RE: Exemptions to STAR and other standardized testing

Kelly,

Your question as to the risks of test items leaking is valid. One of the reason a new test shows up every so often... more often than the testing companies would like. 

Tempering that is the fact that such tests have 50-100 questions per subject, so memorizing many of them is not trivial. More importantly, the -- hopefully small -- effect of item leakage tends to work on student's "favor", so at least individual students are not penalized in NRT scores.

Teaching to the test is a pernicious practice, but not limited to NRT. Most (all?) schools and districts have school-wide and district-wide tests which, as a rule, are well known to the teachers. Teaching to the test seems to happen there on much wider scale, based on the heresay I heard. Please realize that the pressure to have one's students score well, or continue to the next grade, did not start with the STAR. It is just that the scores stopped being school's "dirty secret" hidden from the wider public.

Before finishing this message, I want to comment regarding your concerns about the effects of testing (I assume NRT or not) on self esteem. I personally believe they are smaller that you make them seem. However it may be, you should balance it against the very real possibility of inflated self esteem by scoring well on meaningless tests, and then have students fall on their faces once they hit the "real" world - be it college or work.

Regarding your question if serving on the STAR panel is "a paid one", the answer is yes - I pay with vacation days from my real work for this pleasure :-)