Jonathan Pelto recounts here the story of PARCC’s efforts to stifle hundreds of bloggers.
Can a multinational corporation stifle free speech?
Can teachers and parents speak about and criticize the tests that children are required to take?
Can Pearson/PARCC hide behind copyright law to prevent any open discussion of the quality and developmental appropriateness of the tests they create?
When a conscientious teacher writes that the test her students took in fourth grade were written in language appropriate for sixth and seventh grade, isn’t this information that parents and the public need to know?
Is the copyright law being used to hide the shoddy quality of Pearson’s work?
Does the “fair use doctrine,” which permits limited quoting from copyrighted material, pertain to standardized tests?
Is it possible to give a test to millions of children and expect that none of the questions will be discussed at home, on social media, or in teachers’ lounges?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
One of the truest symptoms of creeping fascist tendencies is denying others the right to free speech. Fascists are dictators that have no patience with any resistance or disagreement with their iron fist policies. Hacking is a digital expression of book burning, sign trampling or pulling out the fire hoses.
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Bullying, badgering, and threatening litigation are not “hacking”!
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Hacking can also be a way of expanding free speech and debate, by revealing “secrets” the powers-that-be may find uncomfortable. Wikileaks is a prime example.
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FLERP
Were you the kid in class who took special joy in pointing out every word a teacher misspelled or misspoke? Many of us here type fast and think fast; and often with emotion that overrides perfect diction.
You come here with a unique and important viewpoint, but your constant nit-picking gets a little tedious. retired teacher is one of the most articulate, prolific, and important contributors to this blog and should be cut more slack than most.
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Yes, I was that kid!
Leaving that aside, this is not a typo or a question of diction. It’s about a fundamental misunderstanding of an important word, a misunderstanding that’s displayed over and over by a lot of people on this blog (including our host). In my view, understanding that word is worth the tedium. You and many others are free to disagree — and by golly, that’s what makes this country so wonderful!
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I understand what you are saying, Flerp. I didn’t get it at first because I assumed the use of the term “hacking” referred to the mysterious disappearance of comments and posts some very vocal people have experienced. I have my own language police tendencies ( the use of “loose” for “lose” drives me crazy!), but if retired teacher is equating the bullying and threatening with hacking I agree it is important to point out the difference even if you are annoying! :).
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Reblogged this on patthaleblog and commented:
When a conscientious teacher writes that the test her students took in fourth grade were written in language appropriate for sixth and seventh grade, isn’t this information that parents and the public need to know?
Is the copyright law being used to hide the shoddy quality of Pearson’s work?
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Is it appropriate to give a test with such high stakes and not solicit feedback from users?
This is craziness. A bizarre agenda appears to be afoot. I hope the optout movement and others generate more and more resistance.
I understand policy makers seeking to be more diligent with budgets and spending. It is intolerable that elites are absconding with the futures of our children, using a flawed, unproven choice ideology to excuse their responsibility to ensure kids get the education they need to keep a strong country and economy.
Read: Charter schools: hope or hype by Buckley
I wonder if a revolution is in our near future…
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The problem with your argument is that feedback from users was solicited every step of the way. Teachers from the PARCC states participated in passage reviews, item reviews, bias reviews, range setting, etc.
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Lucia,
Prove it (your statement about “feedback was solicited”. Hell, I can solicit a prostitute and no one would know, not even the prostitute.
Show us the links that prove those things were actually done in an open fashion.
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Well there’s this, for starters….
https://www.engageny.org/resource/parcc-model-content-frameworks-for-educators
PARCC and SBAC’s first steps were to develop frameworks for what the ELA and Math tests would look like. They released them to the public for comment (I could add several more links here, but you get the idea. You can google “PARCC releases ELA content frameworks specifications ELA” and “PARCC releases Math content frameworks specifications mathematics” to find more–including commentary and feedback.
From there, teachers from member states were involved in reviews for every step of the development process. PARCC’s website is full of information about their process, some archived by now, but it’s there.
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Tests so well vetted and developed that only 6 states remain out of the original 24. And if “teachers” actually participated, it probably wasn’t too hard to find enough Kool Aid drinkers back in the early days of this historical fustercluck. PARRC testing is a major FAIL and will be relegated to the smoldering ash heap of Common Core disasters. In five years, PARRC will be nothing more than a bad memory. Schill much Lucia?
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I don’t believe I’ve shilled. While that’s an opinion, every other statement I’ve written is a fact.
