Monday, March 2, turned out to be a rough day for the West Windsor-Plainsboro schools. Yet another winter storm caused the schools to delay opening for 90 minutes, which in turn impacted the implementation of the controversial PARCC testing, which had been scheduled to start state-wide on that day.
Due to the delayed opening, the district “tweeted” a revised PARCC testing schedule. All PARCC testing at the high school level was canceled for the day, and would be rescheduled to a later date. Testing at the middle schools would run as scheduled. The upper elementary schools would reschedule their early morning sessions; the rest of the testing would take place as scheduled. Morning sessions at three of the four elementary schools were postponed; Wicoff expected to hold its morning session.
Some changes, but for the majority of grades and classes scheduled to take the PARCC on Monday, March 2, the testing would occur as scheduled.
Except that it didn’t.
Later that morning, the district announced that: “Due to a testing complication, PARCC testing for Grades 4-8 will not be held today and will be rescheduled.”
Shortly thereafter, another message was sent: “WW-P was just informed that due to a testing complication, morning PARCC testing for Grade 3 was not held and will be rescheduled.”
This was followed by a third message: “Grade 3 PARCC testing for this afternoon has been postponed. As soon as testing is rescheduled, we will let you know.”
So what happened? On Tuesday, March 3, the district announced: “West Windsor-Plainsboro Regional School District experienced technical issues related to the administration of the PARCC assessment. These issues concerned the proctor caching of the test.”
Proctor caching allows districts to download content from the testing company’s server to a secure local computer prior to starting a test session, so that in theory, the integrity of the test is protected if the server (or the Internet) crashes while students are taking the test. Students should still be able to continue testing while technicians resolve Internet connectivity issues, at least according to test manufacturer Pearson Services. It didn’t quite work out that way.
According to one WW-P parent, Virginia Manzari, in her middle school son’s testing classroom, students immediately found out that they couldn’t log onto the test, and “basically sat around doing nothing for one and a half periods while teachers and others tried frantically to log into the tests. For the next one and a half periods, the kids were instructed to read their books while efforts to log onto the tests continued, to no avail. So the students in the testing classrooms were really doing almost nothing for three periods.”
The district’s statement explained the steps taken to resolve the glitches: “We worked throughout the day and evening with the New Jersey Department of Education and Pearson Services (the test manufacturer) to resolve these issues. As of this morning, it is believed that we have resolved the technical concerns that were experienced on Monday. Additionally, we have requested and the Department of Education has agreed to provide on-site technical support to assist the district should any additional concerns surface Tuesday morning.
“PARCC testing will resume today, Tuesday, March 3, 2015 as planned.”
Testing resumed as scheduled on Tuesday and Wednesday, and on Tuesday afternoon, the district sent another message: “We are happy to report that today’s PARCC testing went smoothly. PARCC testing will continue according to each school’s schedule.”
Anecdotally, parents have reported some lingering problems, said Manzari, particularly with the amount of time it has taken to log into the test. “One interesting story that I heard was that some students saw the words ‘hacked’ and then ‘go home’ flash across their screens. But the biggest complaint that I have heard is the differences between the questions that students in the same testing room received. For instance, some high school students were asked a question about ‘The Odyssey,’ while others were asked about ‘Rapunzel.’ I don’t really think these two topics are comparable,” said Manzari, who is a critic of the PARCC program (see letter to the editor, page 2).
But overall, the technical problems faced by the district on Monday were not repeated. Of course, the weather-related issues — including a snow day Thursday, March 4 — are another story.
The first component of the PARCC testing runs from March 2 through March 27, and is being administered to all students in grades 3 through 11. Students are tested for a total of five days, spread throughout the month; not all students in any given grade test on the same day. While there is no “opt out” provision; students may still choose not to take the test, even if they have already begun testing.
Despite the many concerns raised by parents and students regarding the PARCC exam, not many have actually acted on those concerns, with only approximately one percent of students “refusing” the test.
According to the district, “As of the first day of testing, [on March 2], WW-P had 93 students who ‘opted out’ of PARCC testing. Enrollment in Grades 3-11 is 6,794; district enrollment is 9,672 (as of October 15, 2014).”
