{"id":97,"date":"2006-11-15T17:40:49","date_gmt":"2006-11-15T21:40:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=97"},"modified":"2008-08-05T11:10:40","modified_gmt":"2008-08-05T15:10:40","slug":"letter-to-the-editor-about-science-fcat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=97","title":{"rendered":"Letter to the editor about science FCAT"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here is an interesting letter to the editor<\/a> about the science FCAT:<\/p>\n

As a science graduate and education specialist teaching science in high school, I find myself along with other teachers arresting our science curriculum in anatomy and physiology, physics, zoology, environmental science and chemistry to help our students either learn or relearn 79 benchmark items that will appear on the 11th grade science FCAT at the end of February.<\/p>\n

The 11th-grade science test may not yet count toward graduation, but the scores will be used to grade our schools and will permanently reside in each student’s official record.<\/p>\n

The science FCAT tests students specifically on their content knowledge in the areas of physical and chemical science, Earth and space science, energy and motion (physics) and scientific thinking instead of progressive skills that they should have learned. The last time our students were taught Earth and space, if at all, was in the 8th or 9th grade. Yet, this test is designed for 11th graders.<\/p>\n

I voted for Charlie Crist for governor. Educators now need him to work with us in developing a test that matches what students should know, such as biology, chemistry and physics. Parents, educators and students also need resources that will help them practice for the test, which now are in place for reading and mathematics.<\/p>\n

The FCAT graduation requirement and the school-grade component in science need to be deferred until an appropriate measure to test students’ knowledge can be found.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here is an interesting letter to the editor about the science FCAT: As a science graduate and education specialist teaching science in high school, I find myself along with other teachers arresting our science curriculum in anatomy and physiology, physics, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-1z","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1201,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1201","url_meta":{"origin":97,"position":0},"title":"2010 Science FCAT and beyond","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 29, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"The annual Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test results are finally released. These are exams that students across the state in specific grade levels must take in core subjects. These scores can influence students\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 promotion to the next grade, and dictate what the student can or cannot take the next school year,\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 3 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 3 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1201#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":605,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=605","url_meta":{"origin":97,"position":1},"title":"2008 science FCAT scores","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 10, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s science FCAT scores were released today. For those who don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know, the FCAT is the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test given annually to all Florida public school children in grades 3 through 11. The FCAT is supposed to measure what students have learned about reading, writing, mathematics and science. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "FCAT"","block_context":{"text":"FCAT","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=22"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":891,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=891","url_meta":{"origin":97,"position":2},"title":"Insights into Florida science testing","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"February 5, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"David Campbell is a Florida Citizens for Science board member and was featured in a New York TImes article about the teaching of evolution. Here on this blog I've been posting about a movement to eliminate the 11th grade science FCAT and replace it with end-of-course tests. (see here, here\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 5 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 5 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=891#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":991,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=991","url_meta":{"origin":97,"position":3},"title":"High School science concerns","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"April 7, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Paul Cottle, a professor of physics at Florida State University and a member of the committee that drafted Florida's new science standards, has been busy writing articles in defense of science education. Here is his latest one: Two bills put high-school physics at risk in Florida. However, the legislation that\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=991#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1345,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1345","url_meta":{"origin":97,"position":4},"title":"Science FCAT 2011","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"June 6, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Results for Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s annual science exams taken by 3rd, 8th, and 11th graders were released today. The good news? Scores overall improved since last year. The bad news? The rise in scores is small, and 50 percent of our state\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s students aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t proficient in science. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m tired of being a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "FCAT"","block_context":{"text":"FCAT","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=22"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":213,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=213","url_meta":{"origin":97,"position":5},"title":"2007 science FCAT scores","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"May 23, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s science FCAT scores were released today. For those who don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know, the FCAT is the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test given annually to all Florida public school children in grades 3 through 11. The FCAT is supposed to measure what students have learned about reading, writing, mathematics and science. The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Alert"","block_context":{"text":"Alert","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=6"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=97"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=97"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=97"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=97"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}