The World Economic Forum is based in Davos, Switzerland. Ten years ago, I had the pleasure of attending. The forum was filled with heads of state and potentates, politicians, business magnates, even Brad and Angelina and Bono. WEF ranks states according to progress on whatever measures it chooses. It just decided that the schools of Finland are the best in the world.
This just-released World Economic Forum Global Competitiveness Report 2016-2017 names Finland’s primary schools, health and national institutions as #1 globally (p. 46):
https://www.weforum.org/reports/the-global-competitiveness-report-2016-2017-1/
What’s their education secret? According to Fulbright Scholar and part-time Finland resident, university lecturer and public school dad William Doyle, it’s not just Finland’s culture, or its size and demographics, which are similar to some two thirds of American states. Says Doyle, “Finland has the most professionalized, the most evidence-based, and the most child-centered primary school system in the world.” Those three foundations, says Doyle, can inspire and be adapted by any school system in the world. He adds, “Until the United States decides to respect and train its teachers like Finland does (a highly selective masters degree program specializing in research and classroom practice, with two years of in-class training and maximum autonomy once they graduate), we have little hope of improving our schools.”
Please note that Finland has no charters, no vouchers, no Teach for Finland, and very low levels of child poverty. Grades K-9 are free of standardized testing. Children have recess after every class. Academic studies do not begin until age 7. Before then, play is the curriculum.
Finnish scholar Pasi Sahlberg often says that Finland got its best ideas by borrowing from the United States.
Pasi Sahlberg will speak at Wellesley College on October 13 at 7 pm in Alumnae Hall. His topic: “The Inconvenient Truth about American Education.” Pasi taught at the Harvard Graduate School of Education as a guest scholar for the past two years. He is the author of the award-winning “Finnish Lessons.” The lecture is second in a series I endowed called the Diane Silvers Ravitch 1960 Lecture. Pasi will be introduced by Howard Gardner. Come one, come all.
If you are not in the area, the event will be videotaped and later made available.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
One has to conclude testing children every school year grades 3-8, designating schools as failing if they have less than 80 percent of children proficient, using one shot test scores to rate teachers, and the numerous hours in test prep for USA students have debased American education. Thank you to George Bush, Barack Obama, Arne Duncan and John King. The best of intentions associated with poorly informed policies and superficial assumptions about how children learn turned the renowned United States public education system into the United Stares Assessment corporation.
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Was it really the best of intentions or was it more sinister. The science and other national systems have been there for quite some time.Don’t expect fact based research to change anything.
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Isn’t it obvious that our “fearless leaders” favor schools that “produce” compliant citizens trained to do what they are told rather than independent, creative thinkers who might ask difficult questions? If they really had the “best intentions,” why do the powerful send their own children to learner-centered progressive schools–similar in many ways to the Finnish schools–while continuing to push one-size-fits-all standards in tax-supported public schools? What is ironic is that NCLB and it’s later incarnations demanded programs based on research, while totally ignoring extensive research that contradicted its own policies.
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“Thank you to George Bush, Barack Obama, Arne Duncan and John King.”
You forgot Rod “Miracle Man” Paige and Margaret “Don’t Know” Spellings.
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From everything I have read, Finnish schools sound marvelous! The operative phrase here is that “Finland has very little poverty”… this is a huge game-changer in dealing with education issues. All the teacher training in the world with “Finnish style” in the States would not achieve the same results because we have children who are traumatized in so many various ways (from living in chronic poverty) and they do not suddenly turn into “untraumatized beings” when they enter the school room. There are good American teachers out there here and now but without professional respect and freedom and without receiving children whose health and well-being has been assured since birth (coming to the classrooms) all the articles about Finland and its wonderful schools are meaningless. My words sound harsh but as a teacher who sees the effects of poverty day in and day out and faces way too many “top-down” nonsensical directives, I read this article patronizing. BECAUSE the US must solve the chronic poverty problem first and foremost. A classic “corporate ed reform” stance is “no excuses”… but I see day in and day out so many EXCUSES… Could you focus on fractions if you were a 3rd grader whose teeth are rotting and your mouth is in pain? Would you be able to solve math problems when you just left home after having your house raided by the police and seeing your father taken away in hand-cuffs? Would you be able to read when you need to visit and eye doctor to get glasses but aren’t given an opportunity to go?Just thinking here. Maybe we need the Finnish social system first so that citizens basic needs would be met from shelter to food and healthcare….
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If we wait until chronic poverty is solved before addressing improving primary education, we’ll be waiting forever. We need to address primary ed for the poor now. The prerequisite is turning the corner on 30+ yrs of anti-common-good policy promulgated byneoliberal Dems/ mainstream & rightwing Reps. Some of the research- & evidence-based Finnish ed policies would ameliorate things immediately– holding off an academics during play-based preschool/K-1 yrs to develop socialization, creativity, self-directed learning, and recess after every class to refresh/ recharge & maintain physical fitness, postponing stdzd testing until hs years. Buttress ed w/ health & social services at community-based public school centers with parental involvement & after-school activities for the neighborhood.
