By George P. Hassett

Somerville teens led an MCAS reform rally last week at the State House urging lawmakers to take a second look at the test, six years after it became a graduation requirement.

Greg Rego, an 18-year old- Somerville resident told a group of 200 Boston-area high school students of his personal struggles with the high-stakes Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System test. He said he was never given notice of the test until the day it came and after failing twice by a combined 3 points, dropped out of school.

“I’m just one voice out of all the teenagers in Massachusetts that have to deal with this potentially life-altering test. Maybe some students have no problem with it. For them it’s just an annoying bump in the road that they have to deal with. For others, it’s a make-or-break situation that determines the future of their education,” he said

In the five years after MCAS became a graduation requirement, drop out rates in Massachusetts’s high schools increased 32 percent to 11,145 kids out of school.

“That’s 10,000 young people on the streets with nothing to do,” said Teen Empowerment Director Stanley Pollack as he paced back and forth surrounded by cheering teens. “We can talk about numbers and numbers but this is about real people’s lives!”

State Rep. Carl M. Sciortino filed the bill that would keep the test in schools but eliminate it as a make or break graduation requirement. When he asked the room how many people knew someone who had dropped out, nearly all young hands went up.

The teens walked through State House halls and dropped off cards in Gov. Deval Patrick’s office that read: “Thousands of Massachusetts students suffer the unintended consequences of MCAS:increased drop out rates, stagnant or growing achievement gaps, and schools more focused on testing than on providing a well rounded education.

“Please support MCAS reform and help save our students.”

Sciortino said he expects the bill to come before legislators for a vote by April. So far Patrick has been responsive to the idea of reform, he said. However, in published reports Patrick has said he would like to see passing the test remain a graduation requirement for high school students in the state.

Critics of MCAS have said it unfairly hurts urban students, increases drop-out rates and narrows classroom curriculum only to subjects covered on the test.

Alexis Ramos a junior at Somerville High School, said her classes are shaped by the test.

“And what do you after you take a test? Most kids forget everything because they won’t need to use it again,” she said.

Anna Rodriguez, a SHS sophomore, said MCAS performance should be one factor in the overall evaluation of a student.

“It shouldn’t make or break our future,” she said.

The Massachusetts Teachers Association also called for MCAS reform at the rally on Wednesday, Feb. 13.

But some people like the test just how it is. Former State Sen. Thomas Birmingham, one of the architects of the 1993 Education Reform Bill that spawned the test, has spoken out against reform and the day of the rally the Boston Globe published an opinion piece by Scott Lehigh denouncing reform efforts.