The December meeting of the Kansas State Board of Education (KSBE) featured a presentation by University of Kansas Center for Educational Testing and Evaluation (CETE). The CETE linked their State assessment test scores with the equivalent scores on the national ACT tests that many Kansas students take for college admission.

    The very close correlation in scores on the state assessments and ACT was enthusiastically received by KSBE members. State assessment tests are currently required of all Kansas students and it can be difficult to get students to take the test seriously since it is used to rate schools but does not otherwise affect the student. Now that schools can show a close correlation between the state assessments and the ACT used for college entrance, that may provide some incentive for college-bound students to use state assessments as a practice for the ACT.

    But an obvious question was never asked: If the state assessment scores and the ACT scores are so highly correlated, why give redundant tests?

    The revised testing regulations in the new Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) that replaces No Child Left Behind includes the option for states to choose a nationally recognized high school test instead of a unique state assessment test. And there are many advantages to Kansas switching to use the ACT in place of state assessments.

    The state pays for the assessment tests and the students’ parents pay for the ACT test for students wanting to go to college. Currently, 74 percent of Kansas students take the ACT. Kansas could join the 18 states that currently underwrite the ACT for all students. It would save Kansas parents a lot of money.  And switching state funding from CETE tests to the ACT would likely save state funding as well since the ACT operation costs are supported by the majority of states nationwide.

    Some Kansas students who do not currently take the ACT—especially those from economically poor families—may not realize that they are college-able. Taking the ACT, when it is underwritten by Kansas as the state assessment test for all, will alert these students that they indeed are “college material.”

    Since customized state assessments are variable, it is difficult to make state-by-state comparisons using the CETE tests. But with a majority of states use the ACT, across-state comparisons could easily be made.  While all students participate in the ACT in 18 other states, Kansas is leaving out over one-fourth of its students and this makes current ACT comparisons difficult.

    The major damage of No Child Left Behind was the de-professionalization of teachers. High stakes testing forced many teachers to stop treating students as unique individuals and turned them into drill-and-kill test-prep workers. While the ACT is a standardized test of the accumulation of reading and mathematics skills, it is primarily an aptitude test, not an achievement test. It does not provide a consistent target that leads to teaching-to-the-test.  ACT-prep mainly provides familiarity with the test format and rarely boosts scores more than 2-3 percent. With ACT the only state assessment, Kansas teachers could get back to being professionals who use their own internal tests to educate unique students.

    The extra class time freed up from our current double testing, along with restoring the teachers’ role in determining in-class testing for unique students, would go a long way toward restoring teacher professionalism.  

    Kansas administrators, teachers and parents statewide will applaud any reduction in our continued over-testing.

    And every Kansas farmer knows that the more time you spend weighing them, the less time you have to feed them. It is time to get back more “feeding time” in school.

It’s curious how common items either go out of use or their intended purpose alters. One of those is the nutcracker. Most people nowadays think this term refers to a seasonal ballet where they might enjoy watching children or grandkids dressed up as old-fashioned ornamental German nutcrackers wearing military-style hats or as dainty sugarplum fairies. Others may store treasured family heirlooms until they retrieve them to decorate their tree. I recently had occasion to realize that actual nutcrackers frequently found in auction boxes serve a real purpose.

As a kid, my family bought whole nuts at Christmas time and offered them in a decorative bowl along with a metal pincer-style device and a silver pick for getting at hard to reach nutmeats. This practice continued a custom both my parents grew up with during the Depression. Their frugal families passed on a ritual long followed by their ancestors.

At our house, one of those traditions included filling Christmas stockings with an orange, an apple, and either some unshelled peanuts or whole nuts. Knowing many generations practiced this holiday tradition reminds me of a time when fresh fruits and nuts were luxuries one enjoyed only on special occasions. Despite knowing I’d see nuts every holiday that required a special opener, I never considered the nutcracker tool an essential kitchen utensil until I recently received a 5 lb. bag of fresh pecans.

An Oklahoma friend lives near the many groves in Eastern Oklahoma and shared his bounty. When I first saw lumpy grocery sack, I imagined it full of ready to eat pecans. When I opened this treasure trove, I realized my mistake. This freshly picked harvest had gone through a mechanical cracker to make it easier to extract the tasty center. However, I had to peel away shattered outer husks and separate the two pecans halves each shell once protected.

It didn’t take long to understand why nuts are holiday treats and why some people esteem pies, cakes, cookies, candies, and butters made with them. As a person who considers walnuts, pecans, peanuts, cashews, and almonds edible only when served by themselves but not in baked goods, I missed this message growing up.

After I spent a couple of hours freeing nutmeats from shells, I understand why I find nutcrackers at almost every auction I attend. They were essential in old time kitchens. Cooks didn’t go to the store to buy a sack of already shelled nuts. They roamed creek banks to harvest nature’s encased proteins and then spent hours extracting meats from hulls. Knowing how my grandmas made use of everything, I’m sure they saved the inedible material to create fabric dyes or enrich garden soils.

This lesson humbled me. I’ve enjoyed preparing family recipes from scratch for decades. I never considered how I take for granted buying already-ground flour or churned butter quarters at the market. This nutty experience reminded me that not-so-distant family cooks would consider such easy access to ingredients an extravagance.

Native Kansan Karen Madorin is a local writer and retired teacher who loves sharing stories about places, people, critters, plants, food, and history of the High Plains.