State eyes proposal to cut high school graduation tests
OLYMPIA, Wash. (AP) - Washington schools Superintendent Randy Dorn says the state is getting carried away with the exams high school students are required to pass before they graduate.
Students in the class of 2012 were required to pass two exit exams. That goes up to five for the class of 2015: reading, writing, biology, algebra and geometry.
Dorn said Thursday he'll ask the Legislature next month to reduce that to three: a reading-writing test, biology and algebra.
Dorn says exit exams are costly and over-testing creates a system in which too much time is devoted to preparing.
Exit exam costs about $30 each. And, alternative portfolios for failing students to demonstrate ability cost about $400.
Students in the class of 2012 were required to pass two exit exams. That goes up to five for the class of 2015: reading, writing, biology, algebra and geometry.
Dorn said Thursday he'll ask the Legislature next month to reduce that to three: a reading-writing test, biology and algebra.
Dorn says exit exams are costly and over-testing creates a system in which too much time is devoted to preparing.
Exit exam costs about $30 each. And, alternative portfolios for failing students to demonstrate ability cost about $400.
Perhaps the educational community should be looking at tests to enter high school, rather than those required for graduation. The real question is how did a student with low academic skills get into high school in the first place. Â
 @Lenore31 Simple, they just pass the kids along to the next grade. Regardless if the student has learned anything or not. Say hello to the No Child Left Behind act. :) In Canada, you putz around in school, you fail, you repeat the grade. I haven't heard of one child since we moved here, fail their grade and are forced to repeat again.Â
If the schools had continued to teach a basic education years ago I think the situation would have been far different today than it is. There is NO substitute for having the knowledge in your head. Trying to build a house with no foundation doesn't work and education without a foundation doesn't work either. Unfortunately some of the kids they are turning out of our high school right now are going to be our future teachers and if that doesn't shake your foundation nothing will. We are a nation that if our technology were removed probably couldn't even function on a basic level anymore and that is really sad.
2 words my child will know: Private School. If you expect your child to obtain a worthwhile education, you have to pay for it yourself.
 @Fugonn or just sent your kid to a good school with great parenting... stupid comment there bub
 @DylanJ That is precisely what my post said - Private School (good school aka a school I choose based upon its merits not its neighborhood), and MY CHILD (who has great parents who wouldn't subject his children to government employees to "teach" them. How many public schools send 100% of its graduating class to 4-year universities? I know a few private schools that do, and can afford to (and will) pay for them.Â
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Investing in your child is the best use of money, and government schools are about as good as government food banks.Â
Better have my grandkids learn Chinese since their going to be everyones boss....
 @Windowseat And if you look at ALL the countries they are taking resources from they are not considered to be awesome to work for...
 @Windowseat Perhaps. Perhaps not. Things can change very quickly you know.
Aren't tests given at the conclusion of a course of study? If so why give them again?Â
 @contraryjim Because it's academic culture, which is not based in the real world.Â
 @contraryjim reading, writing, biology, and algebra are all required courses of study in high school, that is why give them. Geometry isn't a required class and honestly I do not see the point in it being a requirement. I think it'd be nice but I don't believe it's necessary.
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I'll tell you about these tests though. the tests are part of the WASL (washington assessment of student learning) and every student takes these tests every year starting in 9th grade until they pass. SO, this gives these numbskulls FOUR YEARS to figure out how to do these simple tasks.
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I'll tell you that I pass the WASL in 9th grade; back then it was just reading, writing and math (algebra i suppose). anyone with an IQ over 100 can pass these tests by 10th grade (that's what they're designed for). mathematically, someone with an IQ of ~89 points (below the average intelligence) should be able to pass by the 12th grade
 @DylanJ Before you get to far ahead of yourself, do some research. These tests are not part of the WASL.
A.)  The WASL has been long gone. Although it has been replaced with the Measurement of Student Progress (MSP) in grades 3-8. Students in high school take the High School Proficiency Exam (HSPE)Â
B.) Tests in the article are known as End Of Course Exams (EOCs).Â
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Before you go run your mouth, do some research. Just because you graduated from high school, your time of learning is not over.Â
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http://www.k12.wa.us/assessment/StateTesting/
My thoughts exactly...I remember taking taking 1st semester and 2nd semester tests, why the addintional test at the end of it all; sounds like someone created a job for them selves.
