From MCAS To PARCC And, Maybe, Beyond: A Testing Timeline

Dan French, executive director of the Center for Collaborative Education, provides input to WBUR's Peter Balonon-Rosen piece looking at the 20 year history of Massachusetts' standardized test, the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS). This interview comes shortly before the state board of education plans to announce whether to eliminate the current MCAS in favor of a yet-undeveloped MCAS test, based largely on the Common Core-aligned Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) test.

“You should never make significant decisions about a student based on one single on-demand paper and pencil test. That’s what we do in Massachusetts,” says French. “I might argue that’s one reason why we continue to have some of the widest equity gaps in the nation amongst all states by race, by income and by language.”