Starr Does Not Want Pearson Writing MCPS Assessments

Well, that is the message he is sending out when he is on the road.  But, back here in MCPS land, we know that Starr has partnered with Pearson and that Pearson is writing all of the annual assessments that our students are going to be given in the elementary grades.  Superintendent Starr, do you want to explain why you continue to support the Pearson arrangement but speak against it when you are on the road?

The following question and answer are from Superintendent Starr's presentation at the American Youth Policy Forum in February of 2013.

How can we get states to want districts to use methods of assessing student performance that cause us to want to teach students in ways that develop critical thinking skills? 

Starr suggested we should be crowd-sourcing standardized test creation. First, an incredible amount of money is used to develop standardized tests. In addition, more and more organizations are moving to crowd-sourcing for problem-solving because it works. There are more smart people outside your organization than inside your organization, he argued. Schools and districts would get better assessment questions if we became the validators of good assessment questions developed by kids, teachers, and parents