Local teachers are supporting the Colorado Education Association’s campaign to reduce testing time and unfunded state mandates.
“Student learning is diminished by the inordinate amount of time devoted to mandated testing,” said Tina Mueh, Boulder Valley Education Association president. “Instructional time is precious.”
The Colorado Education Association this week launched a campaign called “Free Our Teachers, Value Our Students” and released the results of a survey that shows teachers aren’t happy with the amount of time spent on testing.
“We’ve heard a lot of talk about testing and unfunded mandates,” said Colorado Education Association spokesman Mike Wetzel. “This was a way to create a community forum so people could address these concerns.”
About 1,200 teachers responded to the survey, sent out earlier this month, with teachers on average saying they spend more than 30 percent of their instruction time preparing students for tests and testing them. Most teachers said testing and preparation shouldn’t account for more than 10 percent of instruction time.
Leigh Campbell-Hale, a teacher at Boulder’s Fairview High School, said state testing now “essentially shuts down school for the first two weeks of March.” Then there’s another week of ACT testing for juniors. New state tests, which must be taken on computers, could create even more issues as there aren’t enough computers for all students to take the tests at once, she said.
“Teachers are becoming increasingly anxious,” she said.
Kristin Donley, a teacher at Louisville’s Monarch High School, said she’s concerned about the time spent on testing, the cost and the lack of useful information generated by the tests.
“Very little of the information I receive from these tests helps me differentiate and plan effective lessons for my current students,” she said. “I would rather see the funds go into reducing class sizes, hiring more effective teachers, helping districts with professional development and support, and to offer better programming. It is time we focus on critical thinking and the ‘how’ we teach rather than meaningless data points.”
The Colorado Education Association also wants more time before students’ test scores are used to rate teachers under a new state-mandated evaluation system. This is a “hold harmless” year, with an ineffective rating not counting against teachers. A teacher rated as ineffective for two consecutive years can be fired for any reason.
At least one more “hold harmless” year is needed, Wetzel said.
“We support the Colorado academic standards and support the new tests that align to those standards,” Wetzel said. “But we’re kind of wary of using new tests to make critical decisions about educators and their careers. We want to have time to work out the kinks and make adjustments before we start thinking of making high-stakes decisions.”
Mueh, Boulder Valley’s union president, went further, saying the union wants the student test score component removed entirely from the evaluation system. Now, half a teacher’s score will be based on an evaluation of professional practices and half on student achievement.
She said concerns include that some content areas and grades have many standardized tests while others have few or none, and how rating teachers based on student test scores will impact teacher willingness to teach at schools with high percentages of low-income or second-language students — who tend to score lower on tests.
“Every educator cares about student achievement, and educators won’t receive high ratings on the professional practices portion of our new evaluation system if their students don’t learn,” she said.
Contact Camera Staff Writer Amy Bounds at 303-473-1341 or boundsa@dailycamera.com.
