MBAE Testimony to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education

January 26^th, 2021

Good Morning. My name is Ed Lambert and I represent the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education.

MBAE wants to thank this Board, the Commissioner, the Secretary and all the dedicated educators and teachers here and across the state for the work taking place to keep learning moving forward.

Our state’s employers are deeply concerned about the educational impacts of the pandemic, particularly for students who had already found themselves on the wrong end of large achievement and opportunity gaps. We’re all aware of the national studies that have demonstrated a disproportionate impact for these students and we know their experience in this school year may only widen those gaps.

We appreciate and support efforts to meet the social-emotional needs of students as a primary goal. We are also increasingly concerned about the lack of a complete picture on lost learning.

We’re concerned, not only about the talent pipeline and the state’s competitiveness, but about how school disruptions and learning loss will derail efforts to achieve racial and socio-economic equity in our state. A healthy and competitive Commonwealth requires that EVERY student have an opportunity for success.

Today, we are asking the Board to take direct and prescriptive action to plan for student recovery by requiring districts, in order to fully understand the impacts of the pandemic and to chart a course toward recovery, to ensure universal diagnostic academic assessment of all students, with reporting to parents, leading to specialized plans for recovering lost learning.

We support the Commissioner’s plan to administer MCAS this year to collect data on collective impacts and to support overall assessment of students and strategies. We feel just as strongly that this early diagnostic assessment of students is vital to getting a head start on learning recovery.

We have seen examples from other states and districts outside Massachusetts where requirements to conduct student assessment, with well-known tools such as MAP testing, iReady and others, with the capability of remote administration, have led to the reporting of results that, in the aggregate, inform the public and influence policy while, for the individual student, provide a roadmap for recovery. Districts like Dallas and Washington, DC have been able to quantify for their residents and families how much learning has been impacted and how they will adopt strategies to respond.

The picture in Massachusetts is less clear as we have not seen diagnostic data nor have we have clarity as to how extensively such assessments have been used.

MBAE’s work creating a database comparing district plans shows that nearly 40% of the 120 districts we looked at did not include diagnostic assessment in the plans they submitted to the Department in August; and, of the remainder, we do not know how many followed through.

We think these assessments are the first step to restoring individual student success.

Perhaps more importantly, we ask that the state require each district to identify strategies for helping EVERY student recover lost learning. A simple return to the status quo will not be sufficient. Every possible action should be on the table to get students back on track—small group instruction, one-on-one intensive tutoring, accelerated programming, extended learning time, and summer scheduling will ALL be necessary elements for ensuring that student recovery will be complete.

With the support of existing and, hopefully, new federal relief dollars, redirected savings and other sources, we should help make learning recovery a priority for all.

And, on a related note, the potentially tragic interruption of the college pipeline speaks to the importance of scaling up early college programs across the state during this budget cycle.

In closing let me say that we know educators face some daunting challenges in this era. Many have shown nothing short of heroism as they have put their students’ interests first.

We applaud them and believe, with a continuation of strong leadership from this Board and the Department, Massachusetts will rise to the occasion once again for all of our students.

Thank you for your consideration.