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bethree5 I understand your comment but if a jugular vein is bleeding out on a patient, making the patient comfortable on a hospital bed while searching for a doctor is not going to save the patient. This is how I liken adding great education programs to our poorest children whose immediate needs are not being met.
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Says Doyle, “Finland has the most professionalized, the most evidence-based, and the most child-centered primary school system in the world.” Those three foundations, says Doyle, can inspire and be adapted by any school system in the world.
Exactly!
My review attempts to streamline Sahlberg’s book into a 3-minute read. But of course it is better to just read the book.
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The United States pretends to care about its children, but actions speak louder than words. If it truly cared about children, it would not have chosen to monetize them. It would also work to strengthen the social safety nets to protect poor children and assist their families.
The United States pretends to care about teachers. but the policy represents nothing more than mistrust, scapegoating and denigration. Public schools in urban areas cannot fill vacancies because public schools and teachers are treated like enemy combatants.
The United States no longer wishes to invest in the “Common Good.” They would rather sell the responsibility off to corporations. In doing so the United States is selling off and betraying the promise of democracy. This is a huge mistake, and no other industrial nation except perhaps England is this reckless and irresponsible.
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I agree. If we cared about the kids, we would have true universal health care and a realistic living wage. The child poverty rate in Finland is in the 3% to 5% range. In the US (richest economy on earth), the child poverty rate is about 21%. The big stumbling block to progress: we have one political party that has morphed into a far right wing cult that hates government and does everything possible to block government from helping its citizens. Truman tried to institute a national health care system in the late 1940s but was defeated by the GOP and the AMA. We almost didn’t get Medicare and Medicaid due to people like Reagan and the corporate elites. I’m not saying the Democrats are angels or that they are free of corporate money but the GOP is off the rails and crazy with its free market anti-government philosophy.
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Agreed
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Well said “retired teacher”!
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Thank you for arranging for the public presentations in your lecture series. I just heard the first, yours, with solid and familiar points, enlivened by a couple of the introductions and the audience questions.
For me, the World Economic Forum Reports, like ratings based on PISA test scores from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) reinforce “economic competitiveness” as a major virtue, perhaps the major virtue for the world’s nation states.
That drumbeat is so loud that it dominates so many other considerations of why we are on planet earth and where, collectively, we are headed.
Economic wellbeing is important, but not everything of great individual and collective worth can be reduced to economic value.
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Finland students have RECESS, too. And they also eat lunch in a polite environment. I think taking the time to eat lunch at school and learning manners is important. This fast food environment has made our citizens look like well (fill in the blanks).
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Ah, lunch at school. I remember these variations to noisy cafeteria-style:
In my small ’50’s primary school, we ate at long tables that were hitched to the gym walls and raised for lunch. So you had to face the wall & couldn’t socialize. But it was pleasant as the teacher played records during the meal; selections included everything from classical pieces to Gene Autry.
Lunch was served family-style with a teacher heading each table at the private school where I taught in the ’70’s. I remember thinking meal duty a bit much, yet it was a good way to bond with students.
There was a recent horrible story out of VA: a SRO scuffled with a middle-schooler over a ‘stolen’ carton of milk, handcuffed and arrested him!
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How I wish I could to this lecture! Let me know how I can access the videotape. Thanks.
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I understand that Finland also has no private schools. That seems to me to be its most extraordinary feature. Yet it’s seldom mentioned in discussions of what makes the Finnish school system great and how it should be emulated.
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And, as far as I know, there is no home schooling in Finland.
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Dear Joe, why should that be relevant to this conversation?
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I’m not Joe or FLERP, but here is why I think these are both relevant points. Home schooling and private schooling are both largely a reaction to dissatisfaction with public schools. They simultaneously tell about flaws in the public school system as well as a different set of social attitudes and political priorities. I think it is a statement about the quality of Finnish public schools, their politics, and their culture’s general worldview, that home schooling and private schooling are not much of a thing there. Also we can see that it is possible to have “quality education” without needing private institutions or parents having to teach their own kids (or feeling like they have to)
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Your theory may be correct, but to test it, we might want to know what private schooling was like in Finland before the early 70s, when enacted its school reform legislation that essentially defined what Finland’s schools are today. That school reform legislation included a “ban” on selective admission, tuition-charging private schools. (Apparently, there are some private schools in Finland, mainly religious schools, but the government pays all the tuition, and private schools are not allowed to use selective admissions criteria. [See http://www.ncee.org/programs-affiliates/center-on-international-education-benchmarking/top-performing-countries/finland-overview/finland-system-and-school-organization/%5D
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Dear Ed, thank you for replying. Families homeschool for all sorts of reasons. That’s a bit of a generalization to think families wouldn’t homeschool if schools here were more like Finland.
