This year on the November Massachusetts state ballot, Question 2 asks voters if the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS) exam should still be a graduation requirement. If the majority of people vote “yes” on this question, then MCAS will no longer be a requirement for students in Massachusetts to graduate. However, students will still have to take MCAS, even if voters decide to repeal MCAS as a graduation requirement.
Since 2003, schools in Massachusetts have required students to pass MCAS exams in English, math, and science during either their freshman or sophomore years of high school in order to graduate. Students are only required to pass their high school MCAS, while the elementary and middle schools MCAS are used for practice. If students do not pass the exams by sophomore year, then they could retake it as a junior or senior. However, if they fail to pass the exam or receive a “competency determination” from the state another way, they are not allowed to receive their diploma. This has never been a huge issue at Westford Academy, as more than 95% of the students have passed MCAS and received their diploma. Nevertheless, not all schools are as privileged.
“Schools like Westford [Academy] certainly don’t need MCAS [to be] a graduation requirement. I think there are [certain] schools where MCAS as a graduation requirement makes sense,” English teacher Rebecca Shaw said. “For a lot of kids in the state […] [MCAS] might be the work they need in order to have the skills that we’ve determined they should have [in order] to be effective citizens.”
This question has been difficult for many people to answer. The argument for voting yes on Question 2 is that dropping MCAS as a graduation requirement could give teachers more curriculum freedom, and give districts the opportunity to tailor the requirements to help English-learning students and students with cognitive disabilities.
“I think that MCAS should not be a [graduation] requirement because sometimes […] MCAS is really tough and long [and] I end up just rushing through it to have time afterwards,” freshman Bennett Acheson said. “It’s [also] another stress that [is] added to the lives of high schoolers and the stress amount is already stacked up pretty high.”
On the other hand, Massachusetts residents have strong opinions about voting no on Question 2. A lot of people feel the need to keep MCAS as a graduation requirement because they would rather the state build on accommodations already in place and keep the standard requirements. Alternative flexibility of the curriculum could also be beneficial for certain teachers but for others it is not so clear.
When people go to vote in November, they will be voting with both the state as a whole and their particular school district in mind. However, WA is a very fortunate town when it comes to education, and according to Dean Bob Ware, Westford will not have to worry much if MCAS is taken away as a requirement to graduate because WA students have had amazing results with the exam.
“It would be nice if this [MCAS] was removed as a graduation requirement. I think I speak personally about our students and our staff and I think we do a tremendous job preparing students for the next level,” Ware said. “Sometimes kids are over tested and if they could take something like a standardized test off their plate, I think it would be beneficial to a lot of people.”
