We know that reformers love tests,
The love it when kids take tests, the more the better.
They love it when teachers get bonuses or get fired because of test scores.
So Ed Berger, a retired teacher in Arizona, decided it is time to write a test especially for the reformers.
Most if his blog is not the test but the report card.
Here are a few of his judgments on our favorite reformers:
“You are too ignorant of reality to understand where you are leading.
Many of those who hide under your coattails are hurting kids, families, and communities, for profit. You think profit is good, so you ignore the fact that they put profit and access to taxpayer dollars ahead of children.
The list of failed programs you have supported is long. In the wake of the ideas you have forced on educators without doing the research or identifying the root problems, you have earned a failing grade.
You did not pass the test. To deal with this record of failure you blame teachers and intend to destroy the people who do not support your ego ignorance.”
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Ed,
thank you for this thoughtful and detailed insight into the workings of the minds,
and perspectives of the “elite” who’ve been given free reign to commodify public education simply by virtue of their enormous wealth.
Your descriptions fit them to a tee.
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A perfect example of this is the mayors $9,600,000 he spent on making the scoring of the Regents more equitable. Who profits? McGrawHill Education which contracted to scan the tests online. this caused delays and meant that teachers who formerly talked to each other about students’ papers looked at computer screens and could no longer talk to each other. Previously when a student received a 63 or 64 the teachers bent over backwards to find an extra point. Now students have to attend summer school because they have a score of 64 on one Regents. This $9,600,000 could have been better used for books, computers for students more teachers in the classroom. Anything but this travesty of education.
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On Multiple Choice tests – Berger is correct that how a student answers a mc item tends reinforce the connection between the question and the answer selected. But there is a way of correcting it, one I used with my Advanced Placement students for around 3-4 years (I had to give them MC questions to prepare them for taking the AP exam). They were to take all question they got “wrong” and go look up up the correct answer and write out why it was the correct answer and what they picked was not. For each one they corrected they got a 1/2 point raise on their test grade. If they corrected all of their wrong answers and it came out on the 1/2 point (eg, 7 corrected for 3 1/2 points) I would round up (in this case to 4 points). If they did not correct all, either missing one or not answering and it was a half point, I rounded down. If they had only missed 1 questions they were not rounded up to a score of all correct.
By taking this approach, i was using the questions as a means of informing them where their knowledge/understanding was not correct and giving them an opportunity to self-correct. Remember – they had not only to give me the correct answer, but explain WHY – that lead to an improvement in their understanding and a greater likelihood they corrected wrong understandings.
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