Author: By SCOTT S. GREENBERGER
Boston Globe: Date: 01/18/2001 Page: B4 Section: Metro/Region
As Beacon Hill gears up for what is sure to be a bitter debate over MCAS, the people who have the most at stake in the fight over the Commonwealth's high-stakes test, students, have made their position clear: They don't think they should have to pass the test to graduate.
The State Student Advisory Council, which includes delegates from more than half the high schools in the state, announced yesterday that Representative Alice K. Wolf, a Cambridge Democrat, has filed a bill on its behalf to keep the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System as a diagnostic tool, but eliminate it as a graduation requirement.
Starting with the class of 2003, students must pass the English and math sections of the test to get a diploma.
"We are not an anti-MCAS group," said Concord-Carlisle senior Jody Kelman, chairwoman of the advisory council and its representative on the State Board of Education. "What we are as a group is anti-graduation-requirement. We don't believe it's fair to punish individual students for the failings of an entire system."
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