Guess our kids aren't stupid enough. Really? Unbelievable. We're surrounded by idiots now and looks like it will continue long into the future.
Speaking of an education, why doesn't KOMO just make the community article the same link as the main article? This one has 38 and the Puyallup one has 6. Why bother putting it in the community section if you're going to make it two different articles?
Why have any public education at all?
The people pay MILLIONS in taxes, and have zip to reclaim. NADA!
Our kids are the dumbest they've ever been, the teachers get what ever they want, and we keep electing idiots like YOU!
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What's the point? You Mr. Dorn are a friggin IDIOT! Elected by all the other Idiots!
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Childrens education in this state is a joke at best. It's just a way to syphon off the taxes for pet projects for those that couldn't care less.
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You SUCK Randy. You don't give a chit about education. Prove me wrong you worthless pc of liberal spewtum.
The dumbing down of America marches on! I'm glad I'm an old fart and won't be around too long after the youth of this country start running things. I wonder how they'll run the country and big corporations from behind the counter at McDonald's though???
I have a novel Idea if the kid has a 2.0 GPA they gradute! How's that?
 @wynooheeman This sounds better if anyone under 2.3 GPA has to take these exams. If they cant pass each individual course with better than a 2.5, they deserve to be tested to get out of high school. 2.4 could be a grey area for the administration to decide for or against a test.
 @wynooheeman Hey, you can be President of the U.S. with just a college 1.6gpa...ask Bush,jr.
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Just have them take the WEST-B like teachers do. It's already established and at about the 8th or 9th grade level.
I have a high-school girlfriend as a FB friend. She constantly captions her photos with "So-and-so and I at the game", and just the other day commented on "walking down the isle". She's been an English teacher at SW WA High school for about ten years now.  Pretty scary.Â
 @Star96 What's scarier is she's still in high school and has been teaching for ten years. I kid; just pointing out your "teacher" omission. Yes, personal pronouns are constantly misused. I find it most noticeable in songs when they say "you and I" a lot. And people on FB are always saying, "Here's a pic of xyz and I". Very annoying, but I just count to 10 now.
In the mean time has anyone noticed that high schools offer very few vocational trac classes. Every one is going to be a rocket scientist and no one will know how to work with their hands.
Kids today don't need to know math (they have a computer to do it for them); they don't need to know history (they have the internet to provide the info); they don't need to know how to actually write, spell and know proper grammer (they have texting); they don't need to know geography (they have the internet to provide the info). Most kids have no clue how to use a library, don't even know what the Dewey Decimal System is.
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Get where I'm going with this?? Take computers away and start actually TEACHING our kids, again, like they did when I was in school in the 60's and 70's!!!!
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And why test them? They get a diploma anyway...........
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I'm afraid for myself and this country when today's kids start running the world. Very sad :(
 @Photogal58 grammar
Notably neither plan includes testing students' knowledge of history, civics or economics.
How about teaching these kids more life skills like: How to balance a checking account, how to write your signature, the basics of investing your money, how to behave in public, how to be kind and help your neighbor, these lessons will go a lot farther than learning geometry and never using it again.
I agree. Most kids think money grows on trees. They have parents who use those payday loan places or just live on credit cards. It's "not real" money, after all.
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I worked in a bank for 5 years (in the 80's). I had a customer who came in one day and told me she couldn't be overdrawn cuz she still had checks left!!!!! I could see that happening today.
@Quackula "how to behave in public" I like it...I like it...Last time I was in a high school it was shocking how poorly behaved the kids were. "Raised in a barn" came to mind. What do parents do these days aside from buying their offspring Iphones?
Eliminate over-paid, socialist Educateurs who dream of a engineering a society of dumb downed, sheaple drones that are easily led over every cliff.
 @ZIPPY One problem Zippy..... All Americans have been led over a cliff..... The Fiscal Cliff that happened several years back.... You know the one politicians are lying about saying we're about to go over now......
How about one test?  A simple math test that would demonstrate that a student has the ability to balance a checkbook and is proficient in the basic financial skills to help them get through life responsibly?
