National Testing Proposal Panned at Local Hearing

The president of the state Board of Education on Wednesday sharply criticized President Clinton’s proposal for national standardized tests, telling a congressional committee that states and school districts are best suited to assess academic achievement.

Echoing the concerns raised by an array of critics, Yvonne Larsen called the testing proposal a federal intrusion into a local issue. She and others who addressed the Committee on Education and the Workforce also said they feared such a measure, even if implemented on a voluntary basis as proposed, would lead to mandatory testing and a national curriculum.

“For the record, I want to make it clear that the state of California has not endorsed President Clinton’s plan for national testing,” Larsen told the committee at Frost Middle School here, a reference to state Supt. of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin’s support for the idea.

“I do not believe the federal government can effectively differentiate the needs and priorities of the people of California versus the people of Pennsylvania, Georgia or North Dakota.”

Clinton’s proposal, unveiled a year ago during his State of the Union address, would create uniform testing of fourth-graders in reading and eighth-graders in math across the country. It has drawn opposition from an unlikely coalition of conservative and liberal lawmakers. Congressional leaders managed to thwart the plan last year, and a compromise with the White House has placed the program on hold until later this year at the earliest.

Gov. Pete Wilson also has said he opposes a test that is imposed by federal officials. Wilson gained approval for a statewide standardized test last year, and students in grades two through 11 will take the same exam this spring for the first time.

U.S. Department of Education officials defend Clinton’s proposal, saying it is intended to provide a nationwide comparison for student achievement, not infringe on local authority. The officials say they have broad support from several of the largest school systems--including those serving Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, Detroit and Atlanta--that comprise 20% of the nation’s 8 million fourth- and eighth-graders. Eastin came out in support of the plan last year, shortly after Clinton released his proposal.

“These tests would remain voluntary, as the president and Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley have called for,” said Julie Green, a spokeswoman for Riley.

Wednesday’s hearing was run by the chief congressional critic of the Clinton plan, Rep. William F. Goodling (R-Pa.), who chairs the House Education Committee. Also on the committee is Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-Santa Clarita), whose district was chosen as the site of the first of several hearings nationwide this year. Thus, Wednesday’s gathering took place at Frost, where about 50 members of the public attended.

“We should put money into the classroom, not into another test,” Goodling said. “We should focus upon what can make a difference--reading readiness, high-quality teacher training, helping children master the basics.”

Goodling’s committee selected in advance each of the hearing’s five speakers, including two parents and a Latino rights activist. Each criticized Clinton’s plan.

Rebecca Bocchino, a San Clemente mother of three public school children, said she believes that national testing will strip parents of involvement in their children’s education.

“National tests have become a vehicle for those who have an agenda,” Bocchino told the committee. “Big government and corporate America are now equal partners in . . . a hostile takeover of the education of our youth. [Parents] will have no voice in a national test. If we are brought in at all, it will be in a nominal capacity.”

One speaker questioned whether a national test would be “dumbed down” for a broad student audience. Holding aloft a recently published math textbook, he contended that new approaches to teaching math have ruined schoolchildren’s mastery of that discipline and warned that sweeping changes in uniform testing would have the same effect.

“To put it bluntly, we feel that the planned test would be worse than no test at all,” said Paul Clopton, co-founder of Mathematically Correct, a San Diego-based parents group that advocates a back-to-basics approach to math.

Theresa Fay-Bustillos, vice president of legal programs for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, raised concerns of equity in a national exam. The proposed exam would test fourth-graders in English, a fact that Fay-Bustillos said would exclude students with limited English skills and “reinforce both low expectations and low self-esteem.”

“If these students are to be the beneficiaries of high standards and their parents to be able to demand accountability, they must be equal partners,” Fay-Bustillos told the committee. “It is bad public policy to exclude [such] students by failing to develop and provide a fourth-grade reading test in Spanish.”