Walking Through the PARCC

Now that Massachusetts has adopted the Common Core Standards, what’s next? What is going to happen to the MCAS? I have had many teachers and parents ask me this question for the past few months. Now the picture is starting to become clearer…

Massachusetts is governing state in a new initiative known as the PARCC (Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness in College and Careers), a state-led assessment consortium with 11 governing states and 26 member states (see above graphic) all together. In fact, Massachusetts’ Commissioner of Elementary and Secondary Education, Mitchell Chester, is the chair of the committee of governing states. The U.S. Department of Education awarded some $170 million in Race to the Top funds to the PARCC for the development of a K-12 assessment system aligned to the Common Core State Standards in English language arts and mathematics.

The emphasis of the PARCC will be beyond the 10th grade MCAS, which establishes minimum competency in ELA and math. PARCC’s goal is to dramatically increase the number of students graduating from high school college-and career-ready by creating a next generation assessment system to help meet that goal. PARCC states are committed to building an assessment system that is internationally benchmarked and anchored in what it takes to be college- and career-ready; scoring “proficient” on the assessments will mean students are on track for the next steps in their education, including postsecondary education and training after high school. Thus, with the PARCC parents will receive results that state how well their child is progressing toward college readiness.

Administered in every grade from 3 to 11, the PARCC will be designed to test students' ability to read complex text, solve complex problems, complete research projects, excel at classroom speaking and listening assignments, and work with digital media. PARCC will also replace the one end-of-year high stakes accountability test with a series of assessments at key points throughout the school year. (For a schematic of that schedule, click here.) The mindset behind this is two-fold: 1) to reduce the weight given to a single assessment given over a day or two, and 2) to incorporate more formative assessment, i.e., giving teachers more ability to access useful information on how well their students are learning. So the turn around time of the PARCC results is shortened, students in the middle and high schools will take these shorter but more periodic assessments online.

Some timelines that have been established for districts: 2012- all ELA and mathematics curriculum should be aligned with the Common Core Standards, and the 2014-15 school year- the administering of the PARCC in Massachusetts and all consortium states. The consortium plans to start the piloting the PARCC during the 2012-13, but it has not yet been determined in which states and with which grade levels. Seeing that Commissioner Chester is chairing the governing states, it wouldn't exactly be shocking to see a pilot in several districts or perhaps even statewide during the 2012-13 school year.

Much work lies ahead for us at MHS. It will be challenging but also exciting, as it all has implications for improving our curriculum, our assessments, and how we design and deliver them. More on this to come...