Standardized Final Exams For Arizona Schools � Better For The Students Or Just Another Measurement For The State?
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Patricia Hawke
Mar 29, 2013, 3:30:04 PM3/29/13
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Article Title: Standardized Final Exams For Arizona Schools � Better For The Students Or Just Another Measurement For The State?
Author: Patricia Hawke
Word Count: 560
Article URL: http://www.isnare.com/?aid=125407&ca=Education
Format: 64cpl
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There is currently a bill in the Arizona state legislature, proposing that the state create standardized final exams for specific core high school courses within the Arizona schools. The bill was introduced by the Senate Education Committee Chairman and has the support of many key educational figures.
Arizona schools chief Tom Horne supports the bill, as does several educational researchers. Paul Koehler, director of WestEd (a nonprofit research agency) also lends support, stating that state standardized final exams gives the state and Arizona schools a �broader and more logical profile� of Arizona schools students� performance.
Along with high school core courses, art and music also would receive the Arizona schools� standardized final exams; and grades three, six and seven would receive state-designed final exams in social studies.
Each district within the Arizona schools could choose to administer only the state final exams or in addition to their own exams.
The idea of standardized end-of-course exams comes from the Advanced Placement courses that allow Arizona schools� students to earn college credits while in high school. Other states already successfully use the state standardized final exam system. New York gives special diplomas to their students who successfully pass the state standardized end-of-course exams.
Consistency and Accountability
State standardized testing for the Arizona schools is believed to ensure consistency in teaching across the state. The Arizona schools can, at the state level, determine if individual schools are offering the same quality teaching and learning as schools in other areas of the state. Arizona State University professor Thomas Haladyna believes the state-design and mandated final exams will allow the Arizona schools to determine if children are receiving a good education, eliminating the haphazard teaching that occurs in the schools today and instituting a more systematic approach to teaching.
Enough Is Enough
Currently, the teachers or districts design final exams for all coursework. The Mesa school system is the largest district in the Arizona schools. They already use district-wide final exams that are created by district teachers, who meet to design the end-of-course exams. Their testing director Joe O�Reilly voiced concerns that the district will lose the local involvement they currently have with state-mandated and designed final exams. He questions the lose of immediacy that the district now has, where exams are given, graded and returned the next day. Besides losing more control to the state, O�Reilly cannot understand how a multiple-choice test can measure student performance in music, painting, or in a chemistry lab.
Arizona schools� parents already complain to school administrators of the amount of homework their children receive in reading, writing and math classes. They continually question whether the overload of work is to help their children learn or to raise the schools� test scores on the Arizona Instrument to Measure Standards (AIMS) exam, securing more funding for the schools.
Arizona schools parents have a right to be concerned, since the proposed final exams will not be used to determine student promotion to the next grade or whether a child graduates high school or not. The Arizona schools� standardized state final exams only determine the rating of each school�s performance and will be used along with AIMS test scores and other factors, such as graduation and student attendance rates.
About The Author: Patricia Hawke is a staff writer for Schools K-12, providing free, in-depth reports on all U.S. public and private K-12 schools. For more information on Arizona schools visit http://www.schoolsk-12.com/Arizona/index.html
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Message delivered directly to members of the group:
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Please consider this free-reprint article written by:
Patricia Hawke
*****************************
IMPORTANT - Publication/Reprint Terms
- You have permission to publish this article electronically in free-only publications such as a website or an ezine as long as the bylines are included.
- You are not allowed to use this article for commercial purposes. The article should only be reprinted in a publicly accessible website and not in a members-only commercial site.
- You are not allowed to post/reprint this article in any sites/publications that contains or supports hate, violence, porn and warez or any indecent and illegal sites/publications.
- You are not allowed to use this article in UCE (Unsolicited Commercial Email) or SPAM. This article MUST be distributed in an opt-in email list only.