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Beth, yes, families do homeschool for many reasons.
That’s a bit of a generalization to think families wouldn’t homeschool if schools here were more like Finland.
I didn’t quite say that. Sorry if I was not clear enough, but I basically said if our public schools, cultural values, and some of our laws (see FLERP’s post) were closer to the Finns’, we would see less reason to homeschool or need private schools. Not that it would disappear completely, or that all reasons for homeschool/privateschool are invalid.
I do think it is safe to say that if our public schools were more appealing, in whatever ways, we’d have less parents wanting/needing to do homeschool/privateschool. It is also safe to say that if we were less concerned with “individualism” than with “social equity,” like the Finns, we’d have less people wanting/needing to homeschool/privateschool.
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Part 1
The World Economic Forum report represents an ideal opportunity to discuss economic growth and prosperity, government policy, and education.
Let’s parse the new 2016-17 WEF report.
To start, the WEF places the United States at #3 in its global competitiveness report. The report notes the huge market size of the U.S., as well as “macroeconomic stability, the result of a declining budget deficit.”
Its important to point out here that in the recent past, USA Today reported, “Deficits have since fallen due to a combination of federal spending cuts and economic growth.” And Business Insider noted that “Under Obama, the deficit is falling from 10% of GDP to just 3%. But only 6% of America knows it.” And yet we have American politicians — and Fox News and Breitbart, and talk radio hosts — telling the public that the economy and budgetary in dire straits.
It’s also important to point out that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce — which has insisted ardently that public school “reform” and “accountability” are imperative to global competitiveness — has filed suit not only against government efforts to curtail tax-motived corporate inversions, designed to move corporate profits – on paper – from the U.S. to low-tax foreign nations, but also against new fiduciary rules “that require advisers to act in the best interests of their clients when advising on retirement accounts.” Se any problems here?
The WEF report also cites obstacles, or “bottlenecks”, to use the WEF term, to U.S. global competitiveness. The primary “bottleneck” is “supply-side constraints that are holding back progress and reducing the effectiveness of monetary policy for jump-starting growth.” Guess which U.S. political party has supply-side policies as its official canon? When George W. Bush proposed his nearly $2 trillion supply-side tax cut in 2001, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said that “a tax cut – as quickly as possible – will help recharge our economy…[a tax cut] is always a top business priority.” No matter if it ends up harming economic competitiveness; the finger of blame can always be pointed at public schools.
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Part 2
But what about other nations in the WEF top half-dozen. Let’s look at them too. What makes them so competitive?
Switzerland is ranked #1, and Switzerland is incredibly democratic. Besides being a haven for innovation, nobody there is trying to suppress voting. Switzerland has a universal health care system and mandates that all citizens purchase health insurance. It provides financial subsidies to those who are low income.
Singapore is ranked #2. According to The National Association of Realtors, in Singapore, “All land in the country ultimately belongs to the state.” About 85% of housing is supplied by government-owned housing enterprises.” All citizens “are required to have a health savings plan; the government sets both policies and prices for private insurance companies; health care costs for services and procedures must be completely transparent; there are high health care subsidies for those with low incomes; and the government invests heavily in medical education.”
The Netherlands, ranked #5, has mandated health insurance which includes “General Practitioner consultations, treatments from specialists and hospital care, certain mental health care, medication, dental care up to 18 years, care from certain therapists, such as speech therapists, dieticians, and maternity care”.
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Part 3
Germany is ranked #5 in global competitiveness. Germany also has what some call a “social welfare state.” Citizens are mandated to have health insurance. The World Health Organization notes that the government funds 77 percent of health care costs. Most workers are unionized and unions hold – by law – seats on the board of directors of companies. The government funds a ton of scientific and industrial research.
Sweden – which is committed to economic fairness – is ranked #6. In Sweden, “The responsibility for health and medical care in Sweden is shared by the central government, county councils and municipalities.” The national government establishes “principles and guidelines” and sets “the political agenda for health and medical care,” while “providing health care is devolved to the county councils and, in some cases, municipal governments…”
The U.S., is now ranked #3, largely because – as the WEF reported last year – “the country’s recovery can build on improvements in institutions—government efficiency is rated higher than in previous years.” The WEF noted that “the deficit is narrowing for the first time since the onset of the financial crisis.” It pointed out that “An economy is well served by businesses that are run honestly, where managers abide by strong ethical practices in their dealings with the government…and the public at large.” It noted that “the macroeconomic environment remains the country’s greatest area of weakness.”