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Shill or not, what is your point? I was a trained, consultant item writer for Measured Progress for many years and I will tell you factually, that the PARRC assessments in ELA violate nearly every important rule for MC item development that exists. The PARRC claims regarding their assessments are 100% fraudulent. That is not an opinion; it is fact. And they have zero evidence to back up the validity and reliability of their Common Core assessments. So what exactly is your point? Other than distraction?
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My point is the one I made in my first comment. The consortium solicited feedback from users–teachers–from the outset and continued to do so in every phase.
If you can demonstrate that PARCC’s other claims about the tests are 100% fraudulent, that’s the evidence you should use to discredit the tests.
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Lucia,
That link does not even begin to “prove” that the process as you described it occurred. Even went to their link and nothing. Nice try, got another.
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http://cemse.uchicago.edu/parcc-frameworks-response/
and
http://www.coreeducationllc.com/blog2/parcc-releases-initial-set-of-test-items-and-task-prototypes/
(snip)
In addition to the release of item and task prototypes, PARCC is also releasing updated versions of the Model Content Frameworks for ELA/Literacy and Mathematics. PARCC held a public comment period in June 2012 asking educators and other stakeholders to provide suggestions on areas in the frameworks that needed additional specificity or clarity. The Model Content Frameworks for Mathematics now include a revised high school section that provides assessment guidance for Algebra I, Geometry, and Algebra II and Mathematics I, Math II, Math III.
Just a couple. There are more.
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Nice try Lucia. Your a bit out of your league here. I now get to invoke Russell’s “Teapot Analogy”! Ha! PARRC is the one making the claims, it’s on them, and they’ve got nothing.
Russell’s teapot, sometimes called the celestial teapot or cosmic teapot, is an analogy, coined by the philosopher Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) to illustrate that the philosophic burden of proof lies upon a person making scientifically unfalsifiable claims, rather than shifting the burden of disproof to others. Russell specifically applied his analogy in the context of religion. He wrote that if he were to assert, without offering proof, that a teapot orbits the Sun somewhere in space between the Earth and Mars, he could not expect anyone to believe him solely because his assertion could not be proven wrong. Russell’s teapot is still invoked in discussions concerning the existence of God, and in various other contexts.
The PARRC claims* are just as preposterous as claiming that there is a teapot orbiting the Sun (between Earth and Mars).
*From the PARRC website:
Why PARCC?
PARCC helps teachers know where to strengthen their instruction and lets parents know how their children are doing.
PARCC is computer-based and uses interactive questions to determine whether students have mastered the fundamentals, as well as higher-order skills such as critical thinking, problem-solving, and analyzing sources to write arguments and informational essays – skills not easily assessed by traditional multiple-choice tests.
There’s no need to stop instruction and “prep for the test.” The questions you’ll find on the PARCC state test look like assignments teachers in effective classrooms give their students every day.
•They serve students of all achievement levels — advanced, average, and struggling — by identifying where they have areas of need, as well as where they are excelling.
•In English language arts/literacy, many states only assessed writing three times from kindergarten to high school. And only some measured critical-thinking skills. PARCC does both at every grade. In mathematics, PARCC gives students a chance to solve real-world problems and show how they solved them.
•For the first time, states now can compare results accurately. What it means to be ready for success in college or careers shouldn’t vary from state to state. And every student, regardless of zip code, should have the same expectations and opportunities to succeed.
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Again, my claim is that PARCC solicited feedback from teachers from the outset and throughout.
You can misstate my claim and refute your misstatement–not sure if that’s got to do with being in anyone else’s league, though.
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So what if they did? If that’s your point it is completely irrelevant to the fact that PARRC assessments are flat out BAD. They are being rejected by states and outed by students, parents, and teachers for CRRAP tests that they have proven to be.
Or is your point that the teachers who were “solicited” are to blame for the useless CRRAP they are trying to pawn off on public schools
My point is that PARRC is just one more FAILED reform product. Period. So who cares if they channeled Horace Mann to develop their assessments, PARRC tests are CRRAP. And Pearson’s defensive behavior regarding Tweets is more than revealing. Pearson is way more concerned about test scrutiny than test security.
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Maybe they are. However, I think demanding to see their field test data on the items is probably a more fruitful legal route to take than demanding to see the questions they’ve field tested and intend to use again.
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PARRC and SBAC received $325 million dollars to develop their tests. And the best they can do is to recycle passages and test items? They knew damn well that their items would NEVER be secure. This is just a ruse to protect their culpability in producing fraudulent assessments.
