WebXams

This week at work we are having "review sessions" on the WebXam that our students will be taking at the end of the course. WebXams have been a bit of a struggle since my first year teaching. The exams never seem to align with what we teach or align with the standards we are teaching from. It is interesting to me that myself (the art teacher) gives the same exam that the IT teacher gives. When this has been brought up to our supervisors they agreed that it needed to be changed... when further looking into this change, it was not possible because it all came down to funding. The IT strand of classes receives more funding than the Digital Communications strands of classes and so we are coded as an IT class.

I do understand that everything comes down to funding, but wish that we could do what is best for kids. Because of this ongoing debate my district is having all of the staff look at the exams and see where there are gaps and how we can modify these tests to better align with the curriculum we teach. We will be taking these tests this week and I am curious to see what will really change. If we come back and say they still don't align... what can they do? They will not change our strand because of the funding and we have to give these tests... so there is really nothing they can do. It seems as though the teachers are put in a position where we can not really make a difference but they want us to feel as if we could.