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Part 4
Guess which president has been responsible for reigning in Wall Street (the Dodd-Frank bill), and reducing the deficit, and improving the economy, and increasing jobs and opportunities? And getting health care for more people?
And guess who has opposed nearly all the policies that led to the reduced deficit, and who insists on more top-down tax cuts that undermine macroeconomic stability? And who has insisted on a repeal of the Affordable Care Act? Guess which non-transparent corporate lobbying organization spent hundreds of millions of dollars opposing the Affordable Care Act?
Finland is ranked #10, and it too, has a national health care system. Education stresses egalitarianism, and is free from kindergarten through upper technical school training or college. The vast majority of workers are unionized, and receive 4 weeks of paid vacation.
Meanwhile, in the world of education reporting, we learn from Emily Richmond of the Education Writers Association, that “just 43 percent of U.S. eighth graders tested met or exceeded the benchmark for proficiency” on the newest NAEP test, the Technology and Engineering Literacy assessment. This is important, Richmond asserts, because “it’s one of the few means of comparing student achievement among states.”
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“This is important, Richmond asserts, because ‘it’s one of the few means of comparing student achievement among states.’”
Horse manure! How can something be important when the comparing mechanism is COMPLETELY INVALID??
The onto-epistemological invalidities involved in the process of developing and using the malpractices of standards and standardized testing has been known since Noel Wilson’s 1997 never refuted nor rebutted “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.
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.
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).
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.
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 words all the logical errors involved in the process render any conclusions invalid.
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.
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.
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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Part 5
Then Richmond poses this question, answer, and explanation:
“Why does this matter? These are skills that experts say Americans must have if they are to compete in a global marketplace. U.S. students typically have middling performance on international assessments gauging math and science ability.”
The implications of this kind of reporting are far-ranging. Emily Richmond, a national education reporter, is telling, or at the very least, strongly suggesting to readers that Americans students just can’t cut it – they aren’t “proficient” – and American economic competitiveness in the “global marketplace” is threatened.
This claim is the very same as that made for the necessity of the Common Core State Standards, which were funded by Bill Gates. Interestingly, the Education Writers Association is also funded by Bill Gates, along with conservative groups like the Kern, Dell and Walton Foundations.
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Part 6
But we already know that’s not true. The claim is demonstrably false. America is already competitive in the global marketplace (, was noted, it’s #3 in the World Economic Forum’s latest competitiveness rankings), and when it loses its competitive edge it’s not because of student test scores but because of stupid economic policies and decisions.
Emily Richmond says nary a word about this. Nor does she make any mention at all that there’s a glut of STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) jobs in the U.S. That’s not true either.
A 2004 RAND study “found no consistent and convincing evidence that the federal government faces current or impending shortages of STEM workers…there is little evidence of such shortages in the past decade or on the horizon.”
A 2007 study by Lowell and Salzman found no STEM shortage (see: http://www.urban.org/publications/411562.html ). Indeed, Lowell and Salzman found that “the supply of S&E-qualified graduates is large and ranks among the best internationally…the number of undergraduates completing S&E studies has grown, and the number of S&E graduates remains high by historical standards.” The “education system produces qualified graduates far in excess of demand.”
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Part 7
Beryl Lieff Benderly wrote this stunning statement recently in the Columbia Journalism Review (see: http://www.cjr.org/reports/what_scientist_shortage.php?page=all ):
“Leading experts on the STEM workforce, have said for years that the US produces ample numbers of excellent science students. In fact, according to the National Science Board’s authoritative publication Science and Engineering Indicators 2008, the country turns out three times as many STEM degrees as the economy can absorb into jobs related to their majors.”
So why is there such a push for STEM? Benderly continues:
“Simply put, a desire for cheap, skilled labor, within the business world and academia, has fueled assertions—based on flimsy and distorted evidence—that American students lack the interest and ability to pursue careers in science and engineering, and has spurred policies that have flooded the market with foreign STEM workers.
Michael Teitelbaum writes in The Atlantic, “The truth is that there is little credible evidence of the claimed widespread shortages in the U.S. science and engineering workforce.” (http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/03/the-myth-of-the-science-and-engineering-shortage/284359/)
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Part 8
Teitelbaum adds this: “A compelling body of research is now available, from many leading academic researchers and from respected research organizations such as the National Bureau of Economic Research, the RAND Corporation, and the Urban Institute. No one has been able to find any evidence indicating current widespread labor market shortages or hiring difficulties in science and engineering occupations that require bachelors degrees or higher…”
But Emily Richmond suggests that we should we should worried that “just 43 percent“ of 8th graders met NAEP proficiency levels, as if 8th graders hold the key – somehow – to American economic competitiveness. That supposition alone is pretty baseless. But what about those NAEP proficiency benchmarks?
