This year, students in the Tucson Unified School District will take a lot fewer tests after the school board authorized a fundamental change of the district's testing processes. The modifications, which cut testing by roughly half for some students, follow petitions signed by over 1,200 educators and parents calling for reform.
In Tucson, teachers and families have complained for years that students spend too much time on tests and not enough time properly learning. During the 2024–2025 school year, when the Tucson Education Association began collecting signatures from concerned community members, the frustration reached its limits.
"Educators and students have shared the concern over too much testing," said TEA President Jim Byrne. "We worked closely with the district to create a task force that was responsible for coming up with real solutions."
Considering TUSD's academic success, the timing of this reform is very important. Only 28% of preschoolers reach proficiency levels in reading, and only 23% in mathematics, suggesting that the majority of students are having difficulty.
Similar alarming statistics apply to middle school, when 27% of students are proficient in reading and 19% in math. Although they do better, high school students still fall short; 48% of them meet reading and 42% satisfy math standards.
These are several assessments that many believed to be eliminated by the district:
The district is switching to i-Ready diagnostic assessments, which are given only three times a year, and completely doing away with quarterly benchmark testing for elementary and intermediate schools.
The DIBELS reading examinations will no longer be used to evaluate teachers in grades K–3, and they will be modified to minimize conflicts with state testing.
Instead of taking ACT practice exams each quarter, high school students in grades 9–11 will only take them twice a year. As required for their particular curriculum, each school are still free to create their own assessment methods.
The modifications are a response to growing complaints about "overtesting" in American classrooms. According to research, timed exams may not fairly assess students' true knowledge and may cause needless stress. Language challenges, test anxiety, and disabilities can all have an impact on performance without accurately representing a student's actual comprehension, and various students work at different speeds.
In fact, some of the best learners take their time solving challenging tasks, dedicating more thought to complex answers rather than working quickly to complete them.
TUSD intends to keep improving its testing procedures. In order to further minimize repetitive assessments, separate federal requirements from unnecessary local tests, and provide additional recommendations to school administration, an advisory committee will meet at least twice throughout the 2025–2026 academic year.
"The Governing Board's approval of our agreement means that educators will have more time to do what we do best — teach our students and help them engage with deep and meaningful learning instead of endless tests," Byrne said.
