SF 1138

as introduced - 89th Legislature (2015 - 2016) Posted on 02/27/2015 09:22am

A resolution
urging the President and Congress to overhaul the Elementary and Secondary
Education Act.

WHEREAS, our nation's future relies on a high-quality public education system that prepares
all students for successful lives and strengthens the nation's social and economic well-being; and

WHEREAS, our schools have been spending growing amounts of time, money, and energy
on standardized testing and using information from those tests to make high-stakes decisions
about our students, educators, and schools; and

WHEREAS, the overreliance on high-stakes testing in state and federal accountability
systems is undermining educational quality and equity in United States public schools by
hampering educators' efforts to focus on the broad range of learning experiences that promote
the innovation, creativity, problem solving, collaboration, communication, critical thinking,
and deep subject-matter knowledge that will allow students to thrive in a democracy and an
increasingly global society and economy; and

WHEREAS, it is widely recognized that standardized testing is an inadequate and often
unreliable measure of both student learning and educator effectiveness; and

WHEREAS, the overemphasis on standardized testing has caused considerable collateral
damage in too many schools, including narrowing the curriculum, teaching to the test, reducing
love of learning, pushing students out of school, driving excellent teachers out of the profession,
and undermining school climate; and

WHEREAS, high-stakes standardized testing has negative effects for students from all
backgrounds, and especially for low-income students, English language learners, children of
color, and those with disabilities; and

WHEREAS, grade-span testing would help reduce that burden but still get the data school
educators, parents, and policy makers need to make sure historically underserved students are
making academic progress; NOW, THEREFORE,

BE IT RESOLVED by the Legislature of the State of Minnesota that it calls on the President
and the Congress of the United States to overhaul the Elementary and Secondary Education
Act (currently known as the "No Child Left Behind Act") and reduce the testing mandates by
adopting grade-span testing. This approach tests each student, in each subject, once in elementary
school, once in middle school, and once in high school to give educators more time to teach and
connect one-on-one with students.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the Secretary of State of the State of Minnesota is
directed to prepare copies of this memorial and transmit them to the President of the United
States, the President and the Secretary of the United States Senate, the Speaker and the Clerk
of the United States House of Representatives, the chair of the Senate Committee on Health,
Education, Labor, and Pensions, the chair of the House Committee on Education, and Minnesota's
Senators and Representatives in Congress.