A reader comments:
We shall win this. Of that I am certain. And we shall do so because the failures of this insanely misguided test-and-evaluate mania become clearer and clearer with each passing day. This terrible idea is self-defeating.
The question is, how long will it take? How much damage will be done before local schools and teachers will once again be given the autonomy to put learning and the particular needs and propensities of their students first?
(I cringe every time I read of the organization Students First, which has worked tirelessly to put students, with their unique needs and propensities, LAST.)
Arne Duncan will come to be known as the worst national education leader in history. His name will be infamous. And NCLB will come to be universally recognized as a blight upon the land. But how much damage will be done until these truths become abundantly clear to everyone?
There are very encouraging signs. There is a new coalition appearing of folks on the right and the left who oppose the testing and evaluation mania. When our children and our basic values are under attack, we put aside our differences and band together against the attackers. How horrific that we should be having to defend our children against our own government and a band of clueless plutocrats.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I am not a conspiracy theorist/believer. However, I do see a broad spectrum of privatization of nearly every aspect of our lives, so that the ones who are able to make the most money can take even more from the many and keep it for the few. People are even stating that water needs to be privatized, even rain water. When everything is considered to be a “for profit” venture, we will have returned to the Middle Ages. As long as those of us who are educated, not test-drones, have a voice, there will be opportunity to stop this in its tracks … education, social security, retirement systems, environment, political voice, and even water cannot continue to be oppressed in favor of the few.
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I think you mean a *Broad* spectrum…. 😉
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LOL. I thought that as I typed it.
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Maybe we should start/counter with TRUTH FIRST.
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Good point.
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TRUE!
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With our continued “education” of fellow teachers, parents and other voters the politicians will realize that our vote cannot be bought! No matter how much campaign money they receive from the corporate reformers, they will lose in the ballot box!
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The real question is, “How much damage has already been done and how much more will we tolerate?”
I received the latest AFT-News email today. There was not one mention of the fight against the reformers; instead, we were treated to an acceptance of the Obama budget plan, questioning only social security. There was a mention somewhere near the bottom of the page about the fight about Chicago schools, but most of the stories had nothing whatsoever to do with education or our resistance. It was sickening.
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Yes. Unfortunately, our union leaders are complicit in this reform movement.
Just yesterday, one local union vice-president just touted New Haven’s reform movement as the best in the country.
For who?
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Thanks for your comments, William. Now, let’s get down to brass tacks, shall we? WHO “is” the union? (I should say “are,” because, of course, we must include the NEA in this hot mess–leadership endorsing Obama MONTHS before the convention w/o even ASKING the rank-&-file!) WE are the union! Therefore, the continuation of poor/complicit leadership is ultimately our fault, as we allow it to continue. Once again, we must point to the CTU, CORE and Karen Lewis. The nationals need a CORE, as do the states. (New York–good luck to MORE.) People, get cracking!
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens
can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
-Margaret Mead
Yes, WE can!!!
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I emphatically agree that WE are the union! But, our AFT-CT leadership disagrees. I tried to talk about these issues with Melodie Peters, the President of AFT-CT, who became very angry with me and told me to “never talk to her again!” She does not want us to get involved or even advocate that our union take the lead in organizing teachers to begin the fight back. She will not hear of such a thing, describing any activism as, “arm waiving and screaming by wild-eyed radicals!”
Therefore, we MEMBERS of AFT must act without the support of our union leadership. They will not help us.
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sickening indeed. complicity a the top
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I find myself thinking about the result of the damage a lot. When the nation is filled with charter schools and the needle hasn’t moved on academic improvement, people will wonder what they gave up. Community schools, qualified people receiving an acceptable salary, community spirit, social diversity and so on.
But then, it may be too late to prevent it. It’s why our voices are important now.
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For whatever faults public education may have, the solutions that are being dreamed up are disasters. Look at the common core, start testing before a solid curriculum for it is developed and taught? That is beyond stupid. Closing over 50 schools in Chicago? What will that look like next September? A cluster of class A proportions.
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Thank you for your tireless efforts.
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Dear Reader,
I read Diane’s blog regularly and truly do not understand the thinking of most of Diane’s contributors. “Win This Battle for Our Future”? What is this war you are fighting? Are you a teacher? Parent? Concerned citizen?
I am a teacher with 14 grandchildren and I stay connected to education because of them. In Minneapolis we graduate only one of every two high school students. If Arne Duncan, Students First or anyone else can change the horrible statistics to high school graduation, I am for them.
