One of the joys of representing the great people of Aurora in the state legislature is being able to hear from my constituents. One of my constituents, an educator in Aurora Public Schools, was kind enough to take the time to give me her classroom perspective about The Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) test that Colorado students take. In her email, she illustrates the manic, often very flawed way this test factors into 50 percent of teacher evaluations:“We would like to let our legislators know what is happening during PARCC testing season. The PARCC test for this year has been a complete nightmare. The nightmare began last week when students, who were logged in to the test, sat in front of computers that wouldn’t load, for hours at a time. They weren’t allowed to talk, do anything else, etc. Testing protocols call for a “standard” environment where students have to sit quietly. I have to give my 8th graders credit. They did ok. The first time.

Eventually, our principal called it off and sent all students back to class, where teachers had to scramble to come up with a lesson for 35 beings they weren’t planning on seeing.

The same thing happened the next day. We cancelled testing for last week and rescheduled for this week. In the meantime, the psychology of kids at all levels has to have been affected. Their schedules were uprooted for testing, then uprooted again for the test not working. They were suffering from test anxiety, and then faced with the frustration of a test that wasn’t working.

In the long run, I would like our legislators to understand that this is NOT the way to measure students’ learning or teachers’ teaching. In the short-term, I would hope an action could be taken this year that would PREVENT this test from being considered a valid tool for measuring the efficacy of school or district or teacher performance.”

I couldn’t agree more. We hold Colorado teachers responsible for providing a high-quality education to students, but too often, we don’t give teachers a say in how student success is measured. This teacher writes about a situation happening far too often. To tie 50% of this PARCC failure to any educator’s evaluation is bad for the teacher — and bad for the student.

Teachers’ evaluations should not be based on the current arbitrary percentage of student growth, especially when the standardized tests used to measure growth are so troublesome and unreliable. Educator evaluations should be comprehensive and based on multiple indicators that give teachers meaningful feedback to enhance their practice. It should be up to local districts to determine the factors they deem accurate and reliable to best measure whether students are meeting our state’s standards.

I stand with educators who question the validity of putting so much emphasis on standardized tests, even if the system were working properly. Unless and until districts can show they are able to administer the PARCC test in a fair and consistent manner, it should not be a factor in teacher evaluations at all. In the meantime, we should take a step back and really look at the role standardized tests play in teacher evaluation, and make sure that what we do is fair to the teachers, the students and the community.

Su Ryden is the current State Representative for House District 36 in Aurora. She has served as State Representative in HD-36 since being elected in 2008. She is the current Majority Whip, and serves as the Chair of the State, Veterans, and Military Affairs Committee.