PARCC Chief Laura Slover’s rhetoric at the Colorado Association of School Executive’s annual summer meeting was stunning.

First, she believes these tests as ‘beautiful tools’ then she goes on an tear about equity and then says they are ‘game changers’. I think Ms. Slover needs a reality check.  This is a very unpopular standardized test. Statements like these are not image improvers.

Excerpt from Chalkbeat with emphasis added:

“I think they’re really beautiful tools, but they’re just tests,” the CEO of the PARCC testing group told Colorado school administrators Friday. “The really important thing is what happens in the classroom every day,”

Laura Slover acknowledged rising criticism of standardized tests but said, “This is not a testing agenda; it’s a equity agenda.”

Slover spoke to the closing session of the Colorado Association of School Executive’s annual summer meeting in Breckenridge, which drew more than 1,000 administrators and others.

Calling the PARCC language arts and math tests “a huge game changer,” Slover said, “This is a quality test. It’s better than anything else out there on the market.”

Better than anything else out there? When you have SBAC and Pearson to choose from, that is not saying much. What’s scary about this Slover’s statements is that she has Colorado’s Superintendent nodding his head:

Dan Snowberger, Durango superintendent, said the old state-only standards “created an un-level playing field” and cautioned, “If we think the new standards are about tweaking what we do, we’ve missed the mark.”

Snowberger also said, “My fear is that there will be this groundswell of anti-Common Core and that some educators will get on board with that.” – Chalkbeat

You got that? A standardized test is going to ‘level the playing field’. Is Superintendent Snowberger partaking of the legalized pot in Colorado?

Related Read:  The myth of Common Core equity