For Subscribers
MCAS English Scores Down Across The Board, Showing Effects of Coronavirus Shut-Downs
By Sam Drysdale State House News Service…
MCAS
For Subscribers
On MCAS Question, Mayors Reluctant To Fill In The Bubble
By Michael Jonas CommonWealth Beacon When it comes to the November ballot question asking whether the state should end the Massachusetts Comprehensive…
For Subscribers
Bay State mulling changes to high school standardized tests
MALDEN, MASS. — Massachusetts education officials plan to decide over the next year or so whether to shift the 10th grade standardized test…
For Subscribers
‘Next generation’ MCAS exam to be developed by N.H. vendor
STATE HOUSE — State education officials have signed a five-year, $150.8 million contract with a New Hampshire-based organization for the…
For Subscribers
Anti-Common Core initiative moves one step closer to ballot
Voters in Massachusetts might be the first in the nation to weigh in directly on Common Core educational standards. Last week, End…
For Subscribers
The Common Core journalism blackout
Earlier this month, a deliberately anonymous teacher set forth some of the problems she saw in the Common Core-based test she…
For Subscribers
Spreading the Massachusetts ‘education miracle’
Last week, the NewBostonPost reported that the Michigan state Senate is considering dropping the national Common Core standards and replacing them and…
For Subscribers
Six questions about Common Core-based tests — including MCAS 2.0
The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) recently sent this item out: The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness…
For Subscribers
Michigan Senate panel turns to old Mass. MCAS standards
BOSTON – If efforts to repeal Common Core education standards succeed and the state returns to the old approach used with the Massachusetts…
For Subscribers
Committee forms to oppose Common Core ballot question
BOSTON – Former Fitchburg State University president Robert Antonucci will lead a new committee to fight a ballot question that would allow Massachusetts…
For Subscribers
Time for Gov. Baker to take a stand on Common Core
As a sitting governor in a blue state, Charlie Baker must think he is immune from the upheaval in the Republican Party.…
For Subscribers
Maine Common Core foes cross party lines to push repeal
AUGUSTA, Maine – A bipartisan group of Maine lawmakers is pushing a measure to repeal national education standards, known as Common Core, adopted…
For Subscribers
Common Core supporters sue to prevent vote
BOSTON – Supporters of Common Core sued Friday to prevent Massachusetts voters from having an opportunity to weigh in on whether the Commonwealth…
For Subscribers
Second Common Core video released as Mass. considers dumping the federal standards
BOSTON – A second undercover video portraying Common Core as an exercise in profiteering by publishers including Boston textbook giant Houghton Mifflin Harcourt…
For Subscribers
Ballot group sees MCAS 2.0 as bid to ‘mollify our movement’
BOSTON — As Massachusetts school districts prepare for the MCAS 2.0 era to launch in the spring of 2017, ballot activists are…
For Subscribers
Obama signs education law rewrite shifting power to states
WASHINGTON (AP) — Calling it a "Christmas miracle," President Barack Obama signed a sweeping overhaul of the No Child Left Behind…
For Subscribers
Voters may soon get to weigh in on charter schools, Common Core
BOSTON — Proponents of two ballot initiatives aimed at reforming Massachusetts public education dropped off boxes of signed petitions to Secretary of State…
For Subscribers
MCAS or PARCC? The choice is clear
Next month, education policy makers in Massachusetts will decide whether to keep the highly regarded Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) or adopt…
For Subscribers
Common Core opponents ‘anxious’ about meeting signature requirement
STATE HOUSE — Donna Colorio is anxious and exhausted, but happy. The former Worcester School Committee member has been leading a volunteer effort…
For Subscribers
Let’s do Next-Gen MCAS right
The Baker administration and Board of Elementary and Secondary Education should be applauded for maintaining Massachusetts' academic independence and testing autonomy,…
For Subscribers
Ed board backs MCAS 2.0 plan for new standardized tests
MALDEN – Bay State education policymakers voted Tuesday to create an MCAS 2.0 standardized testing program that combines elements of the multi-…
For Subscribers
Ed board urged to take time before deciding student assessment course
MALDEN, MASS. — On the eve of a potentially critical vote, educators, parents and elected officials pressed the Board of Elementary and Secondary…
For Subscribers
MCAS 2.0 called for by Bay State ed chief Chester
BOSTON – A "next-generation MCAS" is the route Massachusetts should take in choosing its new standardized student assessment program, Elementary…
For Subscribers
Reform based on pre-2011 MCAS draws support from Pioneer Institute
BOSTON – As Massachusetts education officials gear up to decide next month whether to adopt the national PARCC exam to assess academic achievement,…
For Subscribers
Bay State reformers backed MCAS over PARCC, think tank says
BOSTON – Debate over standardized testing in Massachusetts schools heated up Wednesday as the Pioneer Institute, an independent policy research organization, rebutted an…
For Subscribers
Bay State lawmakers call for dropping federal PARCC test
BOSTON – A quarter of state legislators urged Education Secretary Jim Peyser and other policymakers to reject federal PARCC academic assessment testing, raising…
For Subscribers
Ed commissioner floats standardized testing compromise
MALDEN — As the state prepares to decide whether to adopt a new standardized test known as PARCC or stick with the existing…
For Subscribers
Keeping MCAS, but upping math standard seen as alternative
STATE HOUSE — Education Secretary James Peyser wrote an op-ed in September laying out the choice the state Board of Education faces…
For Subscribers
The power of knowledge in every century
"Knowledge is power," Sir Francis Bacon famously said. Although he may have had a more pragmatic, empirical approach in mind,…
For Subscribers
Rotten to the core: Big money pushes PARCC and Common Core
Each year, much is written and said about K-12 education when students head back to school. That will be especially true…
