Less than a year after lawmakers overhauled public-school testing following the botched rollout of the new Florida Standards Assessments, the debate over how to measure student learning is far from over.
A leading senator on education issues is working on legislation that would allow schools to use tests other than the statewide standardized exams, which are used in some graduation and promotion decisions, teacher evaluations and school grades.
Democrats and education groups continue to call for the state’s accountability system to be suspended, with test scores being used instead to help set learning goals for schools to be measured against. Some have recommended giving schools a grade of “I,” or incomplete, in the meantime.