Here’s how Gerald Bracey described the NAEP proficiency levels in Nov. 2009 in Ed Leadership:
“the NAEP reports the percentage of students reaching various achievement levels—Basic, Proficient, and Advanced. The achievement levels have been roundly criticized by the U.S. Government Accounting Office (1993), the National Academy of Sciences (Pellegrino, Jones, & Mitchell, 1999); and the National Academy of Education (Shepard, 1993). These critiques point out that the methods for constructing the levels are flawed, that the levels demand unreasonably high performance, and that they yield results that are not corroborated by other measures.”
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Part 9
Bracey added this:
“In spite of the criticisms, the U.S. Department of Education permitted the flawed levels to be used until something better was developed. Unfortunately, no one has ever worked on developing anything better—perhaps because the apparently low student performance indicated by the small percentage of test-takers reaching Proficient has proven too politically useful to school critics.”
And then this:
“education reformers and politicians have lamented that only about one-third of 8th graders read at the Proficient level. On the surface, this does seem awful. Yet, if students in other nations took the NAEP, only about one-third of them would also score Proficient—even in the nations scoring highest on international reading comparisons (Rothstein, Jacobsen, & Wilder, 2006).
The National Academy of Sciences called the NAEP proficiency standards “fundamentally flawed.” NAEP’s original technical evaluation team reported that “these standards and the results obtained from them should under no circumstances be used as a baseline or benchmark.”
NAEP’s governing board fired the team.
The General Accounting Office study of NAEP assumptions and procedures and proficiency levels found them to be “invalid for the purpose of drawing inferences about content mastery.”
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“NAEP’s governing board fired the team.”
When did the report come out and when did that “firing” happen?
TIA, Duane
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Per the late Gerald Bracey:
“The governing board hired a team of three well-known evaluators and psychometricians to evaluate the process — Daniel Stufflebeam of Western Michigan University, Richard Jaeger of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro and Michael Scriven of NOVA Southeastern University. The team delivered its final report on Aug. 23, 1991. This process does not work, the team averred, saying: ‘[T]he technical difficulties are extremely serious … these standards and the results obtained from them should under no circumstances be used as a baseline or benchmark … the procedures used in the exercise should under no circumstances be used as a model.’ ”
“NAGB, led by Chester E. Finn Jr., summarily fired the team, or at least tried to. Because the researchers already had delivered the final report, the contract required payment.”
“The inappropriate use of these levels continues today.”
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Thanks for that info, democracy!
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Part 10
Yet, Emily Richmond tells readers that “These are skills that…Americans must have if they are to compete in a global marketplace. “ She makes no effort whatsoever to educate the public – her readers – on NAEP proficiency score flaws. Does she just not know?
One thing NAEP seems to measure fairly well is income inequality. Or, to put it a bit more precisely, research has found that between half and two-thirds of the variance in student academic performance on NAEP is explained by a cumulative family risk factor, which includes family income, the educational attainment of parents, family and neighborhood housing conditions, and the ability to speak and read English. Richmond says only that there are “gaps…between students from low-income families and their more affluent peers.”
You have to wonder. We have education reporting that appears to be absolutely clueless. We have a major political party that promotes economic nonsense that does real harm, and opposes affordable health care for its citizens. Upper bracket individuals and corporate institutions aggressively avoid accountability and responsibility for greed and fraud — have you read about Wells Fargo? the EpiPen? Trump’s taxes and tax plan? — and then point the finger of culpability at public schools.
Do you think there’s a reason that democratic citizenship is NOT the primary focus of public education? And, isn’t it pretty doggone clear that it ought to be? Why aren’t education reporters writing about that? And why aren’t politicians and education “leaders” avidly promoting it?
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sorry for the 10 parts…but the comment would not post as a single entity.
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“One thing NAEP seems to measure fairly well is income inequality.”
NO!, the NAEP and any standardized or teacher made test doesn’t measure anything. They may assess, perhaps help in the evaluation of student but they measure nothing.
Richard Phelps, a staunch standardized test proponent (he has written at least two books defending the standardized testing malpractices) in the introduction to “Correcting Fallacies About Educational and Psychological Testing” unwittingly lets the cat out of the bag concerning the type “measuring” that supposedly occurs with this statement (notice how he is trying to assert by proximity that educational standardized testing and the testing done by engineers are basically the same, in other words a “truly scientific endeavor”):
“Physical tests, such as those conducted by engineers, can be standardized, of course [why of course of course], but in this volume , we focus on the measurement of latent (i.e., nonobservable) mental, and not physical, traits.” [my addition]
Now since there is no agreement on a standard unit of learning and there is no measuring device calibrated against said non-existent standard unit, how is it possible to “measure the nonobservable” which is what all this standardized testing insanity, truly insanity if you think about it, is about? Standardized tests (and even teacher made tests) attempt to supposedly “measure the nonobservable” with a nonexistent measuring device that can’t be calibrated to a nonexistent standard unit of student learning.
