(Orlando Sentinel) School districts could abandon Florida’s new standardized test and give students the ACT or SAT instead, under a bill the Florida Senate‘s education committee approved today.
The FSA’s debut last spring was marred by technology glitches and many complaints that administering it took up too much time.
The bill by Sen. Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, doesn’t do away with the FSA but gives school districts the option to use one of the two big national exams instead.
It also allows high school students a menu of alternative tests they could use to meet state graduation requirements.
Gaetz’s bill won unanimous approval from the Senate panel. It does not have a companion in the Florida House, however, suggesting it could face hurdles as the Florida Legislature continues its work in Tallahassee.
Gaetz acknowledged the bill not please those who want to end high-stakes testing in Florida’s public schools.
“If you will accept nothing other than a repeal of the FSA, this is not the bill for you,” the Panhandle lawmaker said. “If you don’t like tests that have consequences…this is not your bill, I am not your sponsor.”
But Gaetz said his measure would provide more choices to educators and families and could help reduce testing while still maintaining the state’s school accountability system.
Seventy eight percent of Florida’s high school seniors, for example, already take the ACT as they look ahead to college. So if a district used that exam instead of the FSA for its high school test, students would face fewer tests.
The bill is supported by the Florida School Boards Association and some school districts and won bipartisan support at today’s meeting.
But members of the Florida Citizens’ Alliance spoke against it. The group is opposed to Common Core academic standards, which Florida adopted, and the FSA, designed to test whether students had mastered those standards.
“It still leaves the FSA in play, which is a disaster on every front,” said Keith Flaugh, one of the group’s founding directors.
He called Gaetz’s bill “a false choice between two high stakes tests.”
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