Criticism
The MCAS has been criticized for being too narrow in nature and for pressuring teachers into restricting the curriculum to material covered by the tests. It has been met with opposition from mayor Scott W. Lang from New Bedford, who called it "completely unsustainable" and "impractical". He claimed that the MCAS was causing students to drop out of high school, and expressed dissatisfaction with the fact that public high school students must pass the MCAS to graduate. Charles Gobron, superintendent of the Northborough school district, claimed that the standards set by the MCAS were "unfair", and that the minimum threshold for proficiency on the tests was being raised each year, "making it look like schools are doing worse than they really are." The MCAS has also faced opposition from public school teachers. Some, such as Joan Bonsignore of Easthampton High School, claim that the tests do not accurately demonstrate the skills of students, and that they cause anxiety among the students.
Read more about this topic: Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System
Famous quotes containing the word criticism:
“It is the will of God that we must have critics, and missionaries, and Congressmen, and humorists, and we must bear the burden. Meantime, I seem to have been drifting into criticism myself. But that is nothing. At the worst, criticism is nothing more than a crime, and I am not unused to that.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“When you overpay small people you frighten them. They know that their merits or activities entitle them to no such sums as they are receiving. As a result their boss soars out of economic into magic significance. He becomes a source of blessings rather than wages. Criticism is sacrilege, doubt is heresy.”
—Ben Hecht (1893–1964)
“... criticism ... makes very little dent upon me, unless I think there is some real justification and something should be done.”
—Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962)