Board of Ed: assessment and accountability results

 Martinez: start from an asset-based perspective
there's a memo here but it doesn't have a lot

Tech backlash is big

For the past two weeks, nearly every day brings at least one, if not more, article about the tech backlash in schools. An attempt at a roundup: 

• If you did not see the graduates of the University of Central Florida's College of Communications and Arts boo their graduation speaker's lauding of AI as the future, please watch (that link is for when it happens, but stay to watch their faces).
  If by chance you're going to be in front of graduates this spring, learn from her (negative) example).
  
  
• NBC News shared an extensive piece on the backlash specifically about iReady, the math and reading assessment program that's now being sued for stealing student data. The reach is huge: 
  

  Nearly one-third of students from kindergarten to 12th grade nationwide use i-Ready, including in nine of the 10 largest school districts.

  And the impact on student learning is not nearly as clear as one might like. I really recommend reading, especially if you're in a district that uses it.
  

• A New York City specific parallel to the excellent piece I linked to last month by Jessica Winter in the New Yorker, New York Intelligencer's "Help! My Kindergarten Is All In on AI. “Are they taking over? Yeah, they’re taking over.”" which speaks not only to the depersonalization of apps teaching kids to read and practice math, but notes the "vast amount of data" that STMath*, for example, is collecting from every child. Never forget what it is actually about for the companies: 
  

   “These companies are literally mandated by their corporate charters to maximize profits in any way possible,” said Bridget Kessler, a mom of elementary-school-age children in Flatlands who also serves on her local community-education council. “So how can I trust that they have the best interests of my kids in mind?”

  Earlier in the piece, by the way, is something I have found particularly insidious: the use of so-called "fellowships" to infiltrate school administrations: 
  

  Three years ago, Google partnered with the AI-focused investment firm Global Silicon Valley Ventures to “advance technology” in education — through programs like Amira, which GSV Ventures has a stake in. Top education administrators have joined the Google GSV Education Innovation Fellowship, including superintendent of Manhattan high schools Gary Beidleman and chief academic officer Miatheresa Pate, who is responsible for the city’s AI guidelines. In a policy document from the fellowship, Beidleman advises educators on how to get parents and teachers to accept AI: Find “early adopters and key messengers” to convert skeptics and achieve a “cultural shift” from within. 

  Such programs are not approved by school committees, despite being a commitment of time, and often no one checks if they align with the goals, policies, and values of the district.
  
  
• Government Technology reports that three-quarters of those surveyed by PA Unplugged think students are spending too much time on screens in schools. The article looks at some specific responses in Pennsylvania. 

• Speaking of making money off of all of this, 404 Media reported that the OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft are all supporting the federal Literacy in Future Technologies Artificial Intelligence, or LIFT AI Act. They aren't doing that out of the best interest of students.

• In terms specifically on AI, I thought this piece in Vanity Fair in which AI is appearing in TV shows and it is always a bad guy was really telling:
  

  The Hacks team also explores the real-life messaging that the tech community has been using—that “AI is coming whether you like it or not,” a catchphrase that is heard around Hollywood on a near-daily basis. Ava (Hannah Einbinder) pushes back on that idea, criticizing this “forced inevitability.” “People like you are always saying that it’s happening whether you like it or not, but you are the ones making it happen,” she says. “You could easily stop it if people could say that they don’t want it—but you don’t give people a choice.”

  Statsky says that aggressiveness from the tech community about AI’s inevitability is a red flag for her as a writer. “Sometimes, when something is being forced so hard, you can smell behind it that it’s not organic and it’s not natural,” she says. “If this was really the dream technology that they were pushing, well, then why are you needing to force it down our throats?”

• The family of one of the victims of last year's shooting at Florida State University is suing OpenAI, which the shooter used in planning the attack. 

