Members of the Hamilton County School Board may be moving towards reducing the number of benchmark tests students take during the school year.¶
District 2 Member Ben Daugherty brought the issue up for discussion during Thursday’s board meeting. He says according to data given to him by the district, students spend roughly six weeks every school year doing some form of testing. That includes the Tennessee Comprehensive Assessment Program (TCAP), screening tools, iReady, and three district benchmark tests per year. The benchmark tests are aimed at providing insight into student progress throughout the year, which teachers can then use to customize their lessons. But Daugherty says he’s heard from multiple teachers, parents, and students who say the tests take up too much time and cause too much stress. He says he understands the value of the data the benchmark testing provides but has serious concerns about the toll the testing takes on teachers and students.¶
“If you sit down with any of your teachers, they’re going to tell you there’s a high level of dissatisfaction around the amount of testing that we do,” said Daugherty. “Our teachers only have 180 days to be with these kids and 30 of those days are primarily spent in testing.”¶
Deputy Superintendent Dr. Sonia Stewart said since the district implemented benchmark testing in 2018, overall student performance has improved by 10 percent and noted the district has already made moves to reduce the amount of time spent on assessments. She referred to an announcement to principals last week to decrease the number of benchmarks administered in kindergarten through second grade. Still, she told board members the time spent on testing is an investment in progress.¶
“What we are counting is what information do teachers get from these assessments that drives their instruction and supports their instruction,” said Dr. Stewart. “It’s really important that teachers know where kids are so they can tailor their instruction for it. So, we actually see this as a time saver, not a time waster, because of the way you can tailor instruction as a result.”¶
Felice Hadden is a former high school teacher and represents District 10. She said she understands and values the importance of the information gained through testing. But she also sympathizes with teachers, pointing out that preparing students and the school environment for testing can be a challenge. She suggested allowing teachers to administer their own assessments.¶
“The added tests have become really time consuming. It seems like it becomes almost a full time job for the people who administer the tests,” said Hadden. “I think we could do something more informal but have a test and maybe some of the same data. Maybe we’d want to give the teachers the certain tests they’d like to use and let them administer it in their classrooms without the jumping through the hoops that a benchmark requires.”¶
District 9 Member Gary Kuehn is a former principal and served as an administrator when benchmark testing first began. He said the feedback he’s received from teachers has always been negative, with most of them saying the exams cut into valuable instruction time. He suggested moving to a single benchmark test at the end of the first semester, which would allow teachers to regain lost teaching time during the second semester.¶
“It took away from a lot of class time, and I’ll be honest, that’s been the constant. Year after year I’ve had calls from teachers during benchmark time,” said Kuehn. “And I truly believe that there would be more teaching available. You’re giving them more class time to recover that first semester and it would show in the test scores, and students and teachers would be so much happier.”¶
Dr. Stewart said she’s open to the concerns of the board and the teachers, pointing out that reductions in testing are already being made, and the district continues to evaluate testing practices.¶
“Where we have data redundancy, that’s where we’re looking at reductions, and we’re looking at, are there other places for redundancy,” she said.¶
Multiple other board members also spoke in favor of reducing the amount of time spent on testing, saying they hear from parents and school staff frequently.¶
“Every single teacher I’ve talked to, every single one of them, says this is too much testing. Teachers were taught to teach, not to be test givers,” said District 1 Member Steve Slater.¶
“If this is truly something doing good for us, we’re not seeing it,” added District 6 Member Ben Connor. “I don’t believe anybody has received a positive email about the testing, so I have to listen to that large group of people, especially educators. So how do we truly assess our students with bombarding them?”¶
Board Chair Joe Smith asked Superintendent Dr. Justin Robertson what the impact would be if the district reduced the number of benchmark tests given from three per year, to two or even one per year. Dr. Robertson said it’s difficult to say what that would look like, explaining the current benchmark exams are designed to be given three times annually to measure student progress.¶
“We are not test makers. We are not experts at creating assessments,” said Dr. Robertson. “So, you’re kind of asking me a question like what would happen if you only took your medicine once a day instead of twice a day like your doctor told you to. I don’t know. You could be okay, or we could go back to 2016, 2015.”¶
That uncertainty was a concern expressed by District 5 Member Karitsa Jones. She agrees there is too much time spent on testing, but also wanted to know how educators would be able to get the information they need to meet students where they are and help them to grow.¶
“I hear everybody here and I concur to a certain extent, but for me, I’m not an expert in this,” said Jones. “But what is the proposed solution? How do you all suggest we get what we need if we don’t get it this way?”¶
Daughterty also pointed out that benchmark testing costs the district $788,000 per year. He said cutting the number of those tests would save the district money and ease the burden on teachers and students. He then made a motion to cut benchmark testing to one time a year for the 2025-26 school year, which was quickly given a second. Superintendent Robertson asked the board to give the district time to further evaluate their practices and come back with their own proposal to potentially reduce the amount of benchmark testing. Daugherty agreed and withdrew his motion, telling Dr. Robertson to present his recommendation during the next board meeting on April 17.¶
The discussion comes as state lawmakers look to reduce student testing statewide. The House K-12 Subcommittee is scheduled to debate two bills on this issue tomorrow.¶