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Part of the enormous costs of the tests, no doubt, can be attributed to the expense of developing frameworks, items, test forms, and putting all of that through a review process involving educators from the member states–and then field testing and analyzing that data.
If you’ve worked as a testing consultant you’ve probably got some idea of the cost of one item’s life cycle even when those reviews aren’t undertaken.
PARCC could save an enormous amount of money by never releasing items, I suppose, and using them over and over. I don’t think that would satisfy anyone.
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I really enjoyed reading this debate. You folks should run for congress so we can hear substance without vitriol. It strikes me that no teacher who had a hand in developing PARRC came to the table here to describe the process they went through in 2012.
I have had an opportunity to go to a web site and comment on the revision of the Tennessee state math standards. Tennessee rejected Common Core and the state commissioner then presided over comment on “new” standards. No doubt this was a daunting process for the state, trying to get feedback from teachers from around the state. So I cannot criticize too much. But the result was a new set of standards that are so close to the original Common Core that it requires reading like an editor to tell the difference.
No one really asked if it was reasonable to expect all Tennessee ninth graders to be at a point in their math career to master logarithms. And much more. The state was not not prepared to actually brig in a majority of teachers to various places and ask the tough question: are the expectations reasonable?
I suspect PARRC did not get comments from even one tenth of one percent of American teachers.
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Yes Roy, it’s like the old “shared decision making” process. The powers that be make a decision and then they share it with the underlings. Seats at the table, public comment periods, soliciting teacher input, all provide technical excuses and are used entirely for political cover. In reality, they do what they want to do, regardless of outside comment or input.
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M,
Does copyright law allow “them” to break into my blog and delete a post? I consider that electronic vandalism or just plain theft.
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Now that is hacking! Right, Flerp?
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If Pearson gains unauthorized access to Diane’s blog and removes a post, yes, that’s hacking. If Pearson complains to WordPress about the post and WordPress decides to remove the post, no, that’s not hacking. And if someone posts a comment on this blog and Diane removes it, that is also not hacking.
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I don’t agree, FLERP. When Pearson or anyone else removes a post from my blog, either on their own, or by complaining to WordPress, that’s hacking.
When I delete a comment because it insults me or contains offensive language or absurd conspiracy theories (eg, Sandy Hook massacre didn’t happen, it was staged by Obama), that is not censorship. It is my prerogative. I own the blog and am not obliged to post all comments.
By the same token, it is my blog and Pearson is not or should not be able to delete my posts.
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“Hacking” requires unauthorized access. Pearson is not authorized to access your WordPress account. So if Pearson accesses your account and removes content from your blog, that is “hacking.” If Pearson complains to WordPress (or, more accurately, Automaticc, the company that runs WordPress.com), and WordPress removes content, that is not “hacking,” because WordPress has authorized access to your account. WE know WordPress has authorized access to your account because you authorized it in the user agreement you entered into when you created your account.
Automattic has the right (though not the obligation) to, in Automattic’s sole discretion, (i) refuse or remove any content that, in Automattic’s reasonable opinion, violates any Automattic policy or is in any way harmful or objectionable, or (ii) terminate or deny access to and use of WordPress.com to any individual or entity for any reason.
Notice that the way you describe your authority to control the content that commenters post on your blog is precisely the same authority that WordPress/Automaticc has to control the content that you post on your blog.
Think of it like this. If someone tells me that they saw one of my children smoking pot after school, and I go into my child’s bedroom, and rifle through her possessions in search of marijuana, and find some marijuana and then flush it down the toilet, I have not committed breaking and entering or burglary. I have not “hacked” my child’s bedroom. And the person who told me that they saw my child smoking pot also has not “hacked” my child’s bedroom. And the reason is simply because while it may be my child’s bedroom, it’s my house. She may complain that the person who ratted her out is an awful person and has no right to be meddling in her life. She might say that “this is my room, and you had no right to go in there and search through my stuff.” I might understand why she feels that way, but the bottom line is it’s my house.
Again, “hacking” requires unauthorized access. This isn’t something that reasonable people can disagree about.
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Yup. That’s my understanding as well.
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The US Department of Education paid $360 million to developers of PARCC and SNAC. Most test items, I suppose, were already in the Pearson item bank.