“OpenAI knew this would happen. It’s happened before and it was only a matter of time before it happened again,” Joshi said in a Monday statement. “But they chose to put their profits over our safety and it killed my husband. They need to be responsible before another family has to go through this.” 

Attorneys for Joshi also reiterated that “ChatGPT inflamed and encouraged Ikner’s delusions; endorsed his view that he was a sane and rational individual; helped convince him that violent acts can be required to bring about change,” adding that the software provided what he viewed as encouragement to “carry out a massacre, down to the detail of what time would be best to encounter the most traffic on campus.”

• And don't miss John Oliver:
  

Board of Ed for November: opening comments

 The Board of Elementary and Secondary Education meets today at 9 AM. The agenda is here. The livestream will appear over here.

The meeting is being chaired by Vice Chair Matt Hills, as Chair Katherine Craven is remote today.

Board of Elementary and Secondary Education: accountability and assessment

Martinez: results are mixed
no student group across the Commonwealth that is above pre-pandemic levels
"we always meet children where they're at"
foundational goal: regardless of what people's opinions are of where we were in 2019
"here in our Commonwealth, I seem advantages, I see alignment, I haven't seen in other parts of the country"
At the end it's about us coming together
"I'm fine having critical friends...there are no shortcuts in this work"
"the data will speak for itself"

this sheep has nothing to do with it,
but I thought we might need a sheep to get through this

It's a Board of Ed week

And you can find the agenda for tomorrow's regular meeting of the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education here. 

The big thing on the agenda is the annual release of school and district accountability data, 'though this message on the DESE School and District Profile page: 

...makes me think that we're probably getting some sort of a press event around noontime today. 

Let me give you my annual reminder here that Massachusetts state accountability is based on MANY THINGS beyond the MCAS, and anyone who makes MCAS the sole report they make--I'm looking here at you, Boston Globe, but I see school districts do this, too!--is not only not telling the whole story; they're misrepresenting what the state actually uses in measuring districts.

If someone has told you that the only thing we're focusing on is MCAS, that isn't DESE telling you that.

This will of course be new DESE Commissioner Martinez's first meeting, so it should be interesting to see how he interacts with the Board and with the DESE staff. Too often, in recent years, the permanent commissioner has left DESE staff out there on their own when facing the Board, which has both, in my view, been lousy leadership and not fair.

And speaking of leadership, the Board elects a Vice-Chair, and it will be interesting to see if they finally decide to start to move in the direction of the newer appointees. 

It appears from the posted topics of the chair and the commissioner that we're going to get two rounds on the 'are we teaching 9/11' thing, with--yes!--the Commissioner making reference to the actual state standards (someone is doing their job!). Both the Secretary and the Commissioner are updating on the recent state graduation council release of their Vision of a Graduate. I presume that this goes now to DESE and the Board, as they're the ones who have actual power to do anything with it.

There is also a vote proposed on the "let's clean this up" regulation changes on regional schools (which, no, do not have a single thing to do with admission to regional vokes).

There are also proposed adjustments on the conditions on the certificate of the Felix Virtual School.

I plan to be there and liveblog, as per usual. 

On the House FY24 budget

First, mea culpa for essentially sitting out all of the House budget. I was scrambling when it came out, and I just never caught up. 

With the Senate budget due out the week after next (why does it feel like no one ever knows this for sure?), let me walk through what the House did, however.

Do please note that my K-12 education account by account spreadsheet is up to date through the House passage of the budget, meaning it also incorporates the amendments. Because the House passes amendments in a way that is designed to be opaque, I waited for the Legislature to sort them out before I tried to post. That is now up to date. 

