Cooking the Books -- Public School Style...

[tybrad]

Originally Posted by bhunter

Gee, After reading that article, I feel like joining the teachers union. Objective measures are the only criteria to get some idea of teacher performance. Why do you think University matriculates need so much remedial work? I'd suggest it's a failure caused by most, not all, teachers and their administrators. Spending has dramatically increased for education and yet the results have declined. Some children do need to be left behind.

The article attempts to place blame on the testing requirement and not on the failure and actions of the teachers. That's pure BS. Given any criteria, there will be a certain percentage of people that will cheat. Teaching to the test as something inherently bad only means that the test is not adequate. I would think that the objective of education is to be able to answer the questions on such a test, and thus, good teaching, teaching to the test, ought do exactly that. How else does one tell whether a student is meeting a minimum standard? Teacher evaluations have the exact same problem, namely, some might cheat. Standardized test have the benefit of revealing teaching by statistical analysis and other techniques that can be employed. Further, a teacher caught cheating ought be terminated immediately and forfeiture of all benefits.

What I put in bold... that right there is NOT teaching or educating; it's training, and is a piss-poor thing to have to do to young adults. The implicitly mandated (Feds, on down) need for teaching to tests is precisely what has taken the fun, the wonder, and the education out of education. You just would not believe the completely scripted, no-time-to-explore-a-student's-question that may take the lesson off of its pre-described path situation in biology. No time for spontaneity; see something related in the news? Can't explore it... that was yesterday's lesson, and that is a TRAVESTY. And all of the subject tested areas are the same way- they are dry, delivered matter-of-factly, tested in a factual regurgitative way, and is uninteresting for students. When/if that reaches my subject, I'm gone. I pray that it does not.

It's really no wonder about where it has gone since the 80's- student worlds are expanding, and what teachers can do in education is narrowing. Youtube is blocked, legit sites are blocked with the clumsy, draconian filtering software that is in place. Minimum standards on these sorts of tests (I am speaking from the Maryland HSA perspective); a mile wide, 1/2 inch deep? Rote learning- the lowest/most primitive form of learning? Is that what really ought to be going on? By the time students get to HS, it should be about thinking, problem-solving, and synthesis to prepare for college, trade (God forbid, in the atmosphere of education today!), and for informed and productive citizenship. C'mon guys...

Tyler