91吃瓜

By Matt Underwood

One of the worst chapters in the history of public education in our city聽is nearing a close with the recent聽. In the aftermath of the trial and its outcome, there has been quite a bit of discussion in the media about the case, much of it focused on whether or not the punishment for these educators was appropriate or not. It seems as though not a day goes by without someone new arguing one way or the other about the sentences.

In the midst of this onslaught of opinions, I came across a sharp piece by Daniel Koretz, a professor from the Harvard Graduate School of Education, whose research is focused on educational testing and whose views I鈥檝e聽shared before in my blog. Rather than get into the outcomes of the legal process, Koretz instead explores how the use of standardized testing has shifted markedly in the past 50 years from being used primarily alongside teacher reports and classroom work to provide complementary information about student learning to today鈥檚 use of standardized test scores as the main marker of student, teacher, and school 鈥渟uccess鈥� (or 鈥渇ailure鈥�). 聽, but here are two key takeaways and some commentary from me:

There is way too much pressure on students, teachers, and schools to raise test scores against often unreasonable targets. It鈥檚 clear from the APS case that the evidence shows those educators cheated and violated their contracts and code of ethics. It鈥檚 also clear that the聽expectations 鈥� both carrots and sticks 鈥� were way out of line in APS. Big monetary bonuses were offered up to school leaders for improved scores. And, of course, the need for those improved scores was to stay on track with arbitrary targets set up to be compliant with No Child Left Behind鈥檚 goal of 100% proficiency for all students on reading and math tests. As Koretz points out, Atlanta was not unique in this regard, and though the APS case has garnered lots of press,聽this combination of factors has led to聽.

Using test scores聽as the main basis for school and teacher accountability systems is simplistic and ignores many other indicators of a school鈥檚 or teacher鈥檚 effectiveness.聽Koretz says that the starting point for accountability systems needs to be 鈥渨hat we want to see when we walk into the classroom.鈥� Needless to say, for most of us, it鈥檚 not seeing only how students do on a multiple choice reading or math test. There are many other important 鈥� even more important, in my opinion 鈥� measures of a school or teacher鈥檚 success, including how students perform on real tasks of writing, research, and problem-solving, whether students can monitor and manage their emotional learning, and how well students can communicate verbally.

These points by Koretz are important to consider in the wake of the APS testing trial verdict. Many people have pointed out that students served by the convicted educators were cheated out of parts of their educational experience. 聽I don鈥檛 disagree. But unless and until we address the two points Koretz makes above, our accountability systems themselves are cheating students out of what could be聽more meaningful learning. For every convicted cheating educator, there are 1,000 others who聽work within the rules but engage in countless hours of test prep, teach聽students test-taking strategies, and work the system so that their students鈥� scores are as high as they can be. Those teachers are simply doing their job in a system that demands and rewards high test scores rather than more robust and holistic measures of student learning towards which these educators could be teaching.

Of course, it doesn鈥檛 have to be this way. We can use standardized test scores more sensibly, as they were originally intended to be used, by giving shorter tests at a few points over the year so as to have a better picture of student progress and to not put so much stock into one single score. We can use performance-based assessments in聽writing, research, problem-solving, and the like 鈥� 鈥漷ests鈥� upon which you cannot 鈥渃heat.鈥� Instead of using money for bonuses based on test scores, we could instead use those funds to equalize funding across schools since test results clearly show disparities in scores based on a school鈥檚 level of resources. Shifting the huge amount of time and resources currently poured into administering state standardized tests (like this week鈥檚 Georgia Milestones) into approaches such as these would, I think, result in teaching and learning we鈥檇 all like to see.

The educators in the APS case聽were convicted and now must face the punishments that will come 鈥� you鈥檒l get no argument from me on that point. But for all those who have expressed disgust with what those educators did, I hope that as much of their聽energy will be put into changing the flawed聽way聽we use test scores聽that鈥檚 equally at fault in this case, a system that is harming many more students on a daily basis than these educators ever did.

Matt Underwood is Executive Director of Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School

The views and opinions expressed on CharterConfidential聽are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any agency.聽聽

Georgia Charter Schools Association

The Georgia Charter Schools Association (91吃瓜) is the membership organization for Georgia鈥檚 charter school operators and petitioners, established in 2001. Our mission is to be an effective advocate and service provider for all charter public schools in Georgia.