Arne Duncan and Barack Obama have this unbelievably incredible idea: grade teachers’ colleges by the test scores of the students taught by their graduates. Got that? It’s a stretch but where our Secretary of Education is involved there is no time or place where test scores don’t matter more than anything else. He loves test so much that I wish he would take the new SAT and publish his scores. Or how about if he took the 8th grade NAEP math test and published his scores. No one–no one–loves standardized tests more than Arne.
Bruce Baker, our pre-eminent manure detector, ran a simulation to test Arne’s latest goofy idea.
If n education school wants to get a high rating in New Zjersey, where should they send their graduates? Which districts should they avoid?
Here is his advice for those seeking to please the Secretary, the man who would be king:
“It’s pretty simple – New Jersey colleges of education would be wise to get their graduates placements in schools that are:
20% of fewer free lunch (to achieve good math gains)
5% or lower black (to achieve good math gains)
11% or lower free lunch (to achieve good LAL gains)
2% or lower black ( to achieve good LAL gains)
Now, the schools NJ colleges of ed should avoid (for placing their grads) are those that are:
over 50% free lunch
over 30% black”
Pretty smart incentives, Mr. Secretary.
Help the haves, hurt the have-nots.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Duncan and Obama prove themselves, yet again, to be completely clueless about education.
Arne, stick to basketball
clueless
harebrained cult of misguided data worship
Speaking of Hare-Brained …
what a delight
I am reminded of a photo I saw of a Tea Party protest at which a fellow was carrying a sign saying, “Get a brain, morans!”
Jon, BTW, can you recommend a good introduction to the logic of relatives and the notation that you are using on your blog? Is there a clear, concise intro to this that you can point me to? Thanks.
Diane, can you please share this petition and this article with readers? Parents are upset about their children’s kindergarten show being cancelled out of college and career readiness concerns.
WaPo article: http://wapo.st/1tObrK4
Petition: http://chn.ge/1rtj18O
Had a conversation with a parent of three school-age children.
A son has Aspergers syndrome. School officials request that he maintain his record of perfect attendance on high-stakes test days. He scores so high that he helps to make his teachers and the school look great. His IEP plan calls for work on social skills. That part of his education in not on the radar screen at school.
A younger daughter is progressing at an above average rate in tems of grades, but she understands much more than she is permitted to show on the standardized tests.
Their third child is “the creative,” as are both of her parents. She fills sketchbooks with drawings and collages, struggles to get a C in many classes, and has an IEP plan that allows her to go to the “learning center” to complete some day-to-day assignments. On the high-sakes test days she goes into a melt-down She is a pre-teen.
Bottom line: The test-em-till-they drop policies of Obama/Duncan/Gates and state officials have a corrupting effect on the culture of schools and the education of all three children.
This post says it all about Ed Deform. If the NPE ever gets its hearing on testing, I hope you will be there to say this. I would like to see this read into the Congressional Record.
Obama and Duncan are being had by the plutocrats. Obama based his ed philosophy on the importance of college. The plutocrats have taken advantage of that notion to profit from the government. Duncan drank their koolaid in that it is no longer about going to college that is the priority as much as testing and how its effects have dominated and change the course and the purpose of a more meaningful ed reform.
Hypothetically speaking, If ALL students were college ready, how could Obama finance all of these students, where student loan debts today is in the trillions? Does he really think he can afford to get all kids to college? So now that creates another scam. Colleges will continue to up their tuitiion, but does it guarantee that college graduates will get a job?
Why is Obama so adamant about college degrees, when there are no jobs for all graduates who are then stuck with student loans? College is a costly way to jump through hoops with no guarantees. Plutocrats know this, but it is not what they’re after. Obama and Duncan are fools and have been played by conniving people with deep pockets. It makes me ill to think that this “college readiness” idea is a coverup for a more sinister agenda.
Obama is well…. The buck stops with HIM. He hired Arne. And then there’s Rahm-bo, who Obama took with him to be chief of staff, and then returned to Chicago to become mayor. OY! Looks FOUL to me.
I would have thought that teachers understood the logic of distractors better than this by now.
Maybe it’s only politicians and other stage magicians who truly understand that …
exactly
Jon Awbrey & Bob Shepherd: how about another instance of the ‘magic’ of numbers and grades?
What are the odds that President Obama will apply his latest “idea” to the teachers and students of Sidwell Friends where his daughters go to school?
Don’t hold your breath waiting for him to put some skin in the game…
😎
I am working on a doctoral research project inspired by Diane’s book, Death and Life of the Great American School System (2011). If the public school system–as many of us knew it, at least–is dead or near death, it would stand to reason that public school teachers who remember the system as it was prior to No Child Left Behind (2002) have experienced loss and grief. If you remember what it was like to teach prior to No Child Left Behind, if you feel as if teaching completely changed when No Child Left Behind was implemented, or if you ever felt saddened by some of the changes that resulted from educational reform, then you may be interested in taking my survey.
Professional Loss and Grief in Teachers (a survey)
https://ndstate.co1.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_5nCLnPAFadWZX93
I have frozen all my support from my president, financially, political, or general advocacy of my admiration for him being credible to the Black masses until he personally repudiate the position of his Race To The Top – incidentally does more harm to the Black Masses than NCLB – THAT WILL DESTROY PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
Let’s carry this to its logical conclusion. Teachers are responsible for their students test scores. Schools of education are responsible for the scores of the students of those teachers. Naturally, then the high schools would be responsible for the test scores of the students of the teachers of the education schools that they prepared their students for. Elementary schools, of course, are then responsible for the scores of the students in the high schools they prepared them for, who are, as we have seen, responsible for the test scores of the students of the teachers of the education schools that they prepared their students for. Then of course there are the pre school scores, which would ultimately be responsible for evaluating … hmm, this is starting to sound like the old lady who swallowed the fly. I don’t know why.
One of the main problems with the idea, besides the idea itself, is which college do they credit the teacher with? So many students, now days, start out at community college, then transfer to a 4 year college to finish their degree…so who’s to blame for the low test scores? What about teachers with masters, is the masters program to blame? Where does the blame lie or more importantly why blame anyone at all? Why give students tests they will never get the real results from? This whole idea, like everything else coming out the DOE right now, is the opposite of common sense. It is the opposite of true education. They really need to pull their heads out of the plutocracy cloud they are living in and rejoin the real world, the people who elected, at least one, of them.
http://blindnoise.wordpress.com/2014/04/26/arne-duncan-yet-another-slam-dunce-idea/
Why stop here Arne? Shouldn’t YOU be evaluated by student test scores?
Yes! And since things are, as he states, so bad, he should give back all of his pay for his entire tenure as Secretary of Education. He clearly did not take proper notes on what changes to make.
Here is what I would say to Arne:
What are the implications for graduate schools of education? Will they be forced to accept in-service teachers from only $ucce$$ful districts? Will the pathway be blocked for those teachers of at-risk and/or special needs populations seeking advanced degrees and higher-level training and credentials?
First they tell us that teachers (TFA) need not be education majors and need no more than five weeks of training in order to teach. Then they tell us that success in college education departments should be measured by unreliable methods. Any professor at the college/university level knows the difference between valid, peer-reviewed research and unfounded propaganda.
This man needs to be stopped before he single-handedly undoes nearly a century of social construct in the United States.