Maine is making an all-too-sudden run for the exit after just one year of a new standardized test.
A bill that would have Maine withdraw from the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium, the multistate group that developed the computer-based math and English test Maine students took this spring, has made its way through the Legislature with virtually no opposition.
Gov. Paul LePage appears likely to support the effort, and the Maine Department of Education is putting together plans for the selection of a new test that will satisfy testing requirements under federal law, said Acting Education Commissioner Tom Desjardin.
It’s unfortunate that Maine is on track to prematurely abandon an initiative before educators and policymakers have had a fair chance to judge it by any measure other than anecdote. The test has certainly proven unpopular in some circles, but it hasn’t been the problem its opponents have made it out to be.
Maine has been a governing state in the Smarter Balanced consortium since its 2010 start. The consortium has solicited the feedback of Maine teachers as it has developed test items, and the state has a say in major consortium decisions, such as test changes that might be in order after the first year.
From the start, the Smarter Balanced assessment was supposed to be a different type of test. Given by computer, it relies more on written responses than fill-in-the-bubble, multiple-choice questions. It’s designed to be more challenging and, rather than rote memorization, test critical thinking, problem-solving skills and higher-order thinking — all skills students should be expected to master.
But a May public hearing on the legislation to end Maine’s Smarter Balanced participation was dominated by tales of technical glitches that kept student work from being saved or shut students out of testing, poorly worded and loquacious questions, text passages with typos, and a time commitment that was simply too onerous.
While those anecdotes dominated the public hearing and can’t be dismissed, they didn’t paint the full picture of how testing unfolded mostly without incident in classrooms across the state.
“We kept a log every day of every problem in every school,” said Desjardin. “They were remarkably minimal given the challenge of going to a computer. You’re bound to have issues, and we had remarkably few issues.”
So what’s the reason to dump Smarter Balanced before the first year of scores are even out and before a new test has had the chance to overcome anticipated growing pains?
“It obviously is something, nationally, many in the public have turned against,” Desjardin said. “We have to accomplish what we have to accomplish with testing without all the distractions.”
Plus, Desjardin said, there’s some level of uncertainty that the Smarter Balanced consortium will survive, as a handful of other states weigh withdrawing. But if the consortium doesn’t last, it will be precisely because states such as Maine prematurely dropped out.
With the Smarter Balanced assessment’s fate virtually sealed, the best Maine can do now is go about searching for its replacement in the right way. The Department of Education appears to be doing that.
A 22-person committee, including eight teachers and representatives from a range of education groups, will meet in the coming weeks to develop a request for proposals, then score test vendors’ bids once they have come in, Desjardin said.
The state will seek a computer-based test rather than return to paper, choose one based on the Common Core standards and pursue a test that requires as little time commitment as possible (which could include a test that replaces others that teachers currently give in the classroom throughout the year, reducing the total time spent on testing — standardized and otherwise — as a result).
Maine will lose from this change, to be sure. With three different tests in three years, there will be no way to compare student performance year to year. Maine won’t be able to compare its performance to other states’, either, since it’s unlikely to join a multistate consortium like Smarter Balanced.
But Maine can take the right steps to find a test that’s challenging and academically useful.