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I love the logical disconnect of the faux “reformers”:
You must NOT trust that your kid is learning what he needs to learn by just looking at the homework he brings home or the work he does. You must NOT trust that he is learning anything just because he is reading interesting books and when you visit the class, the kids are engaged. Dismiss everything your child’s teacher tells you.
Nope. Instead you must trust in the standardized test that you aren’t allowed to see! Because you know, for decades, the exact same private schools that the people promoting the tests send their kids to have always said that the measure of a good teacher is the kids getting the top SAT scores, and if the richest donor’s kid gets a 750 and the other kid gets an 800, college always take the kid with the highest test score.
In the richest billionaires’ world, a kid is only as good as his test score, unless that kid gets a higher SAT score than their kid, in which case he is a drone and their kid who only managed a 720 (with massive prep) and not the 800 is “just as good”. And when the private school that educated him tells the college that their kid didn’t need to take a AP exam and prove their mettle by scoring a 5, because the A they received in class is better than having their kids judged against another kid via a standardized test (!) of course there is no disconnect.
After all, if the billionaires say one day that black is white, the reformers who depend on them for their big salaries agree. And if the next day they say that black is black again (but only for public school kids), the reformers who depend on them will agree! And if the billionaires pay them to “research” to show that standardized tests are all important to judge teachers, except for private school kids who shouldn’t be asked to take those tests or have them mean very much, then the people who they pay will happily comply.
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Diane,
I have some expertise in Fair Use.
The answer to your question of “can they do that” is that “yes they can” until a court rules on it.
Under the DMCA they can go directly to any ISP or host and directly ask for information to be taken down, they then have to take it down pending an appeal from the person who put it up, and then it goes to court. This basically favors the copyright holder because the onus almost always is put on the person who wants to post the work that it meets fair use criteria and Fair Use while it has useful handy field tests, those tests are only supposed to help you withstand a challenge IF IT GOES TO COURT.
Fair Use similarly, will only come into play if it ends up getting decided in a court room. ISPs would much rather comply than defend their users and risk an expensive legal battle and let the individuals fight it out themselves.
There are exceptions carved into the TEACH act for long distance education, Fair Use for educational usage and non-profit usage, but, again, you need a court to say on each case “yes you can do that” even if the precedent is established because Pearson can launch a legal battle on each claim if they want to. Bottom line, copyright helps defend in a courtroom but when used in this way effectively stifles free speech because noone wants to pay to fight.
Cease and desist orders are also popular ways to stifle free speech.
You’d need something like the EFF or ALA to launch legal right-to-know, freedom of speech legal battle or another organization that specializes in free speech/copyright issues to settle once and for all whether the public’s right to know and freedom of speech trump’s Pearson’s copyright rights, and, whether those rights are being applied in legitimate ways.
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The issue of test security and breeches to security rests on some assumptions—that the tests are valid and reliable to begin with, are appropriate for their uses, and that they produce trustworthy estimates of what they are intended to measure—for example, mastery or some degree of some kind of learning.
I think M’s comments are on the mark. You will not find much guidance other than copyright and fair use doctrine (and courts) to address criticism of the tests themselves and criticisms illustrated by verbatim citation or by paraphrases of specific items.
The argument for super-security and tracking down cheaters (with CAVON the experts at that) rests on the idea that the “integrity” of the test will be compromised-its fairness, validity, reliability and the rest (including profits, rarely mentioned).
That the test may be unfair in design, and by design, and therefore invalid even if reliable—is just off the table.
Those and related issues are supposed to be addressed in multiple reviews and technical checks and field tests long before the final tests are given. Panel reviews are far more speculative than field tests, but field test cost a lot. (See Lucia’s comment above).
The issue of test security is booted around by USDE, the Government Accounting Office, and authors of the 2015 edition of the “Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing,” (jointly produced by the American Educational Research Association, the American Psychological Association, and the National Council on Measurement in Education). In some states, the legislature has “decided” on matters of security.
If you can stand taking in more information on some of the security issues, take a cruise through this briefing paper. It shows that the testing experts and allied communities are worried about test security. They are not concerned with fidelity to some principled basis for requiring the tests. Nor is there much concern for parental rights and privacy.