- If you distribute this article in an ezine or newsletter, we ask that you send a copy of the newsletter or ezine that contains the article to http://www.isnare.com/eta.php?aid=125407
- If you post this article in a website/forum/blog, ALL links MUST be set to hyperlinks and we ask that you send a copy of the URL where the article is posted to http://www.isnare.com/eta.php?aid=125407
- We request that you ask permission from the author if you want to publish this article in print.
The role of iSnare.com is only to distribute this article as part of its Article Distribution feature ( http://www.isnare.com/distribution.php ). iSnare.com does NOT own this article, please respect the author's copyright and this publication/reprint terms. If you do not agree to any of these terms, please do not reprint or publish this article.
*****************************
Article Title: Standardized Final Exams For Arizona Schools � Better For The Students Or Just Another Measurement For The State?
Author: Patricia Hawke
Word Count: 560
Article URL: http://www.isnare.com/?aid=125407&ca=Education
Format: 64cpl
Contact The Author: http://www.isnare.com/eta.php?aid=125407
Easy Publish Tool: http://www.isnare.com/html.php?aid=125407
*********************** ARTICLE START ***********************
There is currently a bill in the Arizona state legislature, proposing that the state create standardized final exams for specific core high school courses within the Arizona schools. The bill was introduced by the Senate Education Committee Chairman and has the support of many key educational figures.
Arizona schools chief Tom Horne supports the bill, as does several educational researchers. Paul Koehler, director of WestEd (a nonprofit research agency) also lends support, stating that state standardized final exams gives the state and Arizona schools a �broader and more logical profile� of Arizona schools students� performance.
Along with high school core courses, art and music also would receive the Arizona schools� standardized final exams; and grades three, six and seven would receive state-designed final exams in social studies.
Each district within the Arizona schools could choose to administer only the state final exams or in addition to their own exams.
The idea of standardized end-of-course exams comes from the Advanced Placement courses that allow Arizona schools� students to earn college credits while in high school. Other states already successfully use the state standardized final exam system. New York gives special diplomas to their students who successfully pass the state standardized end-of-course exams.
Consistency and Accountability
State standardized testing for the Arizona schools is believed to ensure consistency in teaching across the state. The Arizona schools can, at the state level, determine if individual schools are offering the same quality teaching and learning as schools in other areas of the state. Arizona State University professor Thomas Haladyna believes the state-design and mandated final exams will allow the Arizona schools to determine if children are receiving a good education, eliminating the haphazard teaching that occurs in the schools today and instituting a more systematic approach to teaching.
Enough Is Enough
Currently, the teachers or districts design final exams for all coursework. The Mesa school system is the largest district in the Arizona schools. They already use district-wide final exams that are created by district teachers, who meet to design the end-of-course exams. Their testing director Joe O�Reilly voiced concerns that the district will lose the local involvement they currently have with state-mandated and designed final exams. He questions the lose of immediacy that the district now has, where exams are given, graded and returned the next day. Besides losing more control to the state, O�Reilly cannot understand how a multiple-choice test can measure student performance in music, painting, or in a chemistry lab.
Arizona schools� parents already complain to school administrators of the amount of homework their children receive in reading, writing and math classes. They continually question whether the overload of work is to help their children learn or to raise the schools� test scores on the Arizona Instrument to Measure Standards (AIMS) exam, securing more funding for the schools.
Arizona schools parents have a right to be concerned, since the proposed final exams will not be used to determine student promotion to the next grade or whether a child graduates high school or not. The Arizona schools� standardized state final exams only determine the rating of each school�s performance and will be used along with AIMS test scores and other factors, such as graduation and student attendance rates.
About The Author: Patricia Hawke is a staff writer for Schools K-12, providing free, in-depth reports on all U.S. public and private K-12 schools. For more information on Arizona schools visit http://www.schoolsk-12.com/Arizona/index.html
Please use the HTML version of this article at:
http://www.isnare.com/html.php?aid=125407
*********************** ARTICLE END ***********************
- To distribute your articles go to http://www.isnare.com/distribution.php
- For more free-reprint articles go to http://www.isnare.com
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