Lieutenant Governor Kim Reynolds says it may be time to require an exit exam for graduating high school seniors in Iowa.
‘That’s one of the things we want to take a look at. That’s been very effective in Massachusetts,” Reynolds says. “…Maybe that would be one of the strong assessments that we could put in place that would gauge that they have grasped what we intended them to learn in high school.”
The former commissioner of education in Massachusetts will be a keynote speaker at the education summit Governor Branstad plans to host in Des Moines this summer.
“We are especially interested in hearing him talk about setting high standards and putting strong assessments place, such as Massachusetts have done, in their high school exit exam,” Reynolds says.
Students in Massachusetts score highest on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. The Iowa summit on education is scheduled for July 25 and 26. The governor and lieutenant governor plan to host town hall meetings around the state as well as three “roundtable discussions” with education and business leaders in the weeks before the summit.