FW: [Schools Matter] Fear-Based Education on the Run

["Horn, James" <jhorn@monmouth.edu>]

The Editor' Cut <http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut?bid=7&pid=72868>  has a good commentary on the current bubble-bursting of the testing industry. Here' a clip to enjoy with coffee:


	Looks like the $2.3 billion standardized testing industry forgot to devise a much needed self-examination. 

	Two weeks ago, after two students paid fees to have their SATs rescored by hand, it was discovered that 4,000 students <http://www.slate.com/id/2137795/>  had received scores that were incorrectly low. A week later, the College Board announced that another batch of 1,600 exams had to be rescanned <http://www.cnn.com/2006/EDUCATION/03/24/sat.scoringerror.ap/> . The Washington Post now reports <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/03/23/AR2006032300377.html>  that another 27,000 exams still need to be rechecked. 

	Also two weeks ago, CTB/McGraw-Hill <http://www.ctb.com/>  acknowledged that questions from sample tests were mistakenly placed <http://www.nysut.org/newyorkteacher/2005-2006/060330mathtest3_8.html>  on the actual exam used by the NCLB regime to assess schools and students for 400,000 7th & 8th graders in New York. 

	And the banner month for the industry ended with the Educational Testing Service reaching an $11 million settlement with 27,000 people who were wrongly scored on their teacher certification exams, including 4,100 who were failed incorrectly. 

	As Robert Schaeffer, Public Education Director of the National Centerfor Fair & Open Testing <http://www.fairtest.org/>  (FairTest) puts it: "If you're waiting for the other shoe to drop - this is more like a centipede." 

The rest, here <http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut?bid=7&pid=72868> . 

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Posted by Jim Horn to Schools Matter <http://schoolsmatter.blogspot.com/2006/03/fear-based-education-on-run.html>  at 3/30/2006 07:05:00 AM