Marla Kilfoyle is a National Board Certified Teacher and a leader of the Badass Teachers Association. She is also the parent of a 12-year-old public school student. She was surprised to hear Board of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch say that teachers and parents need the state tests because of their diagnostic value. In this post, she explains to Chancellor Tisch why the state tests have no diagnostic value. Her post contains a typical state test report to parents. It was returned months after the test, when the student has a new teacher. It has scores on it, but no description of the student’s weaknesses or strengths in any particular area. In the example she gives, the parents learn that their child scored a 1, the lowest ranking, but nothing about where the child needs extra help.
She compares the lack of diagnostic information on the New York State report to another test administered to students. It is called WIAT (Wechsler Individual Test). This test breaks down each student’s test performance on specific skills. It is returned to parents in less than a month. (The WIAT is owned by Pearson, which also created the non-informative New York annual tests.)
Kilfoyle is upset by Chancellor Tisch’s description of the opt out movement as a labor dispute. The many thousands of parents whose children refused the tests were not acting on behalf of the teachers’ union. They were acting as parents concerned about subjecting their children to a useless test.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
It’s not a useless test. It’s incredibly useful in reminding us that we are servants to the state, that kids can be sorted and ranked at an early age, that governments have more right to kids than parents do, and that the incestuous relationship between the sociopaths in big business and government see even the youngest of us as pawns. Really not fair to call it useless.
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Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Texas Education.
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the NYS Math test is poorly designed. The NYS Math test in previous years was multiple choice with 65 questions which included questions from all the strands. It was given in mid-May in one day. There are fewer questions now, and some are field test questions. The 6th grade Book 1 today was poorly designed with 6/28 questions on the same topic (can’t say which one at this time). This type of emphasis will skew the data. There are embedded field test questions which are problematic for many reasons. My wish is not to do away with testing completely, but to go back to a reasonable measure which worked quite well in past years.
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” My wish is not to do away with testing completely, but to go back to a reasonable measure which worked quite well in past years.”
NO! They weren’t a “reasonable measure”. Standardized tests are not a measuring device by any definition of the term “measuring device” as there is no agreed upon “standard” (and there can never be) of the teaching and learning process from which to develop a “measuring device”.
When you read and understand the COMPLETE INVALIDITY of those prior tests as proven by Noel Wilson you probably will “wish to do away with [standardized] testing completely”.
Read and understand Wilson’s never refuted nor rebutted treatise on the invalidities involved in the educational malpractices that are educational standards and standardized testing: “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” found at: http://epaa.asu.edu/ojs/article/view/577/700
Brief outline of Wilson’s “Educational Standards and the Problem of Error” and some comments of mine. (updated 6/24/13 per Wilson email)
1. A description of a quality can only be partially quantified. Quantity is almost always a very small aspect of quality. It is illogical to judge/assess a whole category only by a part of the whole. The assessment is, by definition, lacking in the sense that “assessments are always of multidimensional qualities. To quantify them as unidimensional quantities (numbers or grades) is to perpetuate a fundamental logical error” (per Wilson). The teaching and learning process falls in the logical realm of aesthetics/qualities of human interactions. In attempting to quantify educational standards and standardized testing the descriptive information about said interactions is inadequate, insufficient and inferior to the point of invalidity and unacceptability.
2. A major epistemological mistake is that we attach, with great importance, the “score” of the student, not only onto the student but also, by extension, the teacher, school and district. Any description of a testing event is only a description of an interaction, that of the student and the testing device at a given time and place. The only correct logical thing that we can attempt to do is to describe that interaction (how accurately or not is a whole other story). That description cannot, by logical thought, be “assigned/attached” to the student as it cannot be a description of the student but the interaction. And this error is probably one of the most egregious “errors” that occur with standardized testing (and even the “grading” of students by a teacher).
3. Wilson identifies four “frames of reference” each with distinct assumptions (epistemological basis) about the assessment process from which the “assessor” views the interactions of the teaching and learning process: the Judge (think college professor who “knows” the students capabilities and grades them accordingly), the General Frame-think standardized testing that claims to have a “scientific” basis, the Specific Frame-think of learning by objective like computer based learning, getting a correct answer before moving on to the next screen, and the Responsive Frame-think of an apprenticeship in a trade or a medical residency program where the learner interacts with the “teacher” with constant feedback. Each category has its own sources of error and more error in the process is caused when the assessor confuses and conflates the categories.