 @Dumbfounded883 That's not what our leaders want , so it won't happen.Â
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Our leaders want dumbed down consumers who don't realize holding revolving debt is a bad thing.
 @Dumbfounded883 Nope, Why provide tangible skills when you can educate the masses to be philosophers.... You know a well rounded education... Ha!
You know when I was in high school (way back in the '90's) we had a series of standardized tests our sophomore year. Â Never did we spend hours preparing for these tests. Â You either knew it by then or you didn't. Â This is how it should be done. Â And 5 different tests is nuts. Â The can easily be consolidated.
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Standardized tests do have a place, but they should not be the determining factor as to whether or not you graduate.
Kids these days are more illiterate than at anytime in U.S history. There is rampant illiteracy and just plain stupidity walking out of our public schools. Kids can't read or do math coming out of high school as it is. They have also been reduced to using text messaging language on tests and most adults don't have a clue on how to decipher this new language. Don't blame the teachers either. Parents now send their kids to school so they will be babysat while they are working. Time to raise the bar and make parents more responsible for their children's education. The country is in decline for one reason alone and that is illiteracy.
 @Luciferian On the other side of the coin, the ones who aren't illiterate are also the most creative, intuitive and intelligent students to have graduated in US history. Yes a large portion of the population seems to not be getting any smarter, but there's still a large portion who are smarter than ever
 @Luciferian Kids don't even have to write cursive, know their times tables or utilize the library.
@Funky-Munky @Luciferian when I was a kid you couldn't get out of the 4th grade without reading at level and knowing your multiplication tables by memory. They would flunk you. I never bothered to memorize them for the whole year until I heard of the exit test and suddenly they became the most interesting thing in the world.
 @Funky-Munky  @Luciferian Know their multiplication tables?  Heck, in the Tacoma School District, they don't even teach them.  I was helping a cousin with her homework and told her to use it and she had no idea what I was talking about.  They don't even have them learn to count by three's, four's, six's etc. beforehand so multiplication is easier to introduce.  It's nuts.
 @Funky-Munky  @Luciferian Cursive is useless, since nobody anywhere in the world wants to see you write in cursive after elementary school.Â
@Funky-Munky @Luciferian --- Man, those were the days! I remember spending so much time in class on time tables and learnig cursive writing.  (((Sigh.)))
 @Bianca I had to write each one down 25 times if I missed one multiplication problem... 6x6=36 6x7=42 etc.
@Luciferian --- "Don't blame the teachers either." Why not? They must be held accountable for their part in the problem. I also blame the students, parents, administrators, superintendents, and the state. They are all to blame for our failing standards. They ALL need to step up to the plate and become part of the solution.Â
My daughter is in 5th grade in Tacoma - her wkly Geography homework has 8 Q's on it and they get 4 days to do it??? wth???
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One of the 2st Q's was - "How may states are there in U.S.A." *facepalm*
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She even was like "really Mom?"
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They have dumbed the curriculum down so much to meet the "No Child Left Behind Bullist"Â to make sure all the kids pass (to retain funding) that they are teaching them WAAAAAY under thier levels. I know they have to have stuff on a "median" difficulty to teach all levels in a class, but this crap is getting outta control....if they are not expected to learn more or learn harder thing then they never will..this is teaching them to do the bare minimum and just "pass the test". not LEARN SOMETHING>>>>
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Other Countries are LOL'n at us!!
@_Monte_ - and it won't be long before the LOL will turn into IOU - as it is with the US and China now. The dumbing down has been going on for a very long time.
This is NOT about lowering a bar. This is about utilizing teachers to give grades based on performance throughout the year, rather than have all of the time spent preparing for a single test and all of the pressure put on one set of questions to determine a child's fate. Chilren have to pass classes in order to graduate. They do that by passing multiple tests throughout the year. Adding on single test (or up to 5 single tests) to determine eligility to graduate it unecessary. Students ARE tested - continously and conclusively each year. They are called finals. Contributing to the culture of teaching to a test is NOT the answer and takes away from TRUE learning. Signed, ex-special ed teacher.
@Sonolodo  If you don't have standarized tests, the weak teachers can dumb down the tests to hide their inabilities.