more standardista propaganda

[Peter Farruggio <pfarr@cal.berkeley.edu>]

Today's NCLB story in the NY Times follows the 
standard pattern of presenting a propaganda piece 
disguised as news.  Notice how Dillon (or is it 
his editors?) limits his quoted sources to 
pro-high stakes mouthpieces (Ed Trust & Business 
Roundtable).  The spin here is the contention 
that "Oh, well, at least the testing regime has 
helped those poor kids at the bottom"  Of course, 
any informed critic could have noted that the 
"improvement" in those lower end scores is 
meaningless with regard to real learning and 
thinking, and most likely the result of drill and 
kill test prep.  But such a dose of reality might 
have exposed the hypocrisy of our top-down 
autocratic public education system that functions 
to keep the masses in their place.

Some eloquent letters to the editor might be 
useful, although I wouldn't count on the 
intellectual integrity of the Times editorial board to have them published.

Pete Farruggio


June 18, 2008


Report Sees Cost in Some Academic Gains

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/18/education/18child.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

By 
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/d/sam_dillon/index.html?inline=nyt-per>SAM 
DILLON

A 
<http://www.edexcellence.net/detail/news.cfm?news_id=732&id=17>new 
study argues that the nation?s focus on helping 
students who are furthest behind may have 
produced a Robin Hood effect, yielding steady 
academic gains for low-achieving students in 
recent years at the expense of top students.

The study, to be released on Wednesday, compared 
trends in scores on federal tests for the bottom 
10 percent of students nationwide with those for 
the top 10 percent and said those at the bottom 
moved up faster than those at the top.

In tests of fourth-grade reading from 2000 to 
2007, for instance, the scores of the 
lowest-achieving students increased by 16 points 
on a 280-point scale, compared with a gain of 
three points for top-achieving students, 
according to the study, by the Thomas B. Fordham 
Institute, a research organization in Washington.

The period of big gains for low achievers and 
minimal ones for high achievers coincides with 
the federal education law known as 
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/n/no_child_left_behind_act/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier>No 
Child Left Behind, which took effect in 2002. The 
study said that while it was impossible to know 
whether the law caused those scoring patterns, 
such a result would hardly be surprising, since 
the law made it a goal to reduce the gap 
separating low-scoring, poor and minority 
students from higher-scoring white students.

Under the law, schools are required to bring 
increasing percentages of students to proficiency 
in reading and math each year or face sanctions 
that can include the firing of staff members. As 
a result, many schools organize instruction 
around helping low-performing students reach minimal proficiency.

In the debate over the law, little attention has 
been paid to the languid growth among 
high-achieving students, a trend with troubling 
implications for the nation?s economic competitiveness.

?This is like sports,? said Chester E. Finn Jr., 
the institute?s president, who served in the 
Education Department under President 
<http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/r/ronald_wilson_reagan/index.html?inline=nyt-per>Ronald 
Reagan. ?If the only goal of a sports program is 
to get people over a three-foot hurdle, why would 
anybody be coached to get over a four-foot 
hurdle? They wouldn?t. So those who can already 
sail over a three-foot hurdle have no incentive 
to do anything except to sleep late.?

The report included results of a survey of a 
nationally representative sample of 900 teachers. 
Seven in 10 teachers said their schools were more 
likely to focus on struggling students than 
average or advanced students when tracking 
achievement data and trying to raise test scores. 
And about three-quarters of the teachers surveyed 
said they agreed with this statement: ?Too often, 
the brightest students are bored and 
under-challenged in school ­ we?re not giving 
them a sufficient chance to thrive.?

Amy Wilkins, a vice president at Education Trust, 
which lobbies for policies to help close the 
achievement gap, said the gains by low achievers 
should be applauded. ?My concern is that this 
report makes it seem like we have to choose 
between seeking equity and excellence,? she said. ?We need to strive for both.?

Susan Traiman, director of education policy at 
the Business Roundtable, a group that represents 
business executives, said the challenge was to 
improve the ability of schools to educate students across a range of levels.

?We?re producing progress at the bottom, and we 
need to maintain that,? Ms. Traiman said, ?but we 
need to ratchet up the performance of students at 
every achievement level if we?re going to be competitive.?