4. Wilson elucidates the notion of “error”: “Error is predicated on a notion of perfection; to allocate error is to imply what is without error; to know error it is necessary to determine what is true. And what is true is determined by what we define as true, theoretically by the assumptions of our epistemology, practically by the events and non-events, the discourses and silences, the world of surfaces and their interactions and interpretations; in short, the practices that permeate the field. . . Error is the uncertainty dimension of the statement; error is the band within which chaos reigns, in which anything can happen. Error comprises all of those eventful circumstances which make the assessment statement less than perfectly precise, the measure less than perfectly accurate, the rank order less than perfectly stable, the standard and its measurement less than absolute, and the communication of its truth less than impeccable.”
In other word all the logical errors involved in the process render any conclusions invalid.
5. The test makers/psychometricians, through all sorts of mathematical machinations attempt to “prove” that these tests (based on standards) are valid-errorless or supposedly at least with minimal error [they aren’t]. Wilson turns the concept of validity on its head and focuses on just how invalid the machinations and the test and results are. He is an advocate for the test taker not the test maker. In doing so he identifies thirteen sources of “error”, any one of which renders the test making/giving/disseminating of results invalid. And a basic logical premise is that once something is shown to be invalid it is just that, invalid, and no amount of “fudging” by the psychometricians/test makers can alleviate that invalidity.
6. Having shown the invalidity, and therefore the unreliability, of the whole process Wilson concludes, rightly so, that any result/information gleaned from the process is “vain and illusory”. In other words start with an invalidity, end with an invalidity (except by sheer chance every once in a while, like a blind and anosmic squirrel who finds the occasional acorn, a result may be “true”) or to put in more mundane terms crap in-crap out.
7. And so what does this all mean? I’ll let Wilson have the second to last word: “So what does a test measure in our world? It measures what the person with the power to pay for the test says it measures. And the person who sets the test will name the test what the person who pays for the test wants the test to be named.”
In other words it attempts to measure “’something’ and we can specify some of the ‘errors’ in that ‘something’ but still don’t know [precisely] what the ‘something’ is.”
The whole process harms many students as the social rewards for some are not available to others who “don’t make the grade (sic)” Should American public education have the function of sorting and separating students so that some may receive greater benefits than others, especially considering that the sorting and separating devices, educational standards and standardized testing, are so flawed not only in concept but in execution?
My answer is NO!!!!!
One final note with Wilson channeling Foucault and his concept of subjectivization:
“So the mark [grade/test score] becomes part of the story about yourself and with sufficient repetitions becomes true: true because those who know, those in authority, say it is true; true because the society in which you live legitimates this authority; true because your cultural habitus makes it difficult for you to perceive, conceive and integrate those aspects of your experience that contradict the story; true because in acting out your story, which now includes the mark and its meaning, the social truth that created it is confirmed; true because if your mark is high you are consistently rewarded, so that your voice becomes a voice of authority in the power-knowledge discourses that reproduce the structure that helped to produce you; true because if your mark is low your voice becomes muted and confirms your lower position in the social hierarchy; true finally because that success or failure confirms that mark that implicitly predicted the now self evident consequences. And so the circle is complete.”
In other words students “internalize” what those “marks” (grades/test scores) mean, and since the vast majority of the students have not developed the mental skills to counteract what the “authorities” say, they accept as “natural and normal” that “story/description” of them. Although paradoxical in a sense, the “I’m an “A” student” is almost as harmful as “I’m an ‘F’ student” in hindering students becoming independent, critical and free thinkers. And having independent, critical and free thinkers is a threat to the current socio-economic structure of society.
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Ultimately, the tests do not represent the will of the nation’s taxpayers, which cost 20 billion in time to host the tests. To have students sit for endless hours, gripped with conundrums and spending a large amount of time clueless, is a waste of public resources. 4% of the year is a large investment in education that needs to be spent wisely.
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Merryl Tisch is either:
a. delusional
b. arrogant beyond imagination
c. a card carrying member of the 1%
d. Cuomo’s stooge
e. all of the above
(P.S. This is a trick question as ANY of the answers are correct however, answer e. is the MOST correct).
