Improving Tests Won't Solve Real Problems

[Bob Schaeffer <bobschaeffer@earthlink.net>]

IMPROVING THE TESTS WON'T SOLVE LARGER QUESTIONS
Education Week -- Letter to the Editor
March 1, 2006

To the Editor:

Education Sector’s report “Margins of Error: The Education Testing 
Industry in the No Child Left Behind Era” accurately analyzes the 
serious limitations of the testing industry’s products, documenting the 
sad reality that state exams overemphasize low-level skills and 
thinking, with harmful effects on teaching and learning ("U.S. Should Do 
More to Aid States in Developing Tests, Report Says," Feb. 1, 2006).

But the report fails to grasp that modest improvements in test quality 
will not solve the larger problem that teaching to the test narrows and 
dumbs down the curriculum.

The report touts the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System 
exams. But MCAS reviews by the nonprofit Coalition for Authentic Reform 
in Education found that “the tests were very much like all the other 
standardized tests,” and that they “are likely to dampen student 
achievement by undermining quality.” Because the exams are “eminently 
coachable,” the group said, “test scores are likely to improve without 
much attention by teachers to genuine content.”

Similarly, teams of academics examined New York’s language arts, 
history, and science Regents exams, finding them low-level, often 
focused on trivia, and unrelated to college work.

Recently, I reviewed the MCAS and the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and 
Skills language arts tests. For one section on each, I read only the 
questions, then answered eight or nine of the 12 items correctly. If I 
had gone back to skim the passage, my correct-answer rate would have 
been higher.

Last year, Achieve Inc. asked college professors what incoming 
first-year students need to be able to do in order to succeed. Most of 
their list cannot be assessed well by standardized exams: write extended 
works, critically read and respond to complex materials, reason 
scientifically, and be orally proficient.

If our nation is serious about high-quality education for all children, 
it cannot continue to mandate accountability programs tying high stakes 
to standardized tests. Rather than waste vast sums on more standardized 
exams, school systems, states, and the federal government should support 
professional development that focuses on classroom—and especially 
formative—assessment.

Monty Neill
Executive Director
National Center for Fair & Open Testing
(FairTest)
Cambridge, Mass.
Vol. 25, Issue 25, Page 31