On the big stuff particularly in what differs from the Governor's budget:

• Yes, the House fully funds year three implementation of the Student Opportunity Act.
  HOWEVER, the House also (in a separate line) adds an additional $30/pupil minimum increase, bringing it to $60/pupil, which I know was asked for, and I'm sure many are going to see as the House doing a favor to districts. It's a problem, though. It is in no way tied to need (plenty of those dollars will go to districts that have funding capacity and relatively low needs student populations). It will also create a larger hole of hold harmless funding next year (this additional funding does get added to that), pushing some districts that were on the cusp of getting out of hold harmless funding and minimum increases back into it, rather than getting them out into foundation aid. 
  (I'm sure I've lost some of you, and I should write more on this.)
  (For some reason, the House version is $280K less than the Governor's version, and I don't know why.)
  
  
• BIG DIFFERENCE #1 from the Governor's budget: The House budget includes $161M in the budget for free school lunch reimbursement for districts. The Governor, you might remember, put this into a supplemental budget. DESE CFO Bill Bell last week said there's some question as to if the amount is sufficient, but the intent is there for free lunch for all in all districts. Some districts (like Worcester) are of course still funding by the community eligibility provision of USDA. 
  There are also two studies on school lunch in the outside sections, one to study school food waste, and one to study nutritional standards for school lunch. 
  
  
• BIG DIFFERENCE #2 from the Governor's budget: The House budget lifts the cap on the Mass School Building Authority to $1.1B (this is in an outside section, so I initially missed it). THIS IS A BIG DEAL (and, as you might remember, something some of us asked for in public testimony). It also then ties increases annually to increases in sales tax revenue, capping at 4.5%
  (Nothing on accelerated repair; nothing on inflation)
  
  
• Circuit breaker, which this coming year is going to be reimbursing for that 14% increase in out of district tuition, is funded at $506M, up from the Governor's budget of $503M. Is this enough? It is intended to be, but we'll see. And of course districts still have to fund it this and and THEN get reimbursed. 
  
  
• House Ways and Means submitted charter school reimbursement at $13M less than the Governor's budget did at $230M. The House budget passed brings it up about $1.5M. In all cases, this was said to be fully funded; as there haven't been many charter school enrollment increases, this would largely be funding simply the growth in charter tuition caused by the Student Opportunity Act being implemented. 
  
  
• Regional transportation reimbursement, which the Governor's budget funded at $97M, the House funded at $107M, which is seen as 100% reimbursement. There is no reimbursement for municipal districts. 
  
  
• The House budget establishes a clean energy infrastructure fund of $100M for schools, which would be administered by the Department. 
  
  
• MCAS continues to be funded at $32M.
  
  
• METCO overall is up a bit over $2M from the Governor's budget, to $31M.
  
  
• Early college, funded at $13M by the Governor, passed at $15M. 
  
  
• Rural aid, which the Governor funded at $7.5M, the House passed at $10M. 
  
  
• The Governor had zeroed out the extended learning line, but the House puts it back at $4.8M.

• The civics education line kicks $100K for an anti-racism initiative and $500K for the USS Constitution museum into the line, which already includes funding for the JFK Museum and the Edward M. Kennedy Institute, which now totals $2.1M.

• The Governor submitted the safe and supportive schools line at $1.6M; the House budget passed has $640K. 
  
  
• The Governor's budget funded the alternative assessment consortium (MCIEA) at $550K; the House did not fund it. 
  
  
• For those who wonder every year about the mystery of the JYK Networks (account 7061-9406, billed as "college and career readiness"), their line is back to funded (it was not in the Governor's budget) at $875K. 
  
  
• The 21st century ($5M) and civics project ($1.5M) trust fund lines are funded as in the Governor's budget, but the genocide education trust fund, funded by the Governor at $1.5M, was funded at $500K during the amendment process (the House Ways and Means budget had not funded it at all). The House budget does not fund the STEM Pipeline fund, which the Governor's budget funded at $1.7M. 