It’s time for Merryl to fall on her sword for the good of the state. She has infuriated SO many parents, public school educators, members of the Board of Regents and citizens of this state that the ONLY hope she has is to resign now before it’s too late. Opt-Out is JUST getting started and is in no way a “union disagreement” between Andrew Cuomo and teachers. That’s what Arne Duncan, the media and talking head staffers in D.C. and Albany politicos are doing … that’s right, deflect all the blame to teachers and unions. Parents are not that stupid. This is JUST the beginning.
Ladies and Gentlemen: WELCOME TO PUSH-BACK TIME brought to you by the citizens of our nation … so, would you like us to take this out at the polls next November and into the future or, would you like to convene a MAJOR conference with REAL rank and file educators NOW before it’s too late?
My guess is that this is just money-driven but, sooner or later even all the money can’t win. Time for the revolution to begin.
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Then the tests are clearly about testing the teachers performance at the expense of the students who have to take them. All the more reason for teachers and parents to protest the test.
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You must be new to this website.
You are a clueless person as you state in your first sentence.
Please, repeat after me.
We encourage and motivate all conscientious parents, teachers, and students to firmly opt out INVALID and STRENUOUS testing scheme:
1) TO PREVENT corrupted corporations looting billions of dollars from PUBLIC FUND that all tax payers contribute towards AMERICAN PUBLIC EDUCATION.
2) TO RESTORE the original intent for AMERICAN PUBLIC EDUCATION = DEMOCRACY for all children regardless of their races, socio-economic background, and religious belief.
Get it. Got it. Good. Back2basic
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May:
To whom are you referring with the “you” in your first two sentences? “You must be new to this website. You are a clueless person as you state in your first sentence.”
TIA!
Duane
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“It is called WIAT (Wechsler Individual Test). This test breaks down each student’s test performance on specific skills.”
NO! it doesn’t “break down. . . on specific skills”. It may break down TEST SCORES, i.e., the number of correct/incorrect on questions that are PROXIES FOR SPECIFIC SKILLS but does nothing more. It claims to “measure academic achievement” but it can’t as it is not a “measuring device” as there is no “standard” for those “specific skills” that it purports to measure. It suffers the epistemological and ontological errors and falsehoods that Wilson has identified that render the results COMPLETELY INVALID.
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Here’s four great videos to watch regarding the New York opt out movement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_Eiz406VAs
and… some humor…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OvKVkitKOgk
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Unfortunately, too many people believe this mantra – “the tests have diagnostic value and it helps the teacher instruct your child, so without the tests your child will fall further behind”, especially in the minority communities. They also believe that Charter Schools are like manna from heaven, the answer to their prayers.
When our public officials, from the Governor to the NYS Board of Regents, spout such nonsense, they are reinforcing this lie and those gullible citizens remain believers. Switching koolaid for truth serum is our quest.
Ellen #NeverLikedKoolAid
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Quite correct, Ellen, quite correct!
TAGO!
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Reblogged this on stopcommoncorenys.
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WHAT COULD GO WRONG WITH A SNAPSHOT? Marla Kilfoyle points out that Tisch kept referring to these tests as “snapshots”. First, she said:
““The intent of the test is to give a snapshot of performance and allow parents to know where their children are at any given point in their educational career as compared to their peers.”
But this is an oxymoron – snapshots do NOT show where children are “at any given point”, they only show where kids are on testing day, which is once a year. I have a student whose mother died two weeks ago. If he doesn’t do well on this year’s tests, does it mean his teacher did something wrong?
The comparison to peers is also misleading because the APPR’s “norming” algorithms convolute scores by categorizing ELLs, IEPs and high poverty kids while leaving out more important factors like chronic absenteeism, broken homes, ongoing trauma/abuse/neglect, incarcerated family members, substance use, homelessness, etc.
The “norming” done in APPR is the kind of surficial feel-good norming that politicians do to make people think the formulae is so complex we cannot question it. Grouping ELLs tells us nothing – what if one just came to the US last year has been here and another has been here for 10 years and is highly functional in English (I teach some ELLs who don’t speak anything but English). Same for special ed, are we again grouping high functioning savants with MR kids just to feel like we did something?
