Schools
Many School Districts Not Ready for New State Exams
New Hyde Park-Garden City Park faces budgetary constraints for PARCC assessments.
While education administrators in New York State – and particularly on Long Island – have long railed against unfunded mandates handed down from Albany, the latest one to draw their ire takes the shape of additional state testing in computerized formats.
Known as the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness of College and Careers (PARCC) assessments, the new state exams are designed to take place on computers that each district must purchase to cover the amount of students in their two largest grades. Each student must have their own computer for the exams, which will be taken at the same time across the state beginning in the 2014-15 school year. While some districts do not have the space to provide such a dedicated computer room, others, like New Hyde Park-Garden City Park, in light of the state imposed tax cap, find they cannot afford to purchase enough computers in time. Worse, some districts upstate cannot afford to do either.
“We will not be able to be ready with these budgetary constraints for 2014 implementation of the PARC assessment,” New Hyde Park-Garden City Park Superintendent Robert Katulak said during a board of education meeting on April 8 at the Manor Oaks School.
Katulak added that following conversations with the state education department, “they’ve kind of changed their tune because they realize that the technology survey has indicated that there is – not just our district, but many districts who will not be ready – and if the board of regents adopts the PARCC assessments, they’ll probably have to have a paper and pencil component for the first three to five years until everybody gets online.”
While the district has discussed a resolution on a moratorium of state testing, the board of education has not passed a formal resolution.
“We’re waiting to see what these tests look like and how well prepared our students are or not, we’ve been having district-wide conversations with our elected officials and we’ve been having conversations with our PTAs,” Katulak said, adding that “the only people that are going to change these tests are going to be the parents.”
PARCC assessment talks about having 8.5 hours of testing per pupil, with half taking place in april and the second half in June.
“Not only is is outrageous, but it’s not developmentally appropriate on the elementary level,” Katulak said. “The unfortunate thing is, you’re held hostage because of your funding.”
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