Last week I was at the annual NCTM convention (8,000 teachers strong) in Denver. I was totally impressed with what I witnessed. If only I were 20 years younger. The opportunities in the field of education are immense. Change is coming and it rests with Free the Teachers, Vouchers and market-weighted considerations.
Dick Velner – Parent, Teacher and Curriculum Principal
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Dick, the preliminary data on the things you are touting doesn’t match your enthusiasm for them. It’s only going to get worse.
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To Dick Veiner: What exactly is a “Curriculum Principal”. Sounds like something cooked up by a charter school.
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First, if you don’t understand “the thinking of most of Diane’s contributors”, then you either haven’t really been reading, or you need a teacher to help you with your reading comprehension. If you disagree with “the thinking of most of Diane’s contributors”, then feel free to say so and say why, but don’t pretend that the arguments haven’t been crystal clear.
Second, why don’t you go ask your grandkids what they think about standardized testing? And, better yet, test prep? And while you’re at it, why don’t you ask them if they’d be interested in attending a KIPP-style “no excuses” sort of school where they can pay fines or spend time in a “re-eduation room” for having their shoes untied or failing to track the teacher with their eyes even momentarily?
And third, how can you defend charter schools with no accountability or community input/oversight when we have this: http://charterschoolscandals.blogspot.com/ ?
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“In Minneapolis we graduate only one of every two high school students.”
You have a 50% graduation rate in the city of Minn.?
I believe the national stat is 90% of people 18-24 have a HS diploma.
http://healthindicators.gov/Indicators/High-school-completion-adults-18-24-years-percent_565/Profile/Data
Are you sure the 50% is not one of those manufactured statistics where any kid that did not graduate exactly on time (precisely 4 years from the moment he entered 9th grade), or who obtained a special ed diploma, or who moved back to their home country…or any other slightly unusual thing…gets counted as “not graduating” and is thus peddled as a “drop out”?
Just asking.
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http://www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/results/edu/graduation
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Hi Laura,
Thanks for the link.
The 50% IS Minnesota’s cohort-adjusted graduation rate.
So, yes, it appears to be one of those manufactured statistics that Diane has written about.
Any kid who took an extra class over the summer and then graduated or did not pass the various tests (even those who have IEP’s), or had to re test over the summer and then passed or who earned a GED, or who was ESOL and took another year to learn English and pass the classes and tests, etc, etc, etc, is counted in the 50% who “did not graduate”.
Nice.
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Dick,
“The opportunities in the field of education are immense.”
Spoken like a true privatizer!
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Exactly!
I was thinking; opportunity for whom? Opportunity to do what?
Adults to make money, I suppose, because we have no evidence of any of this “deform” being an opportunity for students to love learning, over come poverty, or develop critical thinking skills,or anything else.
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14 grandchildren! A great blessing, that!
Dick, in schools across the country now, a third of the year is being spent a) doing test prep, b) taking practice tests, and c) taking tests. Every teacher I know tells me that he or she has almost no time left for the kids, especially since, in addition to all that, he or she is spending countless hours each week doing “data chats.” The opportunity cost of all this is staggering.
Here’s an analogy. Years ago, I went out and bought some project management software. I thought, this will be great. I will be able to track every resource down to the minute and the penny. But after a few weeks of using it, I realized that I was spending HALF MY TIME updating my stupid PERT and GANTT charts. I threw the crap away and started, again, walking around and interacting with my staff.
That was the job, BTW, that I took when I left teaching–you know, the one that paid me three times as much as I made in the classroom.
You want to fix the problem in Minneapolis? Then fix the poverty in Minneapolis. But that can’t be done easily, can it? It’s much easier to believe in magic, in the relatively less expensive toxic voodoo medicines of high-stakes testing and value-added measurement.
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I got out a chuckle out of your reaction to the project management software. That’s just what I wanted to do with all the data I was supposed to be tracking. My lack of data dedication was used as one excuse for not rehiring me. As you found out, if I spent all my time keeping track of the data generated automatically not to mention that which I was supposed to collect with some unnamed generated tracking system that was useful until Pearson bought it and turned it into a cash cow, my students would have been little more to me than their ID numbers.