May Board of Ed from the Malden Public Library: history, social studies, and civics update

back up is here
Peske: one year since approval of new standards
Michelle Ryan (herself a former Randolph history and social studies teacher):

They have the three pillars of the framework as the following image pic.twitter.com/7ztO5Evmr3

— Tracy O'Connell Novick (@TracyNovick) May 21, 2019

Board of Ed in January, High school assessment

backup is here
Curtin: thank for attention on report cards, heard all of suggestions
will change 'student engagement' label prior to release
no action needed today on how we are going to handle the transition with tenth grade MCAS this year; how we will handle school and district accountability system in 2019
competency determination: Board has voted to have transitional competency determination
ability to do that is allowing us to run the accountability system as we have run it
at high school level still used CPI as measure of student achievement
placing students on the old MCAS scale, will continue to calculate CPI in 2019
then in 2020/21 will be able to move away from CPI to average scaled score as have done in 3-8
Sagan asks about transition
Curtin: there's going to be a messaging challenging there that we'll have to meet, but grade 3-8 experience has prepared us to meet it
Peyser: on Globe story, "sending the right signal to students and families as to where students really are"
"was about more than academic preparation, but there was a key component of that"
"we need to step up our game, in high school in particular"
"we need to send them the right signal as to if they are on track, to help them get on track"

Curtin: will be possible there will be additional indicators at high school level; the above deals with MCAS

McKenna: article, which was really disheartening
crosstalk with West here
Sagan, where do you set the level question

Riley: have done this thoughtfully with hold harmless language, as we sort this out
"we've got to get this right...to focus in a real deliberate way what this is going to look like"
Moriarty: accuracy of GPA as predictor of college success versus MCAS
what's going on junior and senior year with their GPA
McKenna: would like to see which colleges were successful

March Board of Ed: accountability proposed amendments

Wulfson: a vote to go out to formal public comment period
give the field one more opportunity to comment
a more lengthier discussion in June
indicators and weights, which will not be enshrined in regulation "as at least for the next few years, it will be a living document"
Motion passes

March Board of Ed: Opening Comments

This gets rolling at 8:30; the agenda is here. Posting as we go.

Sagan: was heartening to see this (competency) adopted in some schools, more that we could do
didn't get to what we could do; could come back to
next Commissioner to be sworn in at 10 am next Thursday at the State House as part of the Leading the Nation celebration (to which all are invited)
still being decided which Commissioner will sit at April meeting
May will be in Marblehead, as student member Hannah Trimarchi will be hosting, plan on a late start

Wulfson: never expected to be in this role
fully expected to finish in school finance
"has been a very humbling experience"
"many inspiring leaders" in the Commonwealth
"very full nine months"
"we've dealt with transitions in Southbridge and Lawrence and hurricanes in the Caribbean"
got the ESSA plan
thanks to the Board, to all at the Department, to MASS, Commissioner's office
goal is to make every one of our 1800 schools one we'd be proud to send any of our children to
Sagan: thanks for work; "sounded more like a retirement speech than we think you intended"
normal that we'd be doing a formal review; not for acting

Peyser: in light of Jeff's valedictory, express deep gratitude for Jeff's leadership
"not lost any momentuum to drive reform and change in our schools"

McKenna: will there be a chance to do something more formal?
Sagan: yes

Public comment

on last night's presentation: adaptive assessment is the policy level that gets districts to look at individual student growth
incentive to dramatically change their models
allows students to flow through the ladder of the sequence at their pace
qualities and skills developed in students


Testimony in favor of appeal of Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter:
student lives in Springfield and attends school; speaking in favor of expansion
grandmother read about it in the newspaper
"so much more being taught here"
"more academically inclined than other schools"
student: if asked why I was there, I would say because my mom made me go
now can understand almost 2.8 billion people in this world.
let my sister attend this school
Sagan: why doesn't your sister get in with sibling preference?
student: still on the waiting list
Sagan: why are students leaving?
student: looking for more variety
student: looking for sports after school
Morton: no coop sport program with other schools in area?
student: used to have a soccer program..."it was definitely not what we hoped for"
have own soccer program now, it's JV, we're still trying to build that up
have more students to build up clubs and teams would really build up our program
parent of fifth grader from Holyoke: daughter can speak three language
"I'm an impoverished citizen..."has never beent treated differently
"don't understand the attack from adjecent towns and districts"
"think it's jealousy"
glad daughter has the chance to even the playing field in life