Tisch also mentions snapshots to make schools accountable for the money she decided to spend, against the sustained outcry of the public:
“New York State spends $54 billion a year on educating 3.2 million schoolchildren. For $54 billion a year I think New Yorkers deserve a snapshot of how our kids are doing, how our schools are doing, how our systems are doing.”
As she’s mentioned before, she’s worried about the huge investment NY has made in this “baloney” system and what it will mean if it all got scrapped. So this defense is about money. We all know how our kids are doing, Ms Tisch, they are miserable in school. How do we know this? We listen to them, speak to them, observe them, every single day, not just once a year, looking at how many bubbles the scantron says they filled in right.
And for the NY Times reporters that love Cuomo’s question “how can so many teachers be rated effective when so many kids are failing the tests?”, this is your answer. Teachers are being graded on their whole year’s performance by principals who know the community and answer directly to parents, not just one day. The test scores are a high stakes, high stress snapshot of kids taking tests that are usually way beyond their functioning level.
The answer to what could go wrong with one snapshot could be answered by anyone who has ever deleted a photo, which is everyone. I’m sure Merryl Tisch doesn’t want newspapers running pictures of her with her eyes closed, or in a goofy reaction shot. So why don’t we rethink “snapshots” for our kids and go back to more accurate measures?
^o^
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Excellent post!! Up to the last statement. . .
“So why don’t we rethink “snapshots” for our kids and go back to more accurate measures?”
There aren’t any “accurate measures” and never have been. The teaching and learning process is not a human activity that can be measured just as one’s feeling and/or showing love for his/her spouse or children can never be “measured”.
The concept of “measuring” the teaching and learning process is one of the most embedded and insidious discourses/memes in our cultural habitus/milieu, so much so that in questioning it one is viewed as crazy, insane, nuts.
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Technically speaking perhaps, but principal observations over the course of a year are indeed MORE accurate measures than testing because. I agree that all attempts at measuring a practice like flawed and subjective, but you don’t really expect NYSED to consent to forgoing “measures” completely, do you?
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South Bronx Teacher hit it out of the park again with his investigation into who’s behind pro-testing TV and radio spots:
http://www.southbronxschool.com/2015/04/the-truth-about-high-achievement-new.html
The story just gets better and better as you read where his inquiry leads him:
———————————–
====================
Wednesday, April 22, 2015
The Truth About High Achievement New York
For those that have not been paying attention of late there is a new faux education advocacy group in town.
OK maybe not new but we here just found out about them last week just before the ELA exams began. This group, High Achievement New York, is one of those so-called, “Hey we are here for the kids and the families of NYC and we are just regular people and are down with everyone else,” groups.
HANY has even being playing radio spots on WCBS-AM and WINS coercing and lying to those that do not have enough information that testing really is not a major disruption and…well you know what? Let’s look at the script together;
SPOKESPERSON: “I’m Pat Sprinkle, and I am a New York public school teacher. If your son or daughter is in the 3rd through 8th grade, I want you to know this month’s state assessments are crucial for their future. Almost two – thirds of our students graduate from high school without being ready for college or a career. These tests are designed to fix that – they’re a check – up to make sure all our kids are getting the problem – solving and critical thinking skills need ed to succeed . It’s a great investment for your children – the rules guarantee they’ll spend less than 1% of the their time on the tests each year. Let’s give all our students a chance at a better life. Because they deserve it.”
Where to start? We can start with the fact that Pat Sprinkle is a loyal, card carrying member, of Educators 4 Excellence.
These tests do not measure problem solving nor critical thinking skills. These tests are only measure how confused and stressed out our students get.
Maybe 1 percent of students time each year is spent on taking the tests, but how much time is spent each year preparing for the tests?
But what bothers us most is while the voice over at the end of the radio spot tells the listener that the spots were paid for by HANY nowhere do we hear a voice over that HANY is majorly financed by the Gates Foundation, the same financiers that breech birthed E4E.
Yes to a lay person it might seem cynical to imply that Gates monies are pulling the strings. We can give the benefit of the doubt and say that Gates donated to a true grass roots organization. We can. We shan’t.
The Crack Team did a WhoIs search of HANY’s url (Web address) and came up with bupkus. The information the WhoIs came up with showed many a layer hiding the true owners of the web address. Why?
