FCAT: Legislators looking at filing multiple bills to end the testing

Some Highlands County high school students will be taking end-of-course exams this year.

Will that be a portent of an end to the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test?

At least some state lawmakers looking to eliminate FCAT testing at the high schools and others proposing to eliminate it completely are hoping that happens.

First administered in 1998, the FCAT has faced criticism from parents and educational groups who believe teachers are focusing on teaching students to pass or excel on the test since student learning gains, school accountability and state rewards dollars are based on the test scores.

"FCAT is probably the most misused state tests in the country because it is a political tool not an educational one," Bob Schaefer, public education director for FairTest, said Monday.

A Boston-based group, FairTest works to end the misuses and flaws of standardized testing.

The FCAT has been used improperly for grade promotion and retention, determining graduation, allocating school rewards, determining teacher bonuses, etc., none of which it was designed to do, Schaefer said.

Many Florida legislators have similar beliefs about the FCAT and are sponsoring or supporting bills aimed at eliminating it or scaling it back.

"A number of us have always felt that the FCAT is being used for all the wrong reasons," Rep. Bill Heller, D-St. Petersburg, said Monday. Heller also is a special education professor at the University of South Florida in St. Petersburg.

It's not a bad instrument as far the test goes, he said. But, it shouldn't be used to judge whether schools are effective nor whether students are learning the required content in their courses, he said.

Heller is one of six representatives co-sponsoring a bill that calls for discontinuing FCAT beginning with the 2014-15 school year.

House Bill 0473 requires the use of subject area assessments in grades three through five, subject area assessments and end-of-course examinations in grades six through 12 and diagnostic assessments in grades six, eight and 10.

Students in the college courses he teaches are graded based on mid-term and final exams along with papers and other assignments the students are handing in, Heller said.

The university doesn't give students a test at the end of three or four years covering what they should have learned and if they don't pass they don't graduate.

So the bill's sponsors favor the end-of-course test on the content that is taught, rather than relying on the FCAT, he said.

Another co-sponsor of the bill, Rep. Martin Kiar, D-Parkland, said, "I'm very excited about the possibility that it might be switched to end-of-course exams.

"There is a very good possibility of it happening because it appears that Democrats and Republicans are on board," putting together a committee bill to do away with FCAT and go to end-of-course exams over the next four years.

The Highlands School District's Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum Rebecca Fleck noted a proposal by the Florida Department of Education to replace the FCAT graduation requirement with end-of-course exams.

Starting this year, the FDOE will be conducting end-of-course pilot tests.

Avon Park and Lake Placid high schools will be field testing the Algebra I end-of-course exam and Sebring High will field test the geometry end-of-course exam in late April or early May, Fleck noted.

"I know that other states have used end-of-course exams successfully," she said. "To me, it makes perfect sense that a student would be required to take an assessment once they have completed a course."

Sebring parent Brian Lang said agreed.

"Just have an end-of-the year exam, which would test the student's knowledge. If the teachers teach what they are supposed to, then the kids should have no problem," he added.

Because they are linked to the course content, Schaefer noted that end-of-course tests have the potential to be better than the FCAT if the state uses them properly.

"The risk is that the new end-of-course tests could become essentially multiple FCATs where students instead of having to pass one test - the FCAT - to graduate they will now have to pass six or eight or 10 tests, he said.

Other states make the end-of-course exam count for a portion of the student's grade and set up a system where students have to pass a reasonable number, but not all of the tests to earn a diploma, Schaefer said.

End-of-course tests are a relatively new development over the last three or four years and states are just now moving toward them, he noted. About half the states had assessment tests similar to the FCAT and now about six or seven have end-of-course exams with another six states currently considering them.

Heller is optimistic that changes with the state assessment test will occur in the upcoming legislative session.

"I've been reading where others are willing to look at it," he said. " I think you're going to get a lot of conversation between it and the Class Size Amendment.

"I think both of those need to be looked at, but certainly I think we can do a better job of evaluating the degree to which we are teaching our students by end-of-the course tests rather than the FCAT," Heller said.

Sen. Larcenia J. Bullard D-Miami is sponsoring a bill that would discontinue FCAT for students in grades nine through 12.

Senate Bill 0473 requires the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT) to replace the grade 10 FCAT for purposes of measuring a student's knowledge and skills.

It also requires students to earn passing scores on the PSAT/NMSQT to qualify for a standard high school diploma.

If passed, the effective date would be July 1, 2010.