panel in opposition to the appeal
Peter Demling, Amherst School Committee
ask that the Commissioner's decision be upheld
reasons for rejecting expansion have not changed
school has not addressed concerns
gaps of achievement subgroups have not been addressed
addressing this should be first action
prior to any future consideration
Cara Castenson, chair of Pelhem School Committee
four students in PVCICS would be contribution to regional district
"has become a reality"
paying almost $90K in charter tuition
town also forced to take measures
Pelhem voted to pursue full regionalization with Amherst
"were the school being forced to close, it would be a loss to the town of the Pelhem"
school is doing well for students served
school is center of community
"small community schools have served as the backbone of public schools for generations"
Sagan now pressing on reimbursement of students to charter
Castenson notes that district was notified late, after budget had been passed, that students had moved
Sagan presses issue of reimbursement
John Provost superintendent in Northampton
spirit of advocacy and spirit of inquiry
last speakers on how they've been involved in students relocated by Hurricane Maria
15 communities in PVCICS have taken over 900 students; all of us have been immersed in this process
Sagan: "were you implying that the students didn't answer your question? Don't answer that."
he  wasn't

Greenfield Virtual says last night is "preaching to the choir"
competency based will take us to the next level
"we will to transcend the confines of time and space"
"truly grateful for the increase in funding accorded in September"

On the ESSA innovative assessment pilot

It's worth giving a read to this article on the innovative assessments pilot that's part of ESSA. Note first that states have been given a thirty day window on signalling their intent to apply; the first thing I heard on that was "it's not enough time."

One reason for states’ likely reluctance is that the language of ESSA places some fairly strict requirements on them for their testing experiments. For instance, the new assessments must be comparable to existing state tests, and they must eventually be taken statewide. And the assessments have to be rolled out among a broad set of student populations and subgroups, as Alyson points out in her Politics K-12 blog post.

Note, as well, that there's no money attached to the pilot, and one thing everyone agrees on is other assessments are NOT CHEAP.
There's a bit more on this over at EdWeek, and some razzing from New Hampshire over here.

Acting Commissioner Wulfson on assessing districts

Quote in full from yesterday's weekly Commissioner's Update:

It was great seeing many of you at the MASS/MASC conference on the Cape earlier this month. I’m always impressed by the breadth and depth of the panel sessions and presentations on so many vital topics. One session that particularly stood out for me was a presentation by Wakefield Superintendent Kim Smith on the very robust set of rubrics they’ve been developing to measure student growth and learning. MCAS scores are part of it, but so are many other qualitative and quantitative dimensions of student performance. We all know that MCAS does not measure all of the content and skills that we want our students to know. But how often do we hear the complaint that a district is shortchanging some element of the curriculum because “it’s not on MCAS”? I believe it is neither feasible nor desirable for us to expand the state testing program to incorporate every dimension of student learning. So it’s nice to see districts like Wakefield that are willing and able to put MCAS scores into perspective and develop comprehensive local measures to support their educational goals.

September Board of Ed: budget

have filed spending plan for FY18
expect approval in next few weeks
still working with Governor for $4.1M more in student assessment
budgetary subcommittee in October; planning in FY19
still below benchmark for FY18

August Board of Ed: budget

Wulfson: budget signed by Governor
update is here
Bill Bell: "in the process of actively implementing"
conference committee did not fully fund testing fund; continuing to pursue that funding
$4.1M
"doing our plan assuming we're going to have that level"
Sagan: not going to weaken our assessment program
Bell: staffing staying the same moving forward:
Wulfon: even looking carefully at backfill "there are some areas that just might not be staffed"
Bell: keeping an eye on federal funding

