The annual ISTEP+ testing marathon for grades 3-8 begins this week in most schools, amid a chorus of protests from educators across our area and the state.
Put all those comments in one place, as we’re doing here, and you understand the depth of dissatisfaction.
Many superintendents start out opposing the whole concept of rating their teachers, schools and entire school districts by a system weighted heavily on test results.
Add the confusion and bungling that has surrounded ISTEP+ over the past couple of years, and we have a recipe for frustration boiling over.
In response to a new version that made the test twice as long as last year, state leaders recently lopped 3-4 hours off the exam at the 11th hour.
“What bothers me is that schools and teachers are going to be held accountable for a test that has not really been set in stone until the last minute,” said Chris Daughtry, superintendent of Central Noble schools.
“In 26 years in testing, I have never had less confidence in this test,” Garrett-Keyser-Butler schools testing coordinator Greg Myers told his school board last week.
Myers reported finding errors in the practice portion of this year’s newly revised test. Practice sessions across the state also resulted in computer glitches that have become an annual ordeal with ISTEP+.
“I have no confidence in this test,” said Jeffrey Stephens, superintendent of DeKalb Eastern schools. “It’s just a sad day for education as far as I’m concerned.”
The level of disenchantment expressed by superintendents can’t help but filter down to affect the attitudes of teachers and even students taking the test.
But superintendents would be doing us a disservice if they put on happy faces and told us everything about ISTEP+ is just dandy.
No need to worry about that. Listen to the leaders of northeast Indiana’s two largest school districts:
“It’s just disappointing — and frustrating — because you sit and listen and watch and observe and experience how hard these teachers are truly working to help these kids be successful, and it comes down to this one test that’s full of flaws,” said East Noble Superintendent Ann Linson.
“The level of anxiety associated with high-stakes testing is counterproductive to our overall mission of preparing our students to be socially responsible students who are literate, academically successful, engaged in all aspects of their education and prepared for success in the 21st century,” said Sherry Grate, superintendent of DeKalb Central schools.
Local superintendents are not alone in their disdain for ISTEP+.
“The 2015 ISTEP lacks any credibility to grade our students, their learning growth, our staff, and/or our schools,” Monroe County schools Superintendent Judy DeMuth wrote in a letter to Gov. Mike Pence last week.
ISTEP’s leading critic might be Superintendent Rocky Killion of West Lafayette Community School District, who was named 2015 Superintendent of the Year by the Indiana Association of Public School Superintendents.
“It’s inhumane what we are doing to the kids, what we are doing to the educational environment,” Killion said last week amid frustration over an ISTEP+ practice session. “I would prefer all of my students’ parents withdraw and become home-schooled during ISTEP, and then we can re-enroll them.”
Actually following Killion’s advice is not a good idea, because skipping ISTEP+ can have serious consequences for a student, not to mention the ratings of the student’s teacher and school.
Ultimately, the storm over ISTEP+ could have serious consequences for the educational system in Indiana. A problem that has our school superintendents almost unanimously up in arms cannot be ignored.