SPRINGFIELD – Next year will be a year of transition for Springfield students when it comes to mandatory testing.

School Superintendent Daniel Warwick told members of the School Committee on Dec. 17 that Springfield students in grades 3 through 8 would be taking the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) exam next year.

Tenth graders will continue to take the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System (MCAS).

In 2017, students will be given the new MCAS exam, which Warwick said would be designed to have elements of the PARCC.

He dubbed it “MCAS 2.0.”

He believes having the PARCC test next year will help prepare students with the new MCAS. Warwick added the students will take the PARCC exam on paper rather than online as test results from the last PARCC strongly showed students taking on paper performed better.

In another issues, the superintendent praised Kristen Hughes, the principal of the White Street School who in two years has elevated the school from Level 4 status to level 1. This is the second time a city school has made such a performance leap.

During the speak-out portion of the meeting Timothy Collins, president of the Springfield Education Association, shared two political developments with the committee. He said a report from a legislative committee has determined that state funding for education (Chapter 70 funds) “are no longer adequate and are not equitable.”

He urged the committee to speak with the Springfield delegation to support a new formula to determine educational funding.

Collins also spoke of possible legislation that would keep the current cap on charter schools. He noted that 9 percent of the city’s school funding goes to charter schools and while they are, by law, supposed to reflect the demographic make-up of a community, he charged they do not.

Collins asserted students who are more expensive to educate, such as the poor, the disabled, English Language Learners and refugee students are not served by charter schools.

He claimed a growth of charter schools would “lead to the re-segregation of public schools.”

He said the issue is of “critical importance to the children of public schools.”

He also charged some charter schools have “counseled out” students who have been seen to threaten the schools test scores or graduation rates.