So much harm to so many students is caused by the educational malpractices that are standards and testing or as Phelps contends in “measuring the nonobservable”.
How insane is this all???
Utterly beyond my comprehension!!!
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To further complicate things, even if we could “measure the nonobservable,” we’d then have to determine which “units of learning” were more or less valuable than other ones (complicated by the fact that values are not uniform across all humans); and where/who those “units” came from (if we wanted to determine “accountability,” for example).
It is quite insane to believe that we can “measure” something like teaching quality, or if what students learned was “better” or “worse.” As if teaching and learning and human existence were so clear as going up or down one rung on a ladder to heaven or hell…
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Excellent commentary ED!
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Duane:
measure: “ascertain the size, amount, or degree of (something) by using an instrument or device marked in standard units or by comparing it with an object of known size.”
Using that definition, the NAEP does “measure” or assess the size of family income. Most “standardized” tests do. But that’s about all they do well.
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No, democracy, they don’t “measure” that as the tests are not intended as “measures of family income”. That there is a correlation between test scores and SES (more directly mother’s level of education which also conveniently correlates to SES) does not mean that NAEP “measures” SES. That the scores correlate is an interesting side fact, but in no way can it ration0-logically be said that NAEP measures family income/SES.
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To this comment: “One thing NAEP seems to measure fairly well is income inequality. . . . research has found that between half and two-thirds of the variance in student academic performance on NAEP is explained by a cumulative family risk factor, which includes family income, the educational attainment of parents, family and neighborhood housing conditions, and the ability to speak and read English. Richmond says only that there are ‘gaps…between students from low-income families and their more affluent peers.’”
This part of this discussion and related aspects of the report scream for a better dialogue between the formal educational establishment as embodied in K-12 and higher education, and the long-time under-funded but vibrant movement of adult education and literacy in the United States, e.g., the National Literacy Association and library associations in the United States. Focusing efforts on that dialogue can better form the bridges between the general culture, such as it is, where families live,and the richness that is embodied in our formal educational institutions.
As institutions, the family and education became distinguished when education became formalized and, seemingly but not really, moved out of the family, as if it could really leave. However, the “wealth” of the educational establishment has few “veins” open to the family, and what’s there is clogged or closed off for many reasons-cultural, which are economic, but not ONLY that.
The dialogue between formal education and the family often occurs in real-time only in parent-teacher conferences. And potential voters are not always parents.
Lack of adult development, apathy and calcification in a democracy can do strange things, like what happened with Brexit and, recently, in the FARC vote–both of which polled for opposite outcomes and where apparently less than 50 percent of the electorate turned out.
Free colleges will help, and the bleeding patient is still on the table, but systemic change is still an option in the long-term. What an interesting report–I keep returning to it.
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Excellent purview of the dynamism of education in the world.
Writings about the relationship between democracy (or other forms of government) and education abound and go back centuries. However, we need not go far into political philosophy or in the philosophy of education to find the keys to that relationship. That is, at the center of both democracy and its educational institutions is not an ideology but a sense of openness and an accompanying dynamism of spirit. That openness occurs in the context and company of others in the intimate overlapping that is human history. And that context occurs in families as well as in institutions, and consists of caregivers who are also mentors-teachers-guides during the long time it takes for human beings to mature well enough to actually understand and choose and to live in one well, that is, in a democracy.
Democracy and education are wedded so tightly precisely because of that sense of experimental openness and dynamism. The logic goes like this: If the power of a political structure is located in “the people,” as by definition it is in a democracy, then those people, insofar as they were born into a democratic political state, when they are grown and inherit that power, on principle, have the choice of keeping that state of affairs, or of giving it up. The “force” of that power may be through training and habit, but on its own principle, it’s not through ideology.
Of course educational institutions and our teachers need to pass down to our children as much knowledge as we can, e.g., from our various fields of studies and cultural institutions. However, at its core, education in that democratic state, on principle, is charged not with purveying this or that political or corporate ideology or even some special knowledge. Rather, at its core, the educational establishment in a democracy is charged with keeping children attuned with the openness of spirit and mind that human beings are born with. That means even being open to change even their own present political ground.
It follows from that core that children must be and feel free to ask any kind of question in the open dynamism that is the human mind, and during our long process of human development and maturation.
If our children are going to be charged with freely choosing and maintaining their political state of affairs that embodies and fosters that dynamic openness, then at the very least they have to be well-apprised of what that state is, and by refinement and correlation, about all of the other kinds of political arenas that will surely follow should a democratic state fall into disrepair, or fail, or be squandered and given up through the slippery slope associated with political ignorance.
