Creepy: Pearson, the testing company, spies on social media of students taking the Common Core Assessment
March 14, 2015
It was confirmed that Pearson, a United Kingdom-based testing company involved in the development of Common Core Assessments, was “monitoring” the social media accounts of New Jersey students taking the PARCC Common Core Assessment. A student had sent a tweet about the PARCC assessment after school, and Pearson contacted the New Jersey Department of Education (NJ DOE) to have the student suspended, ostensibly on grounds of the student having breached test security. There was no evidence that the student had cheated. Pearson’s monitoring of the students’ social media was done in cooperation with the New Jersey DOE.
This is alarming on so many levels. Apparently, this is not the only student whom Pearson asked to be suspended. Why is a multinational testing company in cooperation with a US state governmental department delving into the social media of the students in New Jersey? Is this happening in other states as well?
PARCC (Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers) is one of the two consortia producing Common Core Assessments; the other is the SBAC (Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium) of which Washington State is a member. We do not know if Washington state students will also be “monitored?”
(Image courtesy of Salvatore Vuono at FreeDigitalPhotos.net)
It was confirmed that Pearson, a United Kingdom-based testing company involved in the development of Common Core Assessments, was “monitoring” the social media accounts of New Jersey students taking the PARCC Common Core Assessment. A student had sent a tweet about the PARCC assessment after school, and Pearson contacted the New Jersey Department of Education (NJ DOE) to have the student suspended, ostensibly on grounds of the student having breached test security. There was no evidence that the student had cheated. Pearson’s monitoring of the students’ social media was done in cooperation with the New Jersey DOE.
This is alarming on so many levels. Apparently, this is not the only student whom Pearson asked to be suspended. Why is a multinational testing company in cooperation with a US state governmental department delving into the social media of the students in New Jersey? Is this happening in other states as well?
PARCC (Partnership for the Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers) is one of the two consortia producing Common Core Assessments; the other is the SBAC (Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium) of which Washington State is a member. We do not know if Washington state students will also be “monitored?”
(Image courtesy of Salvatore Vuono at FreeDigitalPhotos.net)