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Soapbox: Certainly, there are problems in some schools. Teachers are human. We have problems, too. We have personal and health problems. We age. We slow down. But, this whole movement seems to “throw the baby out with the bathwater” when it comes to 1) aging teachers, 2) retirement, 3) teacher health and stress, and 4) most importantly, the harm to students in the long term.
To just bulldoze their way into the educational system is destructive to all concerned. If I were to make any suggestions, it would be to invest in the time and training needed to help all teachers understand how to implement change, give them input, and release them from the fear of being fired if they aren’t as fast as the younger TFA crowd at adapting to rapid changes. They have pulled the rug out from under so many good, dedicated people. They have hurt so many children. They are ruining communities, creating more problems, and offer no solutions to the problems that they say exist. They have merely replaced humans and their lives with “efficient” IT types who will move along and be unable and possibly uninterested in the caring and humanity that is required to be a teacher (same for policemen, firement, EMTs, and other disrespected government workers).
I have said for years to my colleagues that the teaching profession has been moved from being maternal to paternal. It has begun to lose the ground it gained in the 80s and 90s to receive pay that is equal to their dedication and education. I feel that because of the nurturing aspect required to love the kids while teaching them, the teaching profession is now in the same boat as mothers felt they were for all those years in the 40s-70s. Now that teachers have gained a salary that is more in line with professional earnings than part time and “women’s wages” many in the public can’t deal with it.
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I see two futures possible: one where relatively affluent parents opt out of the system altogether and become indifferent the need to abandon the testing regimen; and one where relatively affluent parents become indignant and push back against the system. Wealthy parents have no reason to squawk now: their kids are attending either private schools or public schools where the mandated tests are a nuisance but not a threat. But many relatively affluent parents (i.e. what’s left of the middle class) are beginning to bridle at the limited curriculum their children have because of testing. Their kids are attending schools that are “failing” because of the performance a disaggregated cohort is not progressing fast enough or the school isn’t meeting some statistically artificial benchmark. If this group of parents pushes back against testing in a unified fashion privatization of public education will wither. But if too many relatively affluent parents decide to opt out of public school altogether privatization will prevail.
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… to the demise of our society at large.
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wgersen. A wise analysis.
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They’re poor students
Last week one of the students I try to help teach, came to school very excited and couldn’t wait to tell me that he and his brother had just gotten a bunk bed and no longer had to sleep on the floor. When I shared this with a teacher, she told me that an informal survey conducted by teachers at our school revealed that about a third of our students either sleep on floors or with their parents. The just completed star test will doubtlessly again show ours to be a “failing school.”
From: The real problem in education: the ‘opportunity gap’
One thing the book makes clear is that our achievement gaps arise out of our opportunity gaps, and it also makes clear that those opportunity gaps are cumulative and involve much more than formal schooling.
Last week, UNICEF released a report on child poverty in 35 developed countries. The US came in 34th, second to last – between Bulgaria and Romania, two much poorer countries overall. 23% of children in the US live in poverty. In Finland, a country at the top of educational rankings, it’s less than 4%.
It’s not hard to see how poverty is related to education.
A child without high-quality preschool, for example, faces even greater obstacles:
if she is also without good health and dental care;
if her parents have no stable employment;
if their housing situation is unsure and transient;
if her school has inexperienced and poorly trained teachers who themselves are unlikely to remain at the school for long;
if the intervention required for low test scores at her school hinges on “turnaround” approaches that result in even more churn;
if the school also faces overcrowding and has serious maintenance issues;
if technology and learning materials are spotty and outdated;
if she’s shunted into dead-end, low track classes that do, in fact, evidence a soft bigotry of low expectations;
if educators and others do not understand her family’s cultural or linguistic background and assume that these are deficits that cannot be built upon;
if her neighborhood is not safe and if it has few enrichment opportunities after school or over the summer; and on and on.
How could responsible policy makers avoid the reality that closing the achievement gap means seriously addressing these multiple obstacles?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2013/04/26/the-real-problem-in-education-the-opportunity-gap/
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Arne Duncan is bad, but not as bad as William Bennett was (and still is).
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Bill Bennett did not wield the power that Duncan has. And Bennett never had $5 billion to bribe states to do the wrong things.
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Teach,
Obama and Duncan will come to seen as the worst education team our country has known.
A credible case for any other duo cannot be made.
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Teach–Bennett used to be my (favorite) worst Secretary of Ed. ever. I just LOVED how he flew in to Chicago, shook his finger at the news cameras (speaking at, no doubt, a posh, downtown hotel breakfast or luncheon), and bellowed, “Chicago has the WORST public schools in the nation!” and flew out of the city.
