In November, Massachusetts voters will decide on a ballot question to replace the standardized MCAS tests as a high school graduation requirement, and instead require students to demonstrate that they have mastered the state’s education standards, skills and competencies through their schoolwork and teacher evaluations.
Talk to your family members, friends and neighbors. Let them know that educators and parents support this ballot initiative that will help our kids succeed in high school and beyond.
Voting YES on 2 would replace the MCAS test—a single, high-stakes standardized test—as a requirement for high school graduation. Instead, graduating students will be required to demonstrate proficiency through schoolwork and teacher assessments.
Here are some concrete ways to get involved in the YES on 2 campaign.
The final push is on to replace the MCAS graduation requirement, as educators and other public education advocates have started canvassing neighborhoods and calling voters to ask for their support on Question 2.
Question 2 on the fall ballot will ask voters to replace the MCAS graduation requirement with certification by local districts that students have completed coursework aligned with state academic standards in the areas tested by MCAS. The campaign began more than a year ago, when the MTA joined forces with a group of parents also seeking to end the use of standardized MCAS exams as a high school graduation requirement.
Since then, more than 170,000 voters across the state have signed petitions over two rounds of signature gathering, placing the question on the ballot. The statewide election is Nov. 5. Early voting in Massachusetts begins Oct. 19.
MTA Vice President Deb McCarthy has long maintained that MCAS exams are misused and given too much influence.
“We have high academic standards in Massachusetts. Teacher training and curriculum frameworks are grounded in those standards. What high-stakes MCAS testing has done is actually limit educators’ ability to develop successful teaching strategies for students who do not do well on standardized tests but are quite capable of learning the required material,” McCarthy said. “Denying a diploma to these students, who meet every other requirement, is an injustice. And forcing educators to work toward a one-size-fits-all style of teaching is bad policy and practice.”
Massachusetts likes to brag that it has an exceptional national reputation for public education, but in one aspect, it’s a straggling outlier. The state requires a high school graduation test for a diploma, which is becoming a rarity in the United States.
Massachusetts, which administers the MCAS-based graduation test in the 10th grade, is joined by Florida, Louisiana, Ohio, New Jersey, New York (which is moving toward a fairer and more equitable system in place of a graduation requirement), Texas, Virginia and Wyoming.
The ballot question to replace the MCAS graduation requirement will not affect the continued use of the MCAS as a diagnostic tool.
All ballot initiatives follow a specific process in Massachusetts. The MTA has already cleared several steps in getting a ballot question before voters to end the high school graduation requirement of the MCAS, but we have several more to go.
The proposed law would eliminate the requirement that a student pass the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System tests (or other statewide or district-wide assessments) in mathematics, science and technology, and English in order to receive a high school diploma. Instead, in order for a student to receive a high school diploma, the proposed law would require the student to complete coursework certified by the student’s district as demonstrating mastery of the competencies contained in the state academic standards in mathematics, science and technology, and English, as well as any additional areas determined by the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education.
High-stakes testing and the associated accountability measures have undermined our public education system for far too long.
Massachusetts is only one of eight states in the country that ties its standardized test to graduation. The change in attitudes about exit exams is likely related to research indicating that exit exams don't increase academic achievement.
The current testing system reduces time to teach, narrows the curriculum, adds stress and reduces creativity and misuses education dollars. The punitive aspects of the MCAS regime are especially detrimental to students with Individualized Education Plans, students learning English as a second language, students of color and and students from groups that have been historically marginalized from an equitable and supportive education.
When MTA member Jack Schneider spoke on the impact of the MCAS exams at a State House press conference in December 2022, he teared up at the emotional toll the standardized test has had on his own child.
The high-stakes nature of the test, said Schneider, a professor of education at UMass Lowell who studies the impact of MCAS and school rankings, "incentivizes schools to game the system, to do things like teach to the test and narrow the curriculum."
The high-stakes test has been a hot-button issue for students and educators since the Massachusetts Education Reform Act of 1993, which created the MCAS accountability system.
“This is part of a broken system that has been going on far too long.”
MTA Vice President Deb McCarthy
