BY TRISH GRABER

SPECIAL TO NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

TRENTON – N.J. Senator Shirley K. Turner yesterday introduced four bills designed to address the issue of standardized tests that are conducted in New Jersey schools, including allowing parents to exclude their children from the assessment developed by the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC). The bill package would also prohibit standardized tests in kindergarten through second grade and impose a three-year moratorium on the use of PARCC testing results for certain purposes.

“Parents are justifiably concerned about the amount of testing being conducted in our school districts and the extraordinary amount of time that students spend ‘learning for the test.’ They are also understandably confused about the purpose of some of the tests that their children are expected to take,” said Senator Turner (D-Mercer, Hunterdon). “We have to take a closer look at the assessments that are being given to our students and find ways to expand the classroom time for children to actually learn and retain material that is important to their educational advancement. That means eliminating unnecessary testing and clarifying that parents have the right to decide whether their children should take part in certain exams.”

The first bill (S-2767/A-4165) would allow a parent or guardian of a student to provide written notification to a school district that the student will not participate in the administration of an assessment developed by the consortium of states known as the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC assessments). It would require that no later than September 30 of each school year, a district or charter school shall provide information to parents and guardians regarding the PARCC assessments that will be administered during the school year. The parent or guardian would be required to provide written notification no later than 14 days before the administration of a PARCC assessment that the assessment is not to be administered to the student. A school district or charter school would be required to provide educationally appropriate alternative activities for a student who, under the bill, is not participating in the administration of a PARCC assessment. Any such alternative activity must occur in a room other than the room in which the assessment is being administered.

The second bill (S-2765/A-3077) would require all public school districts, including charter schools, to annually provide to parents or guardians of enrolled students information on certain tests to be administered during the school year. The third bill (S-2766/A3079) would prohibit the administration of commercially-developed standardized assessments in kindergarten through second grade. Finally, the fourth bill,(S-2768/A-4190) would impose a three-year moratorium (for the 2015-2016 through 2017-2018 school years) on the use of standardized testing developed by PARCC to determine a student’s placement in the gifted and talented program, another program or intervention, grade promotion, as the state graduation proficiency test, any other school or district-level decision that affects students, or as part of any evaluation rubric submitted to the Commissioner of Education for approval.