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James Harvey: We Do Not Spend More than Other Nations on Schools

By dianeravitch
January 4, 2017 //
4

James Harvey is executive director of the National Superintendents Roundtable. See their excellent report “The Iceberg Effect,” which put international comparisons of schools into a broad context.

 

He commented today, in response to an article claiming that we spend more than other nations and get worse results:

 

The “we spend more than anyone less for poorer results” argument is specious. We’d really need a forensic examination of finances to get a better fix on this, but American schools carry in their budgets hugely expensive line items for benefits and health insurance, transportation, and athletics that other nations pay for in municipal budgets or through community groups (in the case of athletics). An apples to apples comparison would either eliminate those costs from American school budgets (to get a better fix on true educational expenditures) or calculate, for schools elsewhere, equivalent contributions from outside the school system.

Categories Funding, International

A Misinformed, Embarrassing Article from Brookings about Our “Failing Schools”

By dianeravitch
January 4, 2017 //
18

The Brookings Institution was once known as a reliable source of thoughtful, informed analysis of important policy issues. In the past decade, it has turned its education commentary over to rightwing ideologues, who are driven by ideology and indifferent to facts that they ought to know.

 

On behalf of Brookings, Jonathan Rothwell, economist for Gallup, complains that the U.S. spends more on education, has seen no improvement in decades, and is seeing no gains in productivity. He ends by saying that low-income families can’t afford private tutors or home schooling, as though these were viable ways to improve education for the poorest children .

 

I can’t unpack all this in a short space, but I would like to show you in a few paragraphs why this is an uninformed article. To begin with, Rothwell cherrypicks the data on test scores. This makes his analysis misleading and wrong. Test scores are the highest they have ever been on the only longitudinal measure we have: the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). He selectively quotes one version of the NAEP, while ignoring the other.

 

There are actually two versions of NAEP. One is called the “Long Term Trend” (LTT) data, the other is main NAEP. The LTT is offered every four years to samples of students at age 9, 13, and 17. Main NAEP is given every other year to students in grades 4 and 8.

 

LTT contains questions that are unchanged since the early 1970s and have no relation to what students are taught today. Occasionally, questions are deleted because their content is obsolete (e.g., a question that refers to S&H Green Stamps). The data for 17-year-olds is especially dubious because this group has no incentive to take the NAEP tests seriously.

 

The National Assessment Governing Board is aware of the problem of low motivation among 17-year-olds. When I served on the board, from 1994-2001, we devoted a large part of one of our quarterly meetings to this problem. There was talk of incentives, pizza parties, cash, but it was not resolved. The bottom line, however, is that any data about the test scores of 17-year-olds must acknowledge that this group doesn’t care about the test because they know it doesn’t matter. What the board learned when we discussed it is that some 17-year-olds doodle on the answer sheet or answer every question by checking the same letter. They don’t care.

 

I recommend that Rothwell read Chapter 5 of my book Reign of Error. He would learn there that the scores on the main NAEP reached their highest point ever in 2013 (they were flat for the first time in many years in 2015). This was true for every group of whites, blacks, Hispanics, and Asians. He would also learn that the graduation rate was the highest ever for these groups, and the dropout rate was the lowest ever. He would see a different reading of the LTT data, showing a dramatic rise in test scores in math for black students and Hispanic students in all three age groups, and for white students at ages 9 and 13, from 1973 to 2008. Even white 17-year-olds saw a gain, but it was small.

 

If I may quote my analysis, based on a review of both versions of NAEP, “NAEP data show beyond question that test scores in reading and math have improved for almost every group of students over the past two decades: slowly and steadily in the case of reading, dramatically in the case of mathematics.”

 

I would also urge Rothwell to read chapter 7, which reviews the international test scores. It shows that we were never #1 in test scores on international tests. In fact, when the first international tests were given in 1964, we were last among 12 nations. Yet over the half century that followed, we outpaced all the other 11 nations by every measure.

 

I know that Brookings uses Google or some other search engine to find anything that quotes its articles and research. I hope that they find this article and bring it to the attention of Jonathan Rothwell.