Anyone who studies even the briefest of human history understands how governmental power, even in purported democracies, can succumb to human hubris, and be democratic-no-more. It’s not the power as such that must be maintained in “the government” (or corporate power, for that matter), for a democracy to maintain, but the dynamism of that power and its circularity from institution to the “the people” and back again . . . and those people as informed, open, and vibrant from having been long-engaged in an open and dynamic education where they now know their own political context and understand their place in it,
The way to disable and destroy that dynamism is to uncouple an educational establishment from its own democratic governmental order–an establishment or a governmental order that may, themselves, have lost their view of their own fundamental purpose (this is our present struggle). . . and to introduce all sorts of “preferred” ideologies; to destabilize that government, and to foster methods and institutions that keep students and the public ignorant of the importance of their own understanding of the political experiment–not ideology–they are involved in, its power, and the choices that can follow.
I appreciate having this set of papers at hand.
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Excellent commentary Catherine!!
If I may add a little. You stated “Rather, at its core, the educational establishment in a democracy is charged with keeping children attuned with the openness of spirit and mind that human beings are born with.”
I concur and I believe the statement does fall under the auspices of the fundamental purpose of public education as outlined in 20 of the 25 state constitutions that give a purpose for the establishment of public schools:
“The purpose of public education is to promote the welfare of the individual so that each person may savor the right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and the fruits of their own industry.”
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Despite what state constitutions may say, the influence of the U.S. Dept of Education on educational policy making at the state level negates any “feel-good” statements about “the welfare of the individual.”
For those who haven’t read it, here’s the DOE mission statement.
ED’s mission is to promote student achievement and preparation for global competitiveness by fostering educational excellence and ensuring equal access.
In other words, their purpose is to create worker bees to fuel the economy–unchanged since the public schools of the Industrial Age. “The welfare of the individual? The pursuit of happiness?” Definitely not part of Ed’s mission.
If they are good at anything at all, the DOE excels in glittering generalities. What, specifically, constitutes educational excellence? What is meant by “equal access”? In The End of Average, Todd Rose demonstrates that there can never be equal access until access to information–and the ability to demonstrate the “possession” of that information–are available in the myriad ways in which individuals learn and think. Even if access to the SAME content in the SAME way and at the SAME age constituted equality, the inequality of school funding makes that a joke!
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The purpose of public education as stated in the various state constitutions is not a “feel-good” statement. One HAS to look to the state constitutions for that purpose as that is also where the mandate for public schools is to be found.
Are you suggesting, Judith, that the federal DoE has the final say? Certainly not constitutionally speaking does it have that mandate. Are you saying we should just throw our hands in the air and say “Oh, well, Arne (now Johnny) says that’s what the purpose is so we must bow down to his wishes?
I don’t buy that at all.
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Sorry…that’s not what I’m suggesting at all. But there’s little doubt that the “carrots” the DOE dangles in front of states have tempted them to institute programs that advance the “one size fits all” and standardized testing–policies that are the antithesis of facilitating the development of the individual. Not sure where you got the idea that I was saying, “Oh well..that’s the way it is”…but nothing could be farther from the truth.
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I misread your thoughts then-good thing, eh, for the correction. Thanks!
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Duane: If the general meaning of such constitutions are ignored long enough, they easily become de facto irrelevant to those who are supposed to be working under their auspices and who fail to recognize concrete activities that omit, drift away from, or fly in the face of that meaning.
As an aside, when I was teaching K-12 teachers who were returning to school to get their masters, I often asked them to bring in their school’s mission statements to relate to that school’s present concrete activities. Often, they didn’t even know their school had such a statement, or a set of generalized goals. Most (not all) are written pretty well; but notably many were egregiously contradicted in the concrete goings-on of the school, which made for some interesting action research projects for my teachers. But this was always an enlivening experience for all.
In reading your note with that experience at the background, my first thought was to wonder if private and charter schools are consistently and overtly held to their state constitutions in this regard (I have no experience here or studies to cite); but then I wondered if, if and when such questions were brought up, the powers-that-be would set about changing the constitutions to match their own needs, instead of “measuring” the reform movement’s real-time activities against the general guides embodied in their State constitutions to see if they are “measuring up.”
Sigh . . .what a “state” we are in. Thank you for your comments.
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A couple of things, Catherine. In regards to the private/public school differences in purpose. What the private schools do depends upon the provider of the school. For instance I grew up k-12 Catholic schools and the main “mission” is to instill (some will argue indoctrinate with which I would concur) the Roman Catholic faith and belief system into the students.
