Reactions from schools to Daily News Article on NYS Math Test

A very thoughtful Brooklyn Math coach writes:

There is truth there but I don’t have the same problem with the test.

“That's because it has gotten easier to teach to the test as the questions have gotten easier to predict, a Daily News analysis revealed.”
My reply is that is exactly the point. One reason we give standardized tests is to make certain that educators teach a minimum level of material and that students learn it. Teaching to the test is not a problem if it is a good test. I was a lifeguard and had to take a test. The fact that I knew exactly what was on the test made me train for those skills. If it was a bad test that emphasized say, mopping the pool deck, then my preparation for the test would not have made me a better lifeguard and the test would be unable to distinguish a good lifeguard from a bad one. Since the test emphasized swimming, rescue skills, CPR and so on I would argue that it was in the public’s interest to give the test. The most frequently tested performance indicator on the 8th grade test is 7.A.4 (multi-step equations). This is a post-March 7th grade performance indicator. It is a critical skill for success in high school algebra. The writers of the state standards made a list of 108 performance indicators a student should master during grade 8. Are they all equally important? One standard requires students to understand and apply percents less than 1% and greater than 100%. Is this skill equally as important to success in 9th grade integrated algebra as solving multi-step equations? Its not even close. Tests are a form of communication. They tell teachers what the NYS education department sets a high priority. If the test writers don’t test 7.A.4 every year and make it count a lot for the sake of testing some much less important standard it would send a message to teachers to focus on other things more.

"If you can always make pretty good guesses about what's going to be on the state tests, teachers aren't stupid and we're putting them under a whole lot of pressure, so basically they're strategic about what they teach."
Strategic = good. Should they be the opposite of strategic?
Only a fraction of the simple arithmetic, algebra and statistics that kids should learn every year has been tested, Jennings found, looking back to 2006, when the state rejiggered the test.
If the test tests all the standards they will take 8 days not 3. Scoring will take 5 months. If the test is completely random instead, then teachers will not prioritize and students will not be as well prepared for high school.
In 2009, at least 14 of the 30 multiple choice questions on the seventh-grade exam, for example, had appeared in similar form in previous years, she said. Only 54.7% of the specific math skills the state requires seventh-graders to learn were ever tested in the four years the exam has been given.
If you don’t want post-march performance indicators then test the kids in June, the way high schools do. Give kids a week off and score tests in the school the way high schools do. 7.A.4 is an 8th grade standard because it has never been tested in the 7th grade. It is also a very rigorous standard that was not tested until high school prior to 2006. Algebra became a big part of the 8th grade curriculum to prepare kids better for high school.
State officials said scoring the exams takes into account any changes in how easy questions are.
Field tests are done to calibrate the difficulty of questions and tests. I am not part of the process but easier tests can be easily be adjusted with the scale score process if enough data was collected during field tests. If the state is not doing this then they are playing politics with students’ scores but I have no evidence that this is happening. State officials claim that they do the right thing.
State math exam scores have risen - but it's because tests have gotten easier.
Success is seen as evidence that something is wrong. I do not make the claim that kids today know more than kids did in 2006. I claim that their preparation is more targeted. That is a good thing. If people want to argue over priorities they can, but having no priorities is not the solution.