials
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