As far as public school mission/vision statements, well, let’s just say that more likely than not those who wrote them probably have no clue as to what their state constitution might say about public education. From Ch. 1 of my upcoming book (in the process of reworking it a bit):
Ask any teacher or administrator “What is the purpose of public education?” and more likely than not they will recite their district’s mission statement , perhaps one as succinct as the Nebo School District’s in Utah “We engage, empower, and collaborate to ensure student success.” Or perhaps it more typically reads like this one from a rural Missouri district “The mission of the Warren County R-III School District is to empower each child to fully reach his or her potential as a life-long learner, a responsible adult and a contributing member of a diverse society.” Or it may even come with a disclaimer as this long mission statement from a Pennsylvania district:
Mission Statement
The Mission Statement, Beliefs, and Goals presented below are the result of work completed by Cumberland Valley School District’s Strategic Planning Steering Committee. These philosophy statements are not an attempt to state how things are, but rather are intended to give impetus and direction toward meeting the needs of all children who attend the schools of this district now and in the future.
Our Mission
The Cumberland Valley School District, in collaboration with students, educators, parents and the community, is committed to developing 21st century learning and thinking skills through a rigorous, relevant, and comprehensive curriculum, while preparing students to be innovative, productive citizens in an interconnected world. (italics in original)
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Duane–an afterthought about your quote from some state constitutions: ““The purpose of public education is to promote the welfare of the individual so that each person may savor the right to life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, and the fruits of their own industry.”
Those are democratically-based purposes. That relation to a democratic government is the center of the onion where all other institutional goals and kinds of curricula grow out from there and are layered on.
Note also the meaning of “welfare.” It doesn’t mean giving “handouts” like feeding small, hungry animals who are too lazy to hunt for themselves (aka the Romney oligarchs and the morphing of that term). It means that the state and its educational system is charted with creating the conditions for the continuance of democratic government and institutions–for students to become adults who are well-equipped to well-understand and to “savor” those purposes.
I love the term “savor.” Who can savor anything that we take for granted and don’t learn about, complete with contradictory examples?
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Excellent commentary! Thanks, Catherine!
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To Judith Yero who speaks of the DOE’s “feel good statements about the welfare of individuals” and who says: “If they are good at anything at all, the DOE excels in glittering generalities. What, specifically, constitutes educational excellence?”
Well, I suggest we want those statements to be glittering as well as completely general. You don’t want to be the robot-teacher that detailed or punitive over-regulation by the DOE implies and that, with micromanaging from every corner of the educational establishment, constantly threatens teacher autonomy and, thus, the education of our students.
Like the long-view incorporated in our general mission statements, or in our own U.S.Constitution, such glittering generalities give us the general framework of qualified existence to live under–in our case, as democratic and as applied, well or not, in the ongoing history of our work. Those generalities can be ignored at our peril, especially if they are written well. But like mission statements, the DOE statements need to be connected with our U.S. Constitution, revisited systematically, and “worked” at the level of concrete details through the “savoring” intelligence of all those involved, on site.
But your question about what constitutes educational excellence is a good one and probably rivals Biblical scholarship in the number of extant writings that flow from that question, including those referred to by the DOE over the years. Again, those in the DOE can also lose their own grounded connection with democracy, and have in many cases as revealed on this blog many times.
The movement of power must remain dynamic and circular to remain alive and creative.
But educational excellence starts with a well-developed and concretely test-able cognitional theory. My own point, however, is best related (in a blog) as the centerpiece of the onion that holds the connection between a democratic political system (with a stated Constitution) and its educational mission as embodied in its institutions. All other educational curricula flow from that core. We who live in a dynamic democracy already (?) don’t have to do political or educational philosophy to understand the political, moral, and even spiritual core of that onion and know that all of the other layers need to remain connected and flow from that core. Thanks.
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While I agree that too much specificity is limiting, I see a difference between a generalized statement that provides a broad framework, and a glittering generality, which is a propaganda technique–an emotionally appealing phrase so closely associated with highly valued concepts and beliefs that it carries conviction WITHOUT SUPPORTING INFORMATION OR REASON. Such highly valued concepts attract general approval and acclaim WITHOUT the “hard questions” that should be asked and answered by the “experts” who decide educational policy. For example, phrases such as “high-quality preschool programs” sound great, but what does “high quality” mean? If one digs deeper, we find that it means reducing time for free play and interacting with the real world in the interest of pushing literacy standards into preschool so that children will be “ready” for K-3 standards. The issue I have with this is that it flies in the face of research on authentic learning, as well as by the damage being done to children in the name of academic achievement. This started with a discussion of Finnish education, which DOES pay attention to research. If Finland can structure education around research and still come out on top in the popular measure of test scores, why does the U.S. continue to mandate failed policies and then blame teachers and schools for that failure? Or do we even need to ask that question…
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I look forward to watching the video and thank you for the great job you do for the students and parents of our wonderful public schools by your daily work and diligence.
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Reblogged this on David R. Taylor-Thoughts on Education.
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