Assesses mandated state testing of schoolchildren

...Only test scores count in the formulas used to label schools...

...Thus, test-driven reform is primarily a corporate and conservative impulse, resembling the successful businessled efforts to impose "efficiency" on schools in the 1920s...

...Texas has failed to increase its scores on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) reading tests, despite gains on its state test, which suggests that teaching to the test is simply inflating scores on the state exams...

...Any formula, however, will have to contend with multiple problems— from technical adequacy to the politically charged issues of whether "too many" or "too few" schools are labeled—and then progress to sanctions...

...The testing battle will intensify in states and localities, providing many opportunities for engagement...

...Both versions require test results to be publicly reported at the school, district, and state levels, disaggregated by race, low-income, limited English proficiency, and special needs status...

...In fact, most states with high-stakes testing programs have not improved school quality...

...schools may well intensify, as schools continue to operate primarily as producers of a differentiated labor force...

...The challenge from civil rights groups to address the continuing, pernicious inadequacy of schools serving low-income children must be met, but not in isolation from other issues...

...Because tests are not adequate tools for controlling curriculum and instruction, real educational improvement cannot happen with test-driven reform...

...First, the legislation will impose far too much testing...

...The House bill requires all students to reach the "proficient" level on state tests within twelve years, exempting only pupils with severe special needs...

...Touted as a means to "leave no child behind," the emphasis on testing—coupled with the lack of adequate school funding and the absence of programs to address the needs of poor children, such as housing, nutrition, and medical care—means many children will be left behind...

...It is as dangerous to presume that schools can fix poverty as it is to assume that schools serving low-income children cannot improve even with inadequate resources...

...Proficient" is one level below the top on a state test...

...Test-driven reformers promise that schools serving low-income children will improve...

...The pro-testing group Achieve found that virtually no state test adequately assesses even the state's own standards...

...The demand for equality and justice in education cannot be reduced to test scores and test preparation...

...Thus, the support of testdriven school accountability by some civil rights and education groups is a very dangerous step: the path to high-quality schooling does not lead through standardized testing...

...More immediately, it centralizes control over schools by increasing state power, particularly in the majority of states that previously did not have statewide curricula...

...When tests are used for high-stakes purposes, teaching is reduced to test prep, both narrowing the tested subjects and often eliminating untested areas such as science and history and causing the end of recess, shortening of lunch periods, and similar forms of "speed up...

...BY THE TIME this is published, Congress likely will have mandated a massive in crease in state standardized testing and threatened harsh sanctions on schools that fail to make "adequate yearly progress" in raising test scores...

...Under the guise of high standards for all, tracking in U.S...

...Those children will still get an education enabling them to succeed in college...

...Some believe the accountability provisions will force states to increase funding for low-income districts—which most such districts sorely need...

...Indeed, the pressure to test more children more often will lead to lower quality instruments...

...These assessments can be and should be expanded...

...3) make the school a public charter (an approach that also has had mixed results...

...The Senate version differs primarily in that it has a slower, 1 percent per year test score progress requirement for the subgroups...

...Facing little coherent opposition from mainstream education and civil rights groups, the Senate and House passed plans to increase testing as part of the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), the major source of federal funds for schools...

...MONTY NEILL is executive director of the National Center for Fair & Open Testing (FairTest), 342 Broadway, Cambridge, MA 02139 (fairtest@fairtest.org...

...Third, the sanctions are both unworkable and dangerous...

...A school facing "restructuring" must do one of the following things, all of them unlikely to work: (1) replace teachers and administrators (which ignores the nationwide shortage of teachers and principals, particularly in urban districts...

...Every school and district in the nation, as well as the specified I2 n DISSENT / Fall 2001 subpopulations within each school and district, will have to make one-twelfth of the progress toward proficiency each year...

...Business groups, therefore, are among its most powerful supporters...

...Due to the technological limits of testing combined with practical limits on how much time can be spent on standardized testing, tests will not become adequate...

...This is a long-term battle, bound up closely with struggles for both social and educational justice...

...President George W. Bush has pushed hard for increased testing and test-based "accountability...

...or (4) be taken over by the state (there are few such cases, and they have not succeeded in producing academic improvement...

...The consequences for children, educators, and schools will be profound...

...Even the "model" states of North Carolina and Texas have low graduation rates, low college attendance and completion rates, and high grade-retention rates...

...www.fairtest.org...

...Political Complexities Test-driven reform, at state and now national levels, operates primarily as a means of intensifying schoolwork, and turns many schools into test preparation programs that focus on producing employees for lower-level jobs (only about one quarter of new jobs are projected to require college graduation) and providing more detailed information for employers to use in making hiring decisions...

...Unlike Bill Clinton and the senior Bush, George W. proposed not a national test but mandated state testing every child, every year, in grades three through eight, in reading and math, as well as once in high school...

...Unless the final bill includes measures such as graduation and grade-retention rates, schools will be rewarded for flunking low-scoring students (which virtually all research finds to be counterproductive) and driving them out of school...

...If a school or district that receives federal funding under Title I, Part A of ESEA fails to make this "adequate" progress, it will face interventions and then sanctions...

...According to research by Thomas Kane and Douglas Staiger, a key part of the problem is that year-to-year changes in test scores are highly volatile, and decisions made on such changes "resemble a lottery...

...Community forums, petitions, boycotts, rallies, public education, legislative initiatives, and more are becoming common means to address these tests...

...FORGE W.'s national testing plan is flawed in a number of ways—each of which ought to be a focus of opposition...

...Thus, this approach also has the support of some liberals and civil rights advocates...

...A series of studies, most released after both houses passed their bills, found that almost every school in the nation will end up being identified as failing if either model is used...

...Meanwhile, high quality assessments, ones that can help teaching and learning and provide relevant, rich information for public reporting and school improvement, already exist, as do wonderful schools serving low-income children...

...The White House recognized this outcome as politically untenable and began working with a congressional conference committee to design a system that would identify a far more limited number of schools, mostly those serving low-income students...

...Currently, only fifteen states mandate such extensive testing...

...Second, the use of tests alone to impose sanctions violates professional standards for proper test use and will cause substantial damG COMMENTS & OPINIONS age to students and schools...

...Multicultural emphases in education will also be endangered, making schools even less hospitable to low-income children of color facing endless drill and kill...

...We should argue instead for retaining the 1994 ESEA language, which requires states to assess students just once each in grades three through five, six through nine, and ten through twelve, in reading and math...

...The campaign for better schools and for supportive, rather than reductive or punitive, accountability must develop together with opposition to the overuse and misuse of standardized tests...

...Even if this testing scheme passes, opporDISSENT / Fall 2001 n I 3 COMMENTS & OPINIONS tunities to change the legislation will exist in coming years...

...2) turn the school over to private management (there are only a few hundred privately managed public schools in the country, and they have had mixed results...

...Schools serving rich children, however, do well enough on state tests to mostly ignore them...

...Across the nation, parents and educators are increasingly resisting high-stakes tests— tests used as a sole basis for making decisions about students or schools...

...It obviously provides good public relations for politicians for whom it is an attractive substitute for genuine, and more expensive, school improvement...

...A fixation on judging schools solely on test scores may also serve those who seek to privatize public education...