Excellent Opinion Piece on K-12 Testing

[Bob Schaeffer <bobschaeffer@EARTHLINK.NET>]

     TWO DECADES OF SCHOOL REFORMS TAKE US BACK TO THE 1950S
         Los Angeles Times -- Sunday, February 18, 2001
                         by Larry Cuban

     STANFORD--Since "A Nation at Risk" judged U.S. schools to be
mediocre enough to endanger the economic future of the country, school
reform has become a major industry. In the past two decades, a coalition
of corporate executives, public officials and business groups has
pressed the remedy of imitating corporate organizations. Presidents,
mayors, business executives and parents have repeatedly stressed that
the primary purpose of public schools is to prepare students
academically for an expanding job market that keeps the U.S. economy
productive and globally competitive.
     Toward that end, educators established standards-based curricula,
monitored test scores, had students repeat a grade or a subject and
rewarded or punished teachers and principals when scores rose or fell.
This approach has become a state-driven formula for urban, suburban and
rural schools. Yet, continued concentration on standards, tests and
accountability hardly benefits students, the economy or the nation.
Here's why:
     * Based on past ventures, predictable consequences will occur.
     Instructional time will be increasingly allocated to test
preparation. Political pressure on policymakers will lead to easier
tests or to the lowering of the cutoff passing score to reduce the
number of students who fail to receive a diploma or repeat grades.
Massachusetts, Virginia and Arizona have already done this.
     If there is any agreement among standardized-test designers, it is
that, over time, teachers and administrators become familiar with the
skills being tested, allocate time to prepare their students and,
voila!, test scores rise. Test makers then re-norm their tests to make
them harder, and policymakers choose different tests. Voila! Test scores
dip. Teachers are blamed, and the cycle repeats itself. Ethnic and
racial gaps in academic achievement persist.
     * Standardized tests and strict accountability matter little for
either future job or long-term academic performance.
     Because these tests are the tools that policymakers depend on to
hold teachers, administrators and students responsible for their
performance, there should be, at a minimum, convincing evidence
supporting linkage between tests, future academic success and workplace
performance. Very little exists.
     Consider the standardized tests that elementary and
secondary-school students take repeatedly as they move toward
graduation. Employers seldom, if at all, use individuals' scores from
these tests to screen applicants. No economist claims that these scores
predict performance in the office or at the workbench. Ah, but there is
the SAT (Scholastic Achievement Test).
     The SAT (and similar instruments) predict something: how well
students will do academically in their first year of college. These
tests, however, cannot determine which students will get a degree or how
well they will do as lawyers, engineers, teachers or chefs. What matters
far more than test scores is whether students receive diplomas and other
credentials. Employers use these as evidence that applicants come to
work on time, are persistent, flexible and work well with others.
Credentials matter because they signal employers that entry-level
workers have certain basic attitudes and behaviors that can be molded to
company needs.
     * A one-size-fits-all strategy disregards diversity in U.S.
schools.
     About one in 10 schools in the nation exceeds the high academic
standards and threshold for test scores laid out by its states. Another
four to five either meet or come close to their state's standards and
cutoff scores. The rest don't. Most of these schools are located in
urban and rural districts with concentrations of poor families.
     Yet, the current recipe for school reform is to hammer this
three-tiered system of academic achievement into one mold. It seeks to
lift the bottom: urban and rural students who fail, drop out or do
poorly on standardized tests. Concentrating on those students is
important not only on economic but also on moral grounds. Forcing all
schools to fit into the same mold, however, ignores students who already
meet or exceed the standards. A one-size-fits-all formula compresses all
schools into one version of a good school: a 1950s traditional school
with high test scores.
     For nearly 200 years, the public has wanted schools to do many
things. Schools are expected to create communities of children in which
learning and decency are valued; to build literate citizens who judge
wisely and who contribute to their communities; and to prepare students
to become useful workers for a bustling economy.
     It is this latter goal that drives the current one-size-fits-all
school reforms endorsed by President George W. Bush, governors and
mayors. Creating adults who can think independently, make wise
decisions, participate in their communities and care for those who are
different from themselves may be mentioned in speeches but is hardly
central to the reform agenda of the last two decades.
     What should be done?
     For starters, focus on urban and rural schools with high
concentrations of poverty. While Bush's plan for education moves in this
direction, it is guided by narrowly conceived goals of more tests
without any attention to what poverty does to families even before
children come to school. More Head Start programs, better housing, added
health services and increased job training are just a few initiatives
found in scores of federal and state programs that can be consolidated
and coordinated through schools to help families. Ignoring poverty and
the larger community undermines test-based school reform.
     Reform cheerleaders over the past two decades should publicly admit
that test scores are not measures of school productivity or necessarily
beneficial to the U.S. economy. Moreover, they need to acknowledge that
test scores tell parents and taxpayers little about how well high school
graduates will do in college and in the workplace.
     Furthermore, a much broader menu of "good" schools than reformers
offer is needed. In these years of testing frenzy, schools that are
democratic, arts-based and progressive still dot the academic landscape.
They are in alternative schools, charter schools, schools-within-a
school. But because they lack rigorous assessments tied to standardized
test scores, they are viewed as deviant and in need of correction rather
than working models of the rich and historic goals of tax-supported
public schooling.
     The victory of market-oriented reformers has brought us to the
unfortunate point in our two-century history of U.S. public schools
where the best schools are the ones with the highest test scores.
Beliefs that test scores help students become better workers in an
information-based economy, and help the larger society become more
competitive, are false. Equally untrue is that schools with high test
scores have to be good. Many types of good schools exist in big cities,
suburbs and small towns if we can only look beyond the simple-minded
economic thinking that has produced the current one-size-fits-all
school.
                              - - -
Larry Cuban Is a Professor of Education at Stanford University

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from the ARN-L list, send command SIGNOFF ARN-L
to LISTSERV@LISTS.CUA.EDU.