March Board of Ed: ESSA plan

Chester: will be submitting by Monday, April 3
have been through successive public comment periods
state plan "that we're obligated to submit" and is reviewed by federal government; becomes contract with fed that allows for federal grants
"is not a compliance document"
"reaffirms our constitutional commitment to provide all students with a world-class education"
"very much about our work in Massachusetts"

The Board of Ed meets next week

The Massachusetts Board of Education meets next week on Monday night and Tuesday morning. You can find the agenda here.
On Monday night, the state plans to release preliminary results of last spring's testing. Important note about that:

This year's assessment choices, however, were distributed in such a way that makes it difficult to create a valid representative sample. Approximately 72% of students took PARCC tests in 2016; the remaining 28% took MCAS tests. As a result, ESE will not report aggregate results at the state level for grades 3-8 ELA and mathematics in 2016.

That should make it tricky for headline writers.
Likewise the new school and district accountability levels will be released at that meeting.

On Monday, after the usual round of comments, the Board will elect a new vice-chair and recap Monday night's meeting.
The Board then is getting an update on the state's plans regarding ESSA. Note the following from the updated for September stakeholder outreach plan:

We will work through similar mechanisms in the fall listening phase. We also plan to add several regional listening forums where stakeholders can gather to share input publicly on our plans, as well as to hear from one another about their priorities and concerns.

So, keep an eye out for more to come on that! 
Note also the attachment of suggested indicators of student success or school quality. At first glance, if DESE is really thinking about adding some of this, that would be a very different accountability system. 
They'll also be discussing educator evaluation, specifically the student impact rating. There is significant citation of stakeholder testimony, summed up in:

These stakeholder comments all point to a solution to the concerns of implementation: eliminate the separate student impact rating from the Framework while continuing to use evidence from common assessments in order to provide educators with feedback on the extent to which they are promoting student learning and achievement as well as to incorporate this evidence into each educator's rating.

It looks as though there will be more work to come on that, as the laws will have to be revised if that is to go.

There are updates on the review of the ELA and math standards, as well as the history/social studies standards.

There is an update on the MCAS, including notice that the Commissioner will be recommending that the current test be extended as a graduation requirement through the class of 2020. That backup also includes to-be-explored questions moving forwarding, including those around competency determination (that is, readiness for graduation).
And there's an initial bit on the FY18 (yes 18!) budget.

I will be there to liveblog the Tuesday morning meeting. 

Education-related overrides of Governor Baker's vetos

The veto overrides are in the "bill history" section of H.4450 (scroll way down). There were a few Senators and Representatives that were helpful and tweeted out some of the big items (thank you!), but we can dig through the rest.
A few things that help to know:

• the K-12 education accounts largely start with 70xx, beginning with the Secretary of Education's 7009-1700 . There are a few other education items squirreled away elsewhere, but starting with the 70xx's will get most of them. 
• the House and Senate both met on Saturday, so start with the 7/23 postings.

Here's what I've found. 

• The special education circuit breaker veto was overridden (that's being funded at $277M).
• The veto of the Bay State Reading Institute ($400,000) was overridden.
• The veto of the funding for the Massachusetts Consortium for Innovative Education Assessment ($350,000) was overridden (which bodes well for the Legislature's thoughts on having an alternative to the MCAS).

Note that both the House and Senate are coming back in session this weekend, and they are expected to pass more overrides. 

Massachusetts testing update

Two things:

The state has awarded the testing contract to Measured Progress, who currently hold the MCAS contract. This would not be noteworthy were it not that their subcontractor is Pearson.

