Blog Stage Four: Critique an editorial or commentary from a Texas blog

On March 13, 2019, Mimi Swarts of Texas Monthly wrote a commentary titled “Testing the Test: New Legislation Filed to Audit STAAR”.

In this article, Swarts comments on the conflict revolving around the legitimacy of the STAAR test. Newly filed legislature has been filed to audit the STAAR test and its effectiveness in Texas. This is critical to state and local government because it could directly affect the youth that will one day be in office.

Swarts appears to be primarily targeting parents and students that have been through the STAAR process only to receive poor results. Swarts makes this connection when she addresses how the STAAR exam is set at a higher than appropriate level. This is seen when she writes: “During six highly emotional hours of testimony, parents, teachers, and school district superintendents spoke to the failings of STAAR—of kids and teachers demoralized with more and more classroom time given over to “drill and kill” that mysteriously made no difference in scores.” It would appear that in this passage Swarts is sympathizing with the families that have struggled through this outcome.

The author appears to have strong credibility with over 13 years of experience just at Texas Monthly. You can read more about her here.

Swarts writes as if she is against the current standing of the STAAR test. Elaborating on the topic, “If there was an argument to be made for keeping the STAAR reading exam as it is, they [the defendants] did not appear to have one at the ready. (The closest Morath got was to admit that more teacher support was the best way to ensure student success.” To support her claim, Swarts brings of findings from previous inspects of the STAAR test. She writes: “on multiple cases of academic research indicating that the reading portion of the STAAR test was set two grade levels higher than those it was testing”. Her logic is based around this idea that the test is harder than it should be, and thus discouraging students instead of encouraging them.

I agree with some aspects of this article – specifically, that the test should be written such that it is appropriate for the intended student of a certain academic level. I think that this consideration will not only give more accurate results, but also demonstrate the potential of students and encouraging them to do better.