Our children are spending too much time preparing for a single, state-mandated, standardized assessment — the STAAR. 

As an example: during the 2014-2015 academic year, Houston ISD 5th graders: 

— were administered approximately 68 hours of standardized assessments (82% of which were not state-mandated);

— took a district-wide assessment on 1 out of every 4 full school days in the calendar year;

— spent approximately 1 out of every 7 morning instructional hours taking a district-wide standardized assessment.

Many issues with STAAR have surfaced in recent years which need to be addressed at the state level. However, while Houston ISD doesn’t have a choice in participating in STAAR, the district does choose how much of its curriculum and resources it focuses toward performing on that single assessment.

HISD’s assessment culture hurts our children in a number of ways. 

First, it robs students and teachers of valuable instruction time. These assessments are given at prime hours of the school day and are done so frequently that all other aspects of the student experience are impacted — everything from classroom-based testing for mastery replaced by third-party-authored snapshots to a child’s outdoor play being canceled to minimize testing disruption.

Second, HISD’s assessment calendar, with snapshots and benchmarks every two to three weeks, keeps ever-present what is an exceptional experience for our youngest children — that of bubble-in tests and STAAR-like pressure. The emotional toll of this “rigor” is very new and may not be fully apparent to administrators. However, as parents, we know first hand that many of our children are experiencing emotional distress and social anxieties resulting in a loss of a positive attitude toward their school and sometimes even physical sickness.

We trust HISD schools with the development of our children in whole, and as students, they look forward to being in the classroom for so much more than achieving an acceptable score on a single, standardized test. Learning about the world from their teachers and fellow students, experiencing art and exercise and having the feeling of accomplishment that comes with knowing more than they did and being able to do more than they could from one day to the next and from year to year is just portion of what we expect.

We implore you, the Houston ISD School Board, as the chief policy makers for our local schools, to direct Dr. Terry Grier and his staff to end the culture of assessment that leads to district-wide tests so often and replace it with the empowerment of teachers and principals to shape curriculum and testing for mastery to the maximum benefit of our children.