“We're definitely a test centered-state and nation. Our students' scores aren't living up to our expectations and that is overwhelming, especially when the state test scores can be tied to salary. I know that's been an up-and-down ongoing conversation. That's pretty intimidating and I can see why new teachers would say, ‘This just isn't worth it. What if I get a batch of 3rd graders coming in that can't read, and then the district tells me in May, when they take this test they can't read, that it’s my fauIt?’ I would validate that.”
“I think my personality is to prove that wrong (…) My high schoolers are coming in with disrupted education. They are illiterate in any language. They are reading at a K or 2 level in their home language and I am told they have to take a Biology [state exam] in nine months. They know nothing about science—nothing. ‘This is a plant’—that's where we're starting, right? I have a student that started this year. He's a 10th grader. We made a list on the board of words that he knew on the first day. The superintendent walked in and he's like, ‘What are we going to do with this?’ ‘11’ was the only number he knew. ‘Pink’ was the only color he knew. ‘Welcome’. ‘Hello’. ‘Thank you’. Basic survival skills. And this kid is seventeen. He is nearly illiterate in any language and I'm teaching him English to take an English [state exam]. Our goals are so ridiculous. We're not going to get a 65 on the [state exam]. But if we started at negative 20 and I get you to a 50, we've covered a lot of ground. So next year, if we can go from a 50 to a 65, that was successful. I think test scores are important to show progress. But I'm not willing to commit my teaching career to a test that is really nonsense for some of these kids.”
“I understand that the state needs to know how many students don't speak [English],but when you stop and think about the whole process, we're just doing the test to do the test so that the state is happy.”
“We laugh on their first day of school. They come in. I say, ‘I have to give you a test in English.’ ‘I don't speak English.’ ‘I know that you don't speak English and you know that you don't speak English. But now you have to take this test so that we can send it to the state so that the state can know that you don't speak English, and then you can have class with me and you can learn English.’”
“’We'll see how much you know next year. So you scored at Entering this year because you knew five words. Next year you might be an Intermediate because you know 1,000 words. Look how much you've grown. Look how much you've learned.’ I think because of the group that I work with—we're starting with so little that it's so easy to see growth because (…) every day. they're learning something.”