District/School Administration Administration
The Massachusetts Board of Elementary and Secondary Education

MCAS History and Social Science Tests: 2009-2010

I am recommending that the Board vote to waive the history and social science requirement for a Competency Determination (CD) for the classes of 2012 and 2013, because budget constraints will not allow us to implement the full MCAS testing program as planned. In order to preserve the current English language arts, mathematics, and science and technology/engineering assessment program, we will have to suspend MCAS history and social science testing scheduled for spring 2009 and 2010. Without the 2009 and 2010 administrations of the history and social science tests, we will be unable to set standards and provide curriculum feedback to students and schools in time for the scheduled implementation of the history requirement for the CD in 2012 and 2013. In addition, I believe it is imprudent to add history to the CD requirement at a time when state funding for academic support and other resources for intervening with students who have not yet met the requirement are unlikely to increase and may be reduced.

The Department administered MCAS history and social science pilot tests in grade 5 (North American geography and early American history), grade 7 (world geography and ancient/classical civilizations) and grades 10/11 (United States History) in 2007 and 2008. Our plan had been to administer operational tests this spring and report performance levels and scaled scores at the student, school, and district levels this fall.

I have not come lightly to the decision to suspend these tests. I am deeply committed to the teaching and learning of history and social science as part of a well-rounded curriculum, and understand the role that MCAS can play to promote this important work. However, there are very strong indications that the Department's budget next year, including the budget for student assessment, will be funded at a lower level than this year. Even at current funding levels, we will have insufficient funds to maintain our current program and transition our pilot history and social science tests to a fully operational assessment program. While our history and social science tests are part of our state education reform program, unlike reading, mathematics, and science and technology/engineering tests, they are not required by the federal No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law. If the budget cuts currently projected are realized, there will be additional impacts to the MCAS program, beyond the impact to history and social science assessments.

The Board voted in October 2006 to require that students, starting with the class of 2012, meet or exceed the Needs Improvement scaled score of 220 in history and social science (in addition to requirements in English language arts, mathematics, and science and technology/engineering) as a condition for high school graduation. I recommend that the Board vote to waive this requirement of the CD regulation, 603 CMR 30.03(4), for the classes of 2012 and 2013 as a consequence of the suspension of the administration of history and social science assessments in 2009 and 2010. The effect of this temporary waiver would be that students in the graduating classes of 2012 and 2013 must meet the CD standards in English language arts, mathematics, and science and technology/engineering, but not history and social science, as a condition of high school graduation.

While the usual course under the Board's bylaws is to discuss policy matters at one meeting and vote at the following meeting, I would encourage the Board to waive its bylaw and take the vote this month in order to give the field as much advance notice as possible. Alternatively, the Board may choose to wait until the March meeting to vote on this matter.

I will monitor future years' budgets with the goal of establishing a timeline for reinstituting the MCAS history and social science assessments and implementing the history and social science requirement for the CD as expeditiously as possible. If the state appropriation for student assessment in FY11 is sufficient, and MCAS history and social science testing resumes in spring 2011, I will recommend that the history and social science requirement for the CD first apply to the class of 2014. This will provide schools with scaled scores and performance level results to analyze before the administration in spring 2012 that will, for the first time, count for the CD for grade 10 students who will be members of the class of 2014.

I regret having to make these recommendations, but the difficult times that confront us require difficult decisions. While I understand that school districts face their own serious fiscal challenges, I will be asking them to continue to devote appropriate instructional time to the core academic standards for history, geography, civics, and economics as identified in the History and Social Science Curriculum Framework.

I also want to note that the Department will take this opportunity to consider how we may further expand the MCAS history and social science assessments, including performance-based, curriculum-embedded components consistent with the recommendations of the Board's Task Force on 21st Century Skills as well as with the direction that I shared with the Board in April 2008 for the next generation of MCAS. I will communicate with you the results of our research, as well as our plan for augmenting the assessment of these skills, as we move forward.