PARCC Assessment

Students and families,

Two letters have been sent home announcing CPS's participation in the PARCC test for this school year. Please ask the front office for additional copies if these notifications have not yet made it home with your child.

Despite an initial request to pilot the PARCC test with 10% of schools, CPS has now decided to move forward with the PARCC test. It seems that CPS has made this decision primarily to waylay funding threats from the state (see the Chicago Tribune article below).

Sixth grade students will begin the assessment on Friday, March 13th. Beginning Monday and Tuesday of the Week of March 9th, teachers will guide students through sample test problems and teach a tutorials on computer-based test modalities. This is to ensure that students understand the computer-based aspects (scrolling, dragging and dropping, etc.) Other than these brief 20-minute tutorials, we will continue our Science, Reading, and Writing curriculums as planned.

The computer-based format is pretty similar to NWEA and the test is aligned to our current curriculum. So, despite the quick turnaround on moving forward with the test, we're confident that students are prepared and will perform well. We know that a new test can incite anxiety and uncertainty. However, we have an amazing group of 6th graders who are extremely hard working and have great problem solving skills. I know that everyone will do a great on this test!

I welcome your emails. Please let me know if you have follow up questions.

Ms. Glassco

Some links to educate ourselves on PARCC:

http://chicago.suntimes.com/news/7/71/407509/cps-backs-new-state-test-says-3rd-8th-graders-now-take-parcc

http://www.ctunet.com/blog/ctu-parcc-opt-out-guidelines

http://parcc.pearson.com/

http://morethanascorechicago.org/

http://ilraiseyourhand.org/

http://unitedoptout.com/

http://fairtest.org/