Rosa DeLauro is one of the most significant members of Congress. She oversees Congressional appropriations for education. She is a strong supporter of public education and a critic of privatization of public funding.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 30, 2019
CONTACT:
Will Serio: 202-225-3661
DeLauro Statement on 2019 National Assessment of Educational Progress Results
WASHINGTON, DC — Today, Congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (CT-03), Chair of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education, released the following statement after the Department of Education released the 2019 National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) results.
“The 2019 National Assessment of Educational Progress results for our nation’s fourth- and eighth-grade students are disappointing and show that we must work urgently to strengthen public education in America. That is why I am so outraged to see Education Secretary Betsy DeVos using these results to promote the Trump administration’s cruel, reckless plans for public education.”
“Secretary DeVos proposed cutting K-12 education programs by $4.8 billion in fiscal year 2020 while propping up a $5 billion annual tax scheme to fund private school vouchers. DeVos also wants to eliminate federal funding for afterschool programs, teacher professional development, and student support and enrichment programs. That is unconscionable. Our nation’s public schools are in dire need of robust investments—not Secretary DeVos’ cuts and privatization plans. Research from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that 29 states spent less per student in 2015 than they had before the Great Recession. That is why House Democrats passed a Labor-HHS-Education funding bill that increases investments in public education by $3.5 billion to help reverse this decade of disinvestment and austerity for our schools and communities.”
“Secretary DeVos also claims that additional funding for our public schools does not improve outcomes. That claim has no basis in reality. A 2018 review of research on education spending and student outcomes by a Northwestern University economist found statistically significant positive results for students in 12 out of 13 studies. Since then, similar studies in Texas, Wisconsin, California, and other states have also found that increases in school funding improve student outcomes.”
“Instead of exploiting these disappointing 2019 NAEP results to spread lies and promote her privatization agenda, Secretary DeVos should join House Democrats and families across our nation by supporting increased investments in our public education system.”
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Diane Ravitch's blog 
In business GIGO*. . . in a bit less polite terminology CICO** is what NAEP is. To use the results of a completely invalid and discredited educational malpractice to say anything is. . . well, as Wilson says “vain and illusory” in other words utter nonsense and a total waste of the time, energy and monies involved.
*GIGO = Garbage In, Garbage Out
**CICO = Crap In, Crap Out
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But, but, we have to be able to compare outcomes of the schools!
Says who?
Say those who have a stake in destroying public education. And say those who lack critical thinking capabilities.
By focusing on supposed measured (sic) outputs one deflects the attention away from the wide discrepancies in the inputs in providing a solid schooling experience for ALL students. Hey look over there. . . !
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Duane, Great to see you back — and coming out swinging!
It is interesting that people with vastly different agendas seem to use “flat” NAEP scores to “prove” diametrically opposite things.
That right there should make you wonder.
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The Common Galaxy Test”
We need a common test
For country and for glory
That lets us match our best
With those of A. Centauri
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Outcomes. Like measurement, the word lends a sort of linguistic respectability to a piece of illogical offal. Ultimately, the outcome of an education will perhaps never be perceived by the school, perhaps not even by the person who received it. The wealthy often credit their teachers in a fit of humility, especially if their humility reflects positively off the building shining with their name on the front. Those who perceive themselves negatively often grouse at their failure in education or their education failing them.
There are many things in life we cannot know. Claiming that we can know things that we cannot may line the pockets of some folks, but that does not mean it does them any good.
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Gonna have to steal the “illogical offal” phrase. It’s a good one!
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As with SAT scores, there is direct relationship between NAEP scores and familiy socioeconomic status.
It is curious that some people go to such elaborate lengths (producing, administering and analyzing tests) to get information that can be directly obtained from family income.
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No doubt the scores correlate to SES status. I don’t agree that it should necessarily be called a “direct relationship” but I certainly get your point.
My point being that basing arguments on invalidities and falsehoods almost always nets one another falsehood or invalidity.
But just as the blind and anosmic squirrel occasionally finds an acorn, so too do those who base arguments on falsehoods and invalidities occasionally get something right–by chance not force of argument.
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Right.
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Roy, are you saying that the use of the terms “outcomes” and “measurement” in education is offally illogical?
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That one made me laugh out loud. If I may add a little. . .
“. . . is awfully officially offally illogical.”
I know I can count on you SDP to come up with a good poem on that.
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Duane
No need.
You just did it yourself.
I would just add a couple more modifiers
Woefully (but lawfully) awfully officially offally illogical.”
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Is that enoughully?
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No
Woefully, cawfully (but lawfully) awfully officially offally illogical.”
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Woefully, flawfully (but lawfully) awfully officially offally illogical.”
Self correct does not understand serious stuff like this
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Woefully, flawfully, hee-hawfully, (but lawfully) awfully officially offally illogical.”
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I’m giggling out loud!! I knew you’d come through SDP!
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common core promotes hatred of reading and writing and incomprehension of math. if these results are based on common core, makes perfect sense. we used to talk about multiple intelligence and not shame students who can’t “perform”….
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What may happen is worse than shaming. Low scores may result in student retention or in some cases a school being closed depending on the state. The ridiculous high stakes are punitive.
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I’m reminded of BRAVE NEW WORLD in which the lower class babies are shown a bright, attractive array of books and naturally they start crawling toward them. Then when they’re just about to touch them, they’re assaulted with clanging, frightening noises. Very soon, the babies learn not only to not crawl toward the books but to cry at the very sight of them. Modern methods are just more subtle, but the same ends are achieved.
