Debate rages over plan to mandate school testing

Teresa Hinds

Monday, Oct. 28, 1996 | 11:59 a.m.

The state Board of Education has set in motion mandatory criterion-referenced testing for third-, seventh- and ninth-graders that school district administrators statewide were assured was voluntary.

Critics call the board's bill draft request, approved 8-3 at Saturday's board meeting, premature because they do not know what the fiscal impact will be on school districts and because there is no statewide curriculum in place for third grade.

"In an hour's time, we approved a test on a curriculum that we do not have and mandated it when before we said we wouldn't," said board member Bill Hanlon.

Opponents also say the test will duplicate efforts of school districts that already administer their own criterion-referenced testing, including Clark County. Criterion-referenced tests are designed to measure if children actually learn what is being taught.

For that reason, Hanlon said the board's $450,000 request to develop and implement the test in 1998 is "a waste of money."

Based on discussions at previous board meetings, Hanlon and fellow board member Jan Biggerstaff said their understanding was that the testing would be voluntary.

That's the information Hanlon had passed on to numerous school district administrators throughout the state, including Kay Carl, assistant superintendent for elementary education in Clark County.

"My guess is that (the Department of Education staff) is going to tell the Legislature that this is a mandate," Hanlon said. "When it was originally approved, it sure as hell wasn't."

A copy of the bill draft request, which was included in the board's agenda, does not indicate the testing is to be mandatory.

"When something is meant to be mandatory, we put the word 'mandatory' in" the request, Hanlon asserted. "I thought we were going to make test banks and possible tests for the benefit of smaller school districts that don't have the funds to create these kind of tests, as a service to them."

Biggerstaff had the same impression.

"When the budget came through" for the 1997-99 biennium, "Bill and I both said we did not favor state-mandated criterion-referenced testing and we discussed it again at the last board meeting" held in September in Pahrump, she said.

"At that point I thought it was a dead issue, and then all of the sudden it came through."

In the meantime, Biggerstaff said, "Some of the legislators have emphasized to the state staff that they do want state-mandated tests" to ensure accountability.

Lilliam Hickey, the state board president, defended the vote. She said the bill has no chance of legislative support unless the testing is mandatory.

"If you want something to happen in the Legislature, if you do not say it is mandated, Bill Raggio will not pass it," Hickey said.

As Senate majority leader and Finance Committee chairman, Raggio, R-Reno, is considered the most powerful man in the Nevada Legislature. Bills dependent on state financing must have his committee approval to survive.

Mary Peterson, state superintendent of public instruction, told board members she hoped to have standards for third-grade curriculum in place by next spring, but Biggerstaff said the vote was "premature."

Hanlon agreed.

"We're proposing a test at a third-grade level and we clearly know we don't have a curriculum in place yet," Hanlon said.

Statewide standards are in place beginning with the fourth grade, but "we're mute on kindergarten, first, second and third grade," Hanlon said. "Our curriculum is so nonspecific (for those grades), we've been criticized by numerous organizations," including the American Federation of Teachers.

Hickey, however, thinks curriculum concerns are not warranted.

"It was clarified at the meeting that the standards would be ready by the time the test would be in place," she said. "Everything should be in place by the time we start the testing."

Hanlon also said the testing would be a duplication of efforts already in place by some school districts.

"This is a local control issue," he said. "If they're already doing it with their own criterion-referenced testing, why do we want to duplicate their efforts? They've already spent a lot of time and money in preparing and developing this type of test. Now we're going to duplicate their services."

Hickey said Hanlon and Biggerstaff's concerns aren't warranted.

"I feel comfortable that we are doing the right thing," she said.