The test scores for most charter schools, like most public schools, declined sharply on the new Smarter Balanced tests of the Common Core.
Rocketship charters, in particular, did poorly.
The typical response of charter leaders was not to complain that the tests are biased and unreliable (which they are), but to say, showing grit, “We will have to up our game.” I suppose that means they weren’t trying hard enough until they got the scores.
Will the sobering news burst the charter bubble? Of course not. Too much money riding on their proliferation.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Key word there is ‘game’.
This should wake up those that are in favor of Charter Schools.
Since when did “no excuses” schools suddenly come up with so many excuses?
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“We will have to up our game.”
This probably means some or all corporate Charters will introduce—-if they aren’t already doing it—-the practice of public shaming and this might include caning like they do on stage in front of an entire school’s student population in Singapore.
Caning is a form of corporal punishment (see that article for generalities and alternatives) consisting of a number of hits (known as “strokes” or “cuts”) with a single cane usually made of rattan, generally applied to the offender’s bare or clothed buttocks (see spanking) or hand(s) (on the palm).
Caning is a widely used form of legal corporal punishment in Singapore. It can be divided into several contexts: judicial, prison, reformatory, military, school, and domestic or private. These practices of caning are largely a legacy of, and are influenced by, British colonial rule in Singapore.
Don’t forget Pearson is a UK company and the British introduced this form of corporal punishment to Southeast Asia.
In fact, it seems that a significant number of Americans were once in favor of the caning, claiming that Singapore had a right to use corporal punishment and that the United States did not mete out severe enough punishment to its own juvenile offenders.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_P._Fay
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Here is a sobering thought. What if the charter students also opted out? What then? Clearly, the charters can’t tell us how great a job they do by the tests…and are going to up their game…what if there was no result to measure, the way the love to measure, by tests?
Opt out in a charter=Kicked out
“The Charter Bubble”
The bubble is expanding
At astronomical speed
By Hubble’s understanding:
Disastronomical greed
The larger the bubble, the louder the explosion when it pops.
If it is still on earth when it pops, it will make a loud sound, but what about charters on the moon?
Some day, astronomers will undoubtedly study the charter bubble through their telescopes or at least the gaseous remains stretching out across the galaxy.
Yep, they will be alien astronomers on another planet around another star and they will scratch their heads wherever those heads are located on their bodies and wonder what caused our star to go nova.
The lead alien will say, “That star should have survived another 5 billion years. We have to send a team there to study this. What if the same thing happens to us? If we know the cause, we have a better chance to avoid an early demise.”
If those aliens genes were intermixed with American voters genes, their heads will by under their armpits, hiding from reality.
I’m thinking of another orifice much lower than the armpits.
I dream of a day when “upping your game” means all schools will deliver a solid curriculum and unparalleled support systems to aid all students (especially those in impoverished environments where resources are abysmal), resources are plenty (like in my current engineering position), parents will step up, and the rethuglicans step out, to produce American citizens. Schools with a purpose, with a true vision to produce productive, aware, and knowledgeable American citizens. If only it were that easy.
” ‘We will have to up our game.’ I suppose that means they weren’t trying hard enough until they got the scores. ”
“Up our game” could mean that test taking is like poker, you up the ante to increate the stakes.
But test taking is not a game, or if so, not one that students are choosing. Grownups and the people who work in testing companies are making up all of the rules.
The phrase probably means that students will face more practice in taking tests to increase the odds of getting the right answer. In that case, it would be good idea to get into the mathematical theory of games.
Early in the 20th century Emile Borel, French mathematician hoped to identify the “best” strategy for a given game whether poker or war. He gave special attention to bluffing and the role of “imperfect information” about all of the other players. An enduring contribution is The Infinite Monkey Theorem.-given an unlimited number of monkeys, and an unlimited supply of working typewriters, the theorem predicts the monkeys will eventually produce a particular text (e.g. Shakespeare’s Hamlet) or solve any problem. The Infinite Monkey Theorem assumes random inputs can produce all possible outcomes if there are no limits on time and resources. (Among other uses, the theorem guides work on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence project).
In 2002, some researchers tried a “limited” empirical test of the theorem by placing six monkeys in a cage with a computer. The monkeys typed “s” more than any other letter. They also urinated on the computer and hit it with a rock. One could say that “upping the game” for kids in school is just a matter of spending more time on test prep in the hope of scoring high on the latest timed test.
“Upping the game” for charter schools could also mean looking for more talent, cherry-picking students. The ideal? Consider John Von Neumann. From childhood he had a photographic memory. He could memorize a page from a phone book and recite it. He succeeded in every school subject. Born in 1903, he had earned a Ph.D. in mathematics with minors in physics and chemistry by age 23.
John Von Neumann also “upped the game” in 1944, with the game-changing volume, “Theory of Games Economic Behavior,” with co-author and economist Oskar Morgenstern. That volume revolutionized the study of economics and many other fields where there are problems of finding the best strategy for making decisions under conditions of uncertainty—psychology, sociology, politics, and 20th century wars of mutually assured destruction (acronym MAD)—the zero-sum game. Von Neumann died of cancer in 1959, likely induced by the radiation he received as a witness to the atomic tests on Bikini atoll.
In the urban dictionary “upping the game” means to try harder or to play dirtier.
Another meaning of “upping the ante” is making the win-lose stakes even higher than they once were.
That seems to be the dominant strategy for early 21st century education, test-driven, with outcomes designed to declare relatively few students winners. That is the game being played with this generation as if education is only a game… of Trivial Pursuit.
Stop thinking that education as a competitive game of being one-up, or racing to the top, or casting them in the role of a winner or looser as early as pre-school and Kindergarten.
“Upping our game” = even longer work days and more productivity harassment for teachers, and more test prep for students…