Poll shows that Latino parents back high-stakes testing

By Maria Camila Bernal, NBCLatino

As parents and children prepare to go back to school, a new poll shows that most parents, including Latinos, support standardized testing.

Parents across the U.S. see the tests as a useful way to measure both the students’ and the schools’ performances and say their children are getting just the right amount of standardized tests, according to an Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll.

“At times, the tests are very stressful for my children, but I know that they are good because they measure my kids’ knowlege level,” said Marcela Vargas from Florida, whose two kids begin classes Monday.

The poll found that a full 93 percent of parents say standardized tests should be used to identify areas where students need extra help. Smaller majorities think such tests should be used to measure school quality, evaluate teachers or determine whether or not students are promoted or can graduate.

At the same time, 72 percent of all parents said they want to make it easier for school districts to fire teachers who aren’t getting the job done. That position had the strongest showing among white parents, 80 percent of whom favored the idea. About 6 in 10 Hispanic or black parents agreed.

“The test show the difference in those teachers that give the extra mile,” said Vargas, who thinks that a test can reflect the effort put in by a teacher.

But education union leaders have stood opposed to linking teacher evaluations with these tests, arguing it is unfair to punish teachers for students’ shortcomings.

“You also have to consider the fact that there are lazy kids and very smart kids regardless of the teacher,” said Vargas.

When states have adopted the Common Core State Standards, which aim to provide consistent requirements across all states for math and English, test results often falter and the standards can make schools and teachers appear to be faring worse than they did the previous year.

The AP-NORC Center surveyed parents of students at all grade levels and found that sixty-one percent of parents think their children take an appropriate number of standardized tests and 26 percent think their children take too many tests.

The poll also showed that the majority of parents think that the teachers’ fates shouldn’t rest solely on test results, and 69 percent say such exams are a good measure of the schools’ quality. Also, seventy-five percent of parents say standardized tests are a solid measure of their children’s abilities.

“In general these test are good,” Vargas said. “As parents we need to have a way to know what our kids have learned.”

This article was first published in NBCLatino.