I found this at a site that must be considered biased against the tests related to the Common Core. Given that I am also biased against those tests, though, I thought I would blog the following from https://coalitiontoprotectourpublicschools.org/latest-news/states-leave-common-core-sbac-and-parcc-tests-like-rats-deserting-a-sinking-ship. I love that URL, actually.

Below is a table summarizing all of these changes for States N through Z.

I look at this and wonder if I should have held on to teaching, stayed in the game awaiting a return to sanity. But we are talking about years of peoples lives here. In particular, my middle school bilingual students were absolutely hammered by PARCC® and the unit tests taken from Common Core standards, tests that were attempting to anticipate PARCC®. Let me offer another sample of a unit test given to one of those students:

While there is nothing wrong with the above test itself, giving this test to the student who provided those answers was absurd. I am reminded of a line from a song, “When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” These tests look like academic coffin nails to me. The kids answering those tests ended the year having failed test after test after test. They could never win. Neither could I.

To readers who are asking why I went along with this teaching and testing scheme: Every time I turned around, one of the school’s academic coaches, or the Assistant Principal, or the Principal or even a flock of visitors from the Board Office or the State Department of Education was walking into my classroom. Every time I had strayed from the program, I heard about it. In fact, I was verbally abused at times for my perceived flaws, which mostly consisted of not being with the program. A couple of times, I was absolutely excoriated. I spent one October week-end so shaken that I never fully recovered. I carried a resignation letter in my glove box for months. At best, I got a “I liked how you did this but why did you do that?” I could never win. By the end, I didn’t have the stamina to take the attacks that came with stepping off the Everyone Has to Take the Exact Same Unit Tests and Quizzes Bus.