PR matters: Here are some suggested “media relations” strategies for disclosures of problems with tests:
—Affirm the commitment to fairness and validity of results at all levels of school governance
—Show respect and recognition of the interests and rights of all who are involved, from students and their families to educators in different roles
—Do not “rush to judgment,” but give any investigation careful attention. A rushed or superficial investigation will serve no one well
—When looking at multiple examples of possible misbehavior, start with the “worst of the worst.” (I edited the list p. 54)
Following those media relations tips, this report offersna limp statement about the PARCC/SBAC tests: p. 54
Security for the consortia assessments (PARCC, SBAC, DLM, NCSC, ELPA21, and WIDA ASSETS)
• States should carefully review all test security policies and procedures for any tests they are using from a consortium. States may need to supplement security procedures in some cases.
• Consortia should implement web monitoring for their items during the entire testing window across all states that are administering the assessment. If the consortium isn’t doing this, then individual states should consider implementing it. p. 54
Click to access TILSA%20TEST%20%20SECURITY%20LESSONS%20LEARNED%20REPORT%20062615.pdf
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For what it’s worth, PARCC conducted educator reviews (passage selection, items, bias, etc.) and also field tested the items in spring 2014. Then PARCC analyzed field test data and revised or rejected items.
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Lucia,
Again show us where that has been done. Your first link had nothing about such open reviews. When and where were those supposed open reviews conducted? (maybe in my haste I missed it on the sites you referenced but until proven otherwise, I don’t think I did)
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I can’t link to the PDF. Google PARRC Field Test lessons learned and you can find it.
Also google PARCC Field Test 2014 revisions and you’ll find other articles and documents.
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Lucia,
If many test passages were above grade level, it’s possible that the PARCC teacher reviewers were Turkeys. Or they were Yes-men and -women. Or they questioned grade appropriateness and PARCC ignored them.
(For day-to-day, scaffolded teaching, I take readability formulas with a grain of salt.) Have you read Russ Walsh’s “Russ on Reading” blog re grade level of PARCC and SBAC? I think he wrote those in 2015 (time flies when you’re having fun).
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Then there is the issue brought up by Mercedes (and Jennifer) on her blog as to whether PARCC owns the material and thus holds the copyright.
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And the difference between the PARCC consortium which farmed out the PARCC testing to PARCC Inc till 2017which is a completely different legal entity of which Stover is in charge. There is nothing in the record that states that PARCC Inc is the owner so that one might consider Stover’s declarations as “owner” in it’s takedown order is fraudulent.
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I don’t read or speak legalese, but I think this document spells it out. .
Click to access PARCCIncAgreementTemplate6-2-14v1.pdf
(I googled PARCC Inc and came to this page.
http://parccinc.org/
Under About Us I found procurements.
http://parccinc.org/about-parcc-inc/procurements/
That’s where the link to the agreement is.)
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If standardized tests like FSA, created by Person, aren’t designed to fail Florida students, why aren’t they made public, like Texas STAAR?
What is the secrecy about? Why are teachers not allowed to see the test if there is nothing to hide? From limited question samples that I have seen on FSA site, I can tell that test creators never spent one minute in the actual classroom. Questions were created to confuse not test knowledge. Perpahs, it comes down to the fact that Pearson is a foreign company and their assessment methods are lost in translation. Assessment needs to be tied to instruction. The test is invalid and unreliable if the two ends never actually connect.
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One of the main problems in writing any of the Common Core assessments lies not in the devious minds of the test writers, but in the way that the standards were written. The CC standards in ELA are primarily lists of vague and vacuous skill sets that are simply not conducive for standardized testing. Compound that with the convoluted syntax and reading passage that seem well beyond the grade level being tested and you end up with a fustercluck of a test.
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Pelto’s article linked
http://www.opednews.com/Quicklink/Beware-The-Education-Refo-in-Best_Web_OpEds-Children_Education_Education-Curriculum_Education-K-12-160524-921.html
With a link to this blog: and this comment
Go to the Ravich blog and read her posts on the Testing debacle– tests that have no value and no connection to teaching or learning, designed to make zillions for Pearson, and to provide failing grades so that teachers can be fired.
They robbed teachers of the time and the autonomy to meet the LEARNING needs of our American children, caused our best teachers to be harassed and removed, and our schools to fail, so charters could take over.
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Writing test questions is a very difficult task requiring taking into account usage, grammar, sentence structure, vocabulary, etc. If one is not allowed to correct misinterpretation of a question, the question becomes invalid for any but a basic reading test.
Given that the test is not used by the private school sector, one must conclude that the parents of private-school children do not want their children exposed to these tests.
Who is validating the writing of the questions before the questions are given to the sample group? Soliciting input from teachers is not valid. Not all teachers are acceptable test writers for an entire nation. I am not convinced anyone is.
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