"This was part of a deal," said Alison Franklin '90, an aid to Senate President Thomas F. Birmingham '72, who has been one of the strongest champions of education reform.

"The state would double funding for local schools...and in exchange, there would be accountability at the local level for the performance of local schools," she added.

Proponents of MCAS say education reform has spurred important changes in curriculum, like a new focus on writing and analytical thinking.

Along with MCAS, the Education Reform Act created standardized curriculum guidelines. Now, school districts are scrambling to update their curriculum.

"The pace of change has picked up rapidly over the last three years," said Andrew Calkins '79, a school committee member from the Hamilton-Wenham school district. "There's a lot of activity happening now that wasn't happening before."

After they passed the Arlington resolution, delegates rejected a more strongly worded resolution that would have urged the "prohibition" of MCAS as a graduation requirement, rather than calling for its suspension until other assessments are developed. The margin was closer, 43-85.

Some delegates said they were surprised the stronger resolution was not passed. Others said they had decided to support both resolutions because they did not see much difference between them.

But many delegates said they worried that ruling out MCAS would be going too far. The Arlington resolution sent a strong enough message, they said.