We then googled the telephone # we found on the HANY blog, 212-681-1380 and found out that that is the main number for Mercury LLC a public affairs/lobbying firm in Manhattan.
Heck, Mercury LLC is the public affairs firm for Campbell Brown’s Partnership for Educational Justice! Mercury is also a registered lobbyist in NYC.
It gets deeper.
When The Crack Team spoke with someone at Mercury LLC (More on this in a bit), we shared the address of the blog. Immediately this person read the blog. When The Crack Team checked on the blog’s stat counter and the ISP comes from another public relations firm Porter Novelli which is part of the Omnicron Group.
When The Crack Team spoke with VP of Mercury LLC Jon Weinstein the first question we asked him was who paid for the poll that is listed on HANY’s blog that New Yorkers across the state are in favor of high stakes testing. Jon told The Crack Team that MercuryLLC “commissioned the survey.” This is akin to McDonald’s commissioning a poll to find out which fast food restaurant has better tasting burgers, McD’s or Burger King only to find out McD’s is the better tasting burger.
We thank Jon for his honesty but for some reason asked that the remind of question be written out in an email and he will respond. He did. But first the questions The Crack Team sent;
1. Is it possible to get a copy of the survey that is being touted by HANY?
2. HANY appears to be coming off as a “grass roots” organization. Why hasn’t HANY shared information that the Gates Foundation is it’s main funder in the radio spots or the fact Mercury LLC is the force behind HANY?
3. How many of the coalition members know that the Gates Foundation is your main funder?
4. Is there any official relationship between HANY/Mercury and StudentsFirst, Educators 4 Excellence and Campbell Brown?
5. When 212-630-1630 is googled why does Campbell Brown’s “Partnership for Educational Justice” appear in the listings?
6. Have any of the people who did the voice overs for the radio spots receive compensation and if so how much?
7. Who other than the Gates Foundation has funded HANY?
8. Has Mercury LLC done any lobbying in Albany, NYC, or Washington on behalf of Gates, StudentsFirst, DFER, PEJ, Campbell Brown, E4E, and other such organizations?
Jon replied promptly:
———————————————
“High Achievement New York provides New York parents, teachers, business and community leaders with an organized platform to support the Common Core standards, which are essential for preparing our children for college and 21st century careers.
“We are transparent about where our funding comes from and who our coalition members are.
“Our funders are listed in this press release, posted on our website: http://www.highachievementny.org/high_achievement_new_york_announces_stephen_sigmund_as_new_executive_director
“Coalition members can be found listed at the bottom of each press release on this page: http://www.highachievementny.org/latest_news.
“We are proud of the work we are doing to make sure that all of New York’s children are advancing together and learning the critical thinking and reasoning skills they need for success.
“Finally, no one in our radio ads was compensated for offering their viewpoints. We appreciate your interest in High Achievement New York.
————————————————-
Jon didn’t really answer the question did he? We emailed him back several times and he has yet to respond to what we asked him. As a former reporter for NY1 surely Jon didn’t like BS and obfuscation when it was done to him.
Is it just possible that part of reason thousands of students statewide have opted out is that we are sick and tired of astro-turf groups telling us parents how our kids should be educated? Interfering with our local school boards, our teachers, our politicians?
Time to go away HANY and all the astro-turf groups out there. Leave our children’s education be. WE THE PARENTS AND THE COMMUNITES know what is best. You don’t.
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Not sure if it’s been mentioned yet but Pearson also owns the Connors 3!
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To roxanne
You must be new to this website.
You are a clueless person as you state in your first sentence.
Please, repeat after me.
We encourage and motivate all conscientious parents, teachers, and students to firmly opt out INVALID and STRENUOUS testing scheme:
1) TO PREVENT corrupted corporations looting billions of dollars from PUBLIC FUND that all tax payers contribute towards AMERICAN PUBLIC EDUCATION.
2) TO RESTORE the original intent for AMERICAN PUBLIC EDUCATION = DEMOCRACY for all children regardless of their races, socio-economic background, and religious belief.
Get it. Got it. Good. Back2basic
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May,
It seems to me that Roxanne does get it. Reread her first sentence.
Duane
Man, responses are showing up all over the place today. What’s going on?
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