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TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — Serious technological problems forced school districts on Monday to suspend a contentious new standardized test that middle- and high-school students are taking online.
Multiple school districts from south Florida to the Panhandle halted the Florida Standards Assessment tests after the online portal that students must use for the test was slow or didn't let students log in at all. The tests are based on the controversial Common Core standards that have sparked opposition from some parents and teachers both in Florida and other states across the country.
School superintendents had already been bracing for potential problems, and had warned in recent weeks they weren't exactly sure how the rollout of the new test would go, especially in the middle-school and high-school grades.
Education Commissioner Pam Stewart had recently downplayed any potential problems, and said that districts had told the state they were prepared.
The standardized tests are crucial because they are utilized by Florida to decide everything from who graduates to whether students are held back in the third grade.
Florida Department of Education spokeswoman Meghan Collins said many students were able to access the test, but that the commissioner was investigating and trying to resolve any issues that had arisen. Collins also noted that students have a two-week window in which to complete the 90-minute test.
But Miami-Dade Schools Superintendent Alberto Carvalho said he had no plans to resume testing on Tuesday because he had "no confidence" that the problems would be fixed overnight. He said he made the decision because he not heard anything from state officials as to whether the problems had been resolved.
"Press the pause button significantly so to anticipate not just a fix for this issue but all the random glitches," Carvalho said.
Other districts such as Palm Beach County also said Monday night that they did not plan to resume testing either.
Critics of online testing said the problems just reinforced their position that the state was moving too quickly.
"Florida computerized tests are clearly not ready for prime time," said Bob Schaeffer of the National Center for Fair and Open Testing. "The reason is that they were rushed into place based on a Tallahassee-mandated schedule, not technical competence or educational readiness."
Florida first expanded the use of standardized testing under former Gov. Jeb Bush. But last year was the final one where students took what was known as the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test or FCAT.
Field testing on the test was done in Utah, but not in Florida. Carvalho had testified last month before legislators that the state should test its platform to make sure it could deal with hundreds of thousands of students trying to log on.
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