MA-SEN: Backing ballot question to eliminate MCAS graduation requirement, Warren breaks with GOP opponent
During their hourlong debate Tuesday night, one of the starkest differences between Senator Elizabeth Warren and her Republican opponent, John Deaton, came over a ballot question this fall that gives voters the opportunity to eliminate the requirement that students pass the MCAS standardized test to graduate high school.
Deaton said he wants to preserve MCAS as a graduation requirement. Warren, meanwhile, said she will vote to get rid of it.
The question has made for somewhat odd political bedfellows: It is Deaton, not Warren, who is lining up with the state’s Democratic governor on the issue. Maura Healey has said she supports keeping the MCAS requirement.
“We can’t have 351 standards” across the state’s many cities and towns, Deaton said, arguing the MCAS requirement offers an essential, uniform way of assessing which students are ready to move on from high school. “If you don’t have MCAS, and you have no standards, you’re going to get people graduating from high school that can’t fully speak English now in this state, and that puts them at a disadvantage.”
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/10/16/metro/warren-deaton-senate-mcas-ballot-question-2/
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