The following update was sent out by DESE earlier today regarding computer assessment:

After consultation with the Test Administration Workgroup and other stakeholders, the Department has decided to implement a gradual transition plan to phase in computer-based testing. We hope this will make the transition more manageable for school and district staff. Here are the details: 

· For next year’s tests (spring 2017), our expectation is that all schools will administer the computer-based versions of the ELA and math tests in grades 4 and 8.[1] · The Department’s Office of Digital Learning will provide consultation and support for schools that anticipate difficulty in meeting this requirement. In exceptional circumstances, we will waive the spring 2017 requirement if the school has made a good-faith effort to comply and has a plan for getting on track by spring 2018. 

· For grades 3, 5, 6, and 7, schools may elect either the computer-based or the paper-based tests next spring. We strongly encourage districts to implement the computer-based version in as many additional grades as possible. The Board’s “hold harmless” policy with respect to school level determinations next year provides a good opportunity for students, teachers, and administrators to gain experience with computer-based testing. · Paper versions of all tests will always be available as an accommodation as required by a student’s individualized education program (IEP). We also anticipate setting up a process for principals to request a paper-based test accommodation for a small number of students who do not have IEPs but who are unable to take a computer-based test for other reasons. 

· We are currently considering a transition in grades 5 and 7 to full computer-based testing in spring 2018, followed by grades 3 and 6 in spring 2019. We’ll finalize this schedule after the 2017 test administration and after plans for high school testing are finalized. 

It is the Department’s intention to develop a test that is compatible with most of the devices in common use in schools, including tablets, Chromebooks, laptops, and desktop computers. In the coming weeks, we will be finalizing our selection of the next-generation MCAS testing contractor. After that is completed, we will provide additional details regarding the technical specifications for networks and devices. Additionally, we plan to announce funding opportunities for infrastructure upgrades later this summer.

May Board of Ed: FY17 update

The Board's update is here
Chester: Senate W&M budget has been released, Senate considering amendments to the budget "as we speak"
timeline
"today marks the beginning of floor debate by the full Senate"
if tradition follow suit, they'll wrap up late Thursday or early Friday
on balance, the Senate having the latest tax figures
has increased funding in our budget:
$100M above current spending
it's investment in local aid accounts
it's really $10M above the House
different in the kindergarten program: House continued status quo, Senate appropriated $2M for an $18M program
$10M above current for circuit breaker
did not support initiatives in STEM arena
"it's pretty much what we face each year" funding focused on local districts
strong budget in financing local school districts
Wulfson: Senate outside section on FBRC implementation
Senate finalize this week; conference committee early June; consolidated budget going to Governor to be signed by July 1

Assessment update to Board

Chester: moving agressively ahead on a variety of fronts
in process of issuing an RFP for contract
number of advisory committees
Wulfson: on schedule for this spring's administration
giving both "MCAS legacy test" and PARCC, depending on district choices
have engaged educators in a number of work groups as part of design effort for next generation MCAS
have a drive in session at Hudson High School to talk about details of transition to online testing
RFP going out early to mid March: large effort to write that
right now carrying a placeholder in our budget projections: until it goes out, hard to get a price figure on what it will cost
PARCC: studying design structure
to accommodate multiple types of participation from states
a few districts trying out diagnostic assessment from PARCC (optional; DESE has asked them to report back "if it's got any value")
ELA and math standards educator review panel being assembled
Sagan: really concerned with creating a hybrid test going forward
Wulfson: test design and test concept once we meet the vendor
trying to build flexibility into the design
Sagan: what goes with that is assessing our frameworks, which is on a slightly different path
asks when pieces of this will go public?
in next few weeks
recommendation on changes for the fall; adopt any changes midwinter
Noyce: hopefully will not be a complete rewrite
Sagan: still a great amount of detail
Wulfson: we're going to build in extra time for the Secretary's reviews (that's a joke)
Chester: Governor includes additional $5M--Peyser corrects "$5.6M"-- in assessment
Stewart: global question on assessment: did you submit comments on ESSA regulation?
Chester: sure, I'd be happy to
submitted comments on ESSA, "I don't think I submitted anything on assessment"

ADJOURNED