Yes, Bill, YOU are being PAID to be the Secretary of Education–so WHAT was your plan to HELP CPS? But no–fly in, point a finger, fly out. Just what were we taxpayers paying for? And we can’t forget that Bill wound up stealing stories/fables from Aesop–er, writing an original book, The Book of Virtues. Really, Bill? But, at least you didn’t redirect education money to corporations like Pear$on et.al.
But Diane is right, of course, and Arne Duncan actually has, almost ever since taking office, become my (favorite) worst Secretary of Education. Because–and I have made this point myself–aside from pointing his finger (it’s the fault of TEACHERS, of course!) instead of lifting even a finger to help, Duncan is DESTROYING education in America by choking off every last taxpayer cent from public schools, demoralizing and sickening teachers and testing students to despair (credit to Mr. Mell).
Oh, and let’s NOT forget that he did not just point his finger at Chicago (teachers), he was instrumental in beginning the destruction of CPS, as well. Thanks, Arne!
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Sorry–forgot to say that he also used that finger to poke the Chicago taxpayers in their eyes, attempting to blind them to the misuse of their money, which they thought was going to the public schools.
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I once heard George W. Bush say (one cannot make up statements THIS CRAZY),
“I solved the education problem on my first day in office.”
I’m not making that up. Really. I’m not. He was talking about signing NCLB, and those were his EXACT WORDS.
That sort of attitude is typical of the plutocrats–of people with NO EXPERIENCE in classrooms. It is precisely because of their lack of practical experience that they can believe in magic, in toxic voodoo medicines like standardized testing and value-added measurement.
They don’t know enough to understand why what they are prescribing is bad for kids and for the nation, but because they are VERY IMPORTANT PEOPLE with DATA and with LOTS OF MONEY to pay for GROUPTHINK CONFERENCES with their CONFEDERATES IN THIS CRIME AGAINST CHILDREN, they cannot imagine that they might be mistaken. They are not going to be schooled, certainly, by the lowly folks who actually deal with kids day in and day out. After all, THOSE PEOPLE are the problem.
The hubris of these people is simply breathtaking. Meanwhile, the kids suffer horrifically under their regime, which, like some folktale demon, has replaced their schools overnight with test prep factories. The opportunity cost of their lost educations is incalculable.
I had a conversation at a conference a couple years ago with a representative from Achieve. He talk passionate eduspeak and testing and VAM, and everything he said was utter nonsense. He was, however, absolutely sure of himself and would not be moved by conversation about, uh, actual kids.
I reflect on these clueless apparatchiks and say to myself, “Forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
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With all due respect, Robert D. Shepherd, I see your Bush quote and raise you:
“A reading comprehension test is a reading comprehension test. And a math test in the fourth grade—there’s not many ways you can foul up a test… It’s pretty easy to ‘norm’ the results” (Link: http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=20010315&slug=bush15)
Daniel Koretz, a genuine numbers/stat person [i.e., a psychometrician] who has designed, administered, and evaluated tests (as well as being a Professor of Education at Harvard University) uses the quote in his book MEASURING UP: WHAT EDUCATIONAL TESTING REALLY TELLS US (2008, p. 7) in order to underscore the deep lack of public understanding surrounding standardized testing.
Nonetheless George W. Bush Jr. was not just any member of the general public. Viewed in tandem with your citation his profound ignorance is inexcusable since NCLB rested more than anything else on the scores generated by high-stakes standardized tests. There are innumerable ways that tests can be ‘fouled up’ and that’s not even taking into account the critical question of whether or not standardized tests really measure what is valuable, important and useful [Duane Swacker, please feel free to add a comment if you like!].
This from a POTUS! He seems a poster child for Mark Twain’s prescient remark: “All you need in this life is ignorance and confidence; then success is sure.” [Warning: SATIRE ALERT!]
As for your comment below about a certain type of person who seeks easy answers to hard questions, I just read an apt H. L. Mencken quote (in Gerald Bracey’s READING EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH, 2006, p. 35): “For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple and wrong.”
Thank you for your comments.
🙂
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The one who is far removed from the actual situation on the ground naturally thinks that there are easy answers to difficult questions. “Oh, all we have to do is _________” is what inevitably trips off the tongue of the clueless.
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What is winning?
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