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Betsy knew what she was doing when she demanded more bodyguards to protect her. At this point, I suspect she is competting to become more unpopular than Bernhard Rust, the Nazi Minister of Science, Education and National Culture from 1934 to 1945.
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I’m not against NAEP testing. It seems to me to accommodate the modest, reasonable [erstwhile– before they got intrusive] longtime mission of Dept of Ed, which they’ve had since long before they were elevated to single Cabinet status: to collect data comparing schools in various regions. It’s a sample! & it pretends to no more than what it is: it’s just a thumbnail sketch on how we’re doing public-ed-wise, one region vs another. Import– whether scores reflect SES or whatever, & whether/ what measures should be taken– are left to others.
NAEP scores have been very helpful in countering the results-evasive Ed-deform sector & their ideological claims of “what works” in US ed. NAEP scores have long been a refreshing cold reality-check on our numbskull fed-imposed ed policies.
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If we use the NAEP like a litmus test without test prep or high stakes attached, it is less harmful than the CCSS tests.
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“If” is right. Already there were changes via NCLB ESSA. They now require districts receiving Title I $ to participate every 2 yrs. (Poor urban kids, natch– like they need more tests.) Plus, for 15 yrs they’ve been running a project called Trial Urban District Assessment – now up to 27 districts – “designed to determine the feasibility of using NAEP to report on the performance of public school students at the district level.” !
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” to collect data comparing schools in various regions.”
Can you please elaborate on that in the sense of where in the statute authorizing the Dept. of Ed can we find that specific mandate.
Thanks!
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It defies logic what Devos does. Since test scores are low, she wants kids go to schools where they don’t take these tests. This just means, she sees the problem with tests not test scores. But then just take away the tests from public schools.
Clearly, these tests were invented to destroy public schools.
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What I want to know is who decided that standardized tests should be the so called “measure” of education? (See Duane Swacker for a takedown of the whole “measurement” claim)
And who decided that NAEP is the so-called “gold standard” of standardized tests? (As some like to call it and as the fact that people on both sides quote it seems to imply)
The problem with using standardized test scores to “prove” that standardized testing policies in particular have not worked should be obvious.
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As Duane Swacker has noted time and again, there are (at a minimum) two questions that must yield to specific answers when talking about legitimate measurements.
1) what, specifically is being measured with a particular measurement instrument?
2) what is the standard unit associated with the measurement?
Every legitimate measurement measures something very specific. If one can not say specifically what it is that one is supposedly “measuring”, one is NOT doing legitimate measurement.
Every legitimate measurement is expressed in standard units of that measurement. Distance, for example is expressed in feet. There can be more than one standard unit, but for legitimate measurements, there is always a fixed relationship between the different units by which a measurement can easily be converted from one unit system to another.
So, as Duane Swacker likes to ask, “what is the standard unit of measurement for education/learning?”
The answer “One NAEP point” would not be acceptable because it simply changes the question to “what is one NAEP point?”
There are actually many more questions associated with legitimate measurements (eg, what is the uncertainty associated with a measurement?), but the above two are key in deciding whether something can even be called a legitimate measurement.
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“1) what, specifically is being measured with a particular measurement instrument?”
Well, we can easily name the darn thing these people try to measure: knowledge. The problem is, we don’t know what knowledge is. I certainly haven’t seen any definition of it in ed research papers. They just measure something with tests and they call it knowledge.
So they measure what they can measure, but what they measure is a mystery.
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The test measures knowledge.
What is knowledge?
Whatever the test measures.
What could be more clear?
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Such Mobius logic is very popular among the standardized testing crowd
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“Möbius Proof”
Möbius proof is all the rage
Make a loop from cutup page
Bend the proof back o’er with glue
That will surely prove it’s true
From “The Mywayman” (A DAMthology of Deform)
He did not come in the dawning; he did
not come at noon;
And out o’ the tawny sunset, before the
rise o’ the moon,
When the Test was a Möbius ribbon,
looping the Coleman lore,
An Opt-out troop came marching—
Marching—marching—
The parents all came marching, up to
the Governor’s door.
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Illustration of a Möbius strip: it has only one side. Provenly, this is the only object in existence.
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Exactly SDP! Well stated!
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“Loopy Deform”
Möbius loop
Escher stair
Bottom is top
Cheat is fair
Up is down
Back is fore
Round and round
Deformer lore
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Deformers don’t deserve to be mentioned together with Möbius and Escher. 🙂
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Not incidentally. One could make a pretty good argument that the people behind NAEP created all the current hand-wringing over NAEP scores with their categories (“proficient” and all the rest).
These folks can complain all they want about others misinterpreting (or even misusing) the terminology, but it is not like that was not to be expected. The dictionary definition of “proficient” is “competent or skilled in doing or using something”. So anything less than that would seem to mean “NOT competent or skilled…” The common meaning of a word is important because many (if not most) people do not read the redefinition of common terms for specific applications.
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The achievement levels were created in 1992 when Checker Finn was chair of the National Assessment Governing Board.
Congress approved them but insisted they were considered to be on a “trial” basis. They have been on trial for 27 years. The reason for achievement levels was to give the media a story that the public would understand, instead of scale scores that reported on a scale of 1-500. The scale scores, which did not translate into headlines, allegedly reported what students “knew and could do.” The achievement levels are human judgments, decided by panels of people (teachers, members of the public) allegedly define “what students should know and do.” The validity of the achievement levels have been challenged by scholars repeatedly, who say they are arbitrary and invalid. The definition of “proficient” is not objective. It is subjective.
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