"This is an interesting look at testing in Minnesota. One of the creators of NWEA/MAP tests (which are vastly superior to MCAs, imo) talks at some length at what standardized tests do well and what they don't." Annie.MinnPost High Stakes Testing Trends
I think I agree that MAP tests are better than the MCA's, and have often wondered that the MN Dept of Ed doesn't standardize on them as the State's "measurement" tool. I am guessing they may be somewhat more expensive and the need to take them on a computer may make it difficult in some school districts. Ironically in a world where the schools and Teachers complain about too much testing, Robbinsdale gives the MAP tests 2 or 3 times a year to monitor growth and forecast how the kids will do on the MCA's.
As for Jim Angermeyr's comments in the interview, I thought they were lacking. His comments imply that he thinks high stakes testing and NCLB are not improving things, and that we should go back to local control with apparently no higher level quality monitoring. Which strangely is where we were when all those kids were being Left Behind.
Also, he mentions that the money spent on Grad tests and the required catch up classes could be spent better elsewhere. Apparently passing the Left Behind kids without even an effort to catch them up is acceptable to him. Very odd...
As a counterpoint, here are a couple of opinion pieces by Charlie Weaver from the Star Tribune. He seems to make more sense to me. Maybe it is a private sector business results thing...
Star Tribune: State schools score better like magic
Star Tribune: Is Education Measuring Up?
Thoughts?
2 comments:
Something investors immediately view with great suspicion are changes in a company's accounting rules, like how inventory is valued or reserves booked for anticipated receivables losses. They will insist on more clarification and likely raise the required return on their investment.
So it is here, that we seem to be constantly changing the testing so that year to year comparisons are difficult, or as reported: explainable, understandable, ... But accountability is immediately lost for another two years at least with every such change, as Charlie Weaver in effect says.
It's the same old story: when the needs of the students conflict with the wants of the educators, guess who wins? "I'd like to help you son, but you're too young to vote."
Excellent comment !!! Our company has tweaked accounting systems lately and I have no idea how good we are doing in real terms...
What frustrated me most is that he said the results from NCLB were uncertain or lacking. Which of course makes sense to me since all the Educational System did was complain about the "Harsh Grading" criteria for 10 yrs instead of implementing aggressive actions to fix the problem that had been identified.
If my daughters spent a semester complaining about that "Harsh Teacher / Grading" instead of changing their perspective and behaviors to succeed under the new criteria. They would continue to get D's and continue complaining about how tough and unfair it was. Whereas we have coached them to be flexible and strive to succeed by whatever criteria a Teacher sets, thus they keep getting A's. And usually at the end they understand the Teacher wasn't actually that "Harsh", they just had high stds that they stood by.
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