 

More important, I can only hope and wish that Brookings would make the effort to employ genuine education researchers to write and declaim about this important subject. Over the past decade, its education spokesman was Grover Whitehurst, George W. Bush’s former research director, who turned Brookings into a cheerleading think tank for school choice. This is unworthy of a once-great and once-trusted institution.

 

Categories Accountability, International, NAEP, Reign of Error, Testing

Stanford Research: Investing in Public Schools Is More Effective Than Privatization

By dianeravitch
December 18, 2016 //
13

This is a project that should interest all readers of the blog as well as state and local school boards and elected officials at every level. It includes a book that reviews education issues around the globe and resources that you may access by clicking the link. The bottom line of a vast amount of research is that privatization is a failed policy, not an innovation. The most effective way to invest public dollars is in improving public schools.

 

Stanford Graduate School of Education Research Center Introduces Cross-National Study Central to Debates about Future of the U.S. Education System

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Ralph Rogers
Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education
650.725.8600
ralphr@stanford.edu

 

Stanford, CA – December 13, 2016 – In the midst of the ongoing debate and a potential shift in the U.S. approach to education, the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education (SCOPE) is pleased to introduce new research-based evidence and analysis that supports investment in public schools as a better alternative than the privatization of education.

“This book shows how public investment in education outperforms privatization across three continents, addressing this critical question as President-elect Trump’s appointee, Betsy DeVos, considers shifting U.S. education to a voucher scheme,” said Frank Adamson, PhD, the primary editor, chapter author, and Senior Policy and Research Analyst at SCOPE. “This book offers reasoned evidence to policymakers, communities, and families about how investing in public schools produces better and more equitable outcomes than voucher programs.”

SCOPE’s work addresses the question of how results from public investment approaches compare with those from market-based reforms and provides a timely explanation of alternatives based on real evidence derived from policy analysis and actual outcomes in six different countries. In this project, SCOPE has designed and implemented a set of accessible information resources designed to inform the different constituencies involved in this important debate.

The book, Global Education Reform: How Privatization and Public Investment Influence Education Outcomes, with a set of supporting infographics, videos, and research briefs, provides hard evidence supporting investment in pubic schools. Researchers thoroughly investigated the results of experiments with education in Chile, Sweden, and the U.S. and compared their educational outcomes with those of nearby countries with similar economic and social conditions: Cuba, Finland, and Canada (Ontario). At the national levels in Sweden, the U.S., and Chile, market, charter, or voucher systems are associated with greater disparities and lower student outcomes on international tests.

 

SCOPE’s project combined in-depth analysis of the different ends of an ideological spectrum – from market-based experiments to strong state investments in public education. Written by education researchers, including Linda Darling-Hammond, Michael Fullan, Pasi Sahlberg, Martin Carnoy, and others, the authors present long-term policy analyses based on primary and secondary research on the implementation and results of these different approaches.
To best support an open debate on the issue of school reform, SCOPE has created the following set of free information resources:

 
Privatization or Public Investment in Education is a free SCOPE research and policy brief summarizing the findings in the book.
Six Countries. Two Educational Strategies. One Consistent Conclusion is a free infographic presenting an accessible and concise summary of the differences in approaches and outcomes – privatization versus public investment in education.
Our Kids, Our Future: Privatization and Public Investment in Education, a 3-minute video providing an overview of the differences between experimental privatization models and public investment in equitable education systems.
How Privatization and Public Investment Influence Education: A Look at the Research, a more detailed 12-minute video explaining the differences between experimental privatization models and public investment in equitable education systems.
Educational Inequities in the New Orleans Charter School System is a free infographic from SCOPE and the Schott Foundation that explains the impact on students and schools of New Orleans becoming a predominantly charter district after Hurricane Katrina.

 

The Editors
Frank Adamson, PhD, is a Senior Policy and Research Analyst at the Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education.
Björn Åstrand, PhD, is a Senior Lecturer and Dean at Karlstad University in Sweden.
Linda Darling-Hammond, EdD, is the Charles E. Ducommun Professor of Education at Stanford University, the author of over 300 publications, and a former president of the American Educational Research Association.
About SCOPE
The Stanford Center for Opportunity Policy in Education (SCOPE) fosters research, policy, and practice to advance high-quality, equitable education systems in the United States and internationally.

 
These resources can be downloaded or viewed at the SCOPE Global Education Reform web page.

Categories Equity, International, Privatization, Research

The High Cost of High Scores on International Tests

By dianeravitch
December 12, 2016 //
15

Simon Greenhalgh is assistant principal at the Seoul Foreign School. Most of his professional career has been spent in education in Asia.

 

In this article, he warns about the hidden costs to students in East Asia of an educational regime that values high test scores above all else that a student might do or accomplish.

 

The recent TIMSS (Trends in International Mathematics and Science Survey) and PISA (Program for International Student Assessment) results have been met with the usual fanfare or damp squib depending on where you reside. The idea to compare countries’ educational systems via standardized tests always seems to be an ill-considered one, and yet every year such rankings keep coming. There are people eagerly awaiting the results to see whether a country did well enough to provide cause for celebration or poorly enough to allow for an onslaught of criticism.

 

TIMSS and PISA have many critics, not least from leading academics like Yong Zhao at the University of Kansas; but despite their criticisms they are regularly held up by governments to champion or condemn educational practices in their own country – or other countries. Among other things this has led to an unhealthy obsession among educators from all over the world with Finland, whose results, system, and general educational indefatigability has become the hopeful example of a Western nation that can achieve good scores in the face of competition from Asia, without the need for mirroring long hours and encouraging high pressure competition.

 

This year, in a pattern that is becoming monotonous to follow, the Asia-Pacific has all the real winners, with the TIMSS results showing that Singapore, Hong Kong, South Korea, Chinese Taipei (Taiwan), and Japan significantly outperformed all other countries. These locations have used their success in these global standardized tests to boast of their educational systems, schools, teachers, and students. On the back of this success, we have witnessed a gentle wooing of the West, where, for example, the U.K. now widely utilizes a Singapore mathematics scheme. Alongside these academic initiatives, we have also been subjected to the unusual spectacle of a number of bizarre and disingenuous exchanges, mostly in the name of entertainment. We have seen, on the BBC no less, British children sent to Chinese schools (it was too hard, the Brits were too rude, and they gave up) and Chinese teachers sent to U.K. schools (the children were too rude and wouldn’t listen, so the teachers gave up).

 

In a recent follow-up, the BBC covered three Welsh children in South Korean schools and found that the truth is far more complicated than anything a standardized test can show. South Korean children are studying 14 to 16 hours a day to compete, ultimately, in a make-or-break university entrance exam. Welsh children don’t need to do this and they have more free time, which, depending on who you ask, may be a good or a bad thing.

 

Welsh PISA scores are lower than South Korean ones, but comparing the two is like comparing leeks and kimchi. The Asia-Pacific countries near the top of PISA rankings all feature tough final university entrance exams in highly competitive social environments, whereas Western countries left this behind a long time ago. A key moment in the story of the Welsh children in South Korea came when one of the South Korean children talks about suicides from her peer group due to the pressure coming from family and teachers over the college entrance exam results. How many suicides are worth it so that a country can attain the highest PISA scores?

 

The BBC, keen to make us laugh at hapless Welsh teenagers trying to mop the floors in a Seoul high school, also makes the more morbid point that South Korea has the highest suicide rate in the industrialized world, plausibly linked to the competitive nature of the society. However, those familiar with the countries that topped the TIMSS and PISA rankings will not be surprised by the suicides, the competitiveness, nor the 14-16 hour days of the students. This is the norm in these countries. This is not the norm in Wales and other Western countries for a reason: a different culture exists….

 

The real story is that whilst the wealthier Asian countries dominate these tables, the students are paying a price to do so. The long-term implications at an individual level aren’t really known. The stories of children studying until midnight every night and putting in a double shift all weekend are forgotten in the league tables. What does this mean? That the educational systems are not as good or simply that they have a different focus? At the end of the day, comparing apples and orange will never produce a meaningful or fair comparison. Those that want oranges will never agree that apples are better and the apple lovers shouldn’t mimicking orange growers in the hope of getting better apples.

 

 

 

Categories International, Testing

Pasi Sahlberg on the Beauty of Small Data

By dianeravitch
December 12, 2016 //
24

Pasi Sahlberg is the great Finnish educator whose book Finnish Lessons gave us a vision of a nation that succeeds without high-stakes testing, without standardized testing, and without charter schools or vouchers. He wrote of highly educated teachers who have wide scope and autonomy in their classrooms and who collaborate with their colleagues to do what is best for their children. He wrote of a national school system that values the arts, physical activity, and play. And, lo and behold, the OECD calls it the best school system in the world!

 

So entranced was I but what I read about Finland that I visited there a few years ago and had Pasi as my guide. The schools and classes were everything he claimed and more.

 

Pasi, like many other education experts, is aghast at the GERM (Global Education Reform Movement) that has swept the world. The agency that has spread GERM far and wide is international testing, the great horse race that only a few can win. Since most are losers, the frenzy for more testing becomes even stronger.

 

Pasi suggests a different approach. Instead of Big Data, produced by mass standardized testing, why not search for small data? 

 

Here is Pasi’s thumbnail sketch of the contrast between Big Data and small data:

 

Big data is a commonly used term in daily discourse that often comes with a label that big data will transform the way we think, work, and live. For many of us, this is an optimistic promise, while for others it creates anxiety and concern regarding control and privacy. In general terms, big data means data of very large size to the extent that its manipulation and management present significant practical challenges.
The main difference between big and small data in education is, of course, the size of data and how these data are collected and used. Big data in education always requires dedicated devices for collecting massive amounts of noisy data, such as specific hardware and software to capture students’ facial expressions, movements in class, eye movements while on task, body postures, classroom talk, and interaction with others. Small data relies primarily on observations and recordings made by human beings. In education, these include students’ self-assessments, teachers’ participatory notes on learning process, external school surveys, and observations made of teaching and learning situations.

 

To watch and listen to Pasi, introduced by Howard Gardner, here is the lecture he gave at Wellesley College in October. 

Categories Data, Education Reform, International, Real Education, Teachers and Teaching

Study: Portrait of a “Teach for All” (TFA International) Teacher

By dianeravitch
December 10, 2016 //
10

This study appears in the Education Policy Analysis Archives. Written by Michelle Gautreaux and Sandra Delgado of the University of British Columbia in Canada, it describes the origins of Teach for All, the international wing of TFA, which destroys the teaching profession and unions wherever it goes.

Here is the abstract:

“This article employs narrative analysis to examine how the media in 12 different countries characterize the Teach for All (TFA) teacher. Examining mass media narratives in these 12 countries illustrates that there are some remarkable commonalities in the narratives and character portraits co-constructed and propagated by the media. At the core of these narratives is the notion of a problem in education. This problem justifies the creation and emergence of a character, commonly constructed in opposition to traditionally certified teachers, who embodies the characteristics and attributes of the contemporary neoliberal subject. This article discusses the implications of this character’s widespread representation; namely, how does the character construction influence the broader public perception about education and how is it contributing to the (re)imagination of the role of the teacher?”

Where did Wendy Kopp get the idea for Teach for All? At a meeting sponsored by the Clinton Global Initiative. She suddenly realized she could bring her money-making plan to the rest of the world, appearing to do good while obliterating the teaching profession and unions.

Categories Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, International, Privatization, Teach for America

William Doyle: Please, Mr. Trump, Put Betsy DeVos on a Plane to Finland ASAP

By dianeravitch
December 9, 2016 //
21

William Doyle is living in Finland as a scholar-in-residence at the University of Eastern Finland.

 

In this post, he describes what Betsy DeVos would learn if she visited Finland.

 

He writes:

 

Donald Trump is promoting “school choice” as he vows to improve the American education system. To achieve this vision, he should start by putting his incoming Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos on a plane to world education superpower Finland to see what school choice means in its most powerful form — the choice from among numerous, great, neighborhood schools anywhere in the country.
Just ranked by the World Economic Forum as the No. 1 primary school system globally Finland shows us, that true educational choice means holding politicians accountable to provide families the choice between safe, well-resourced, high-quality local schools, especially in high-poverty areas, schools run by teachers trained at the highest levels of professionalism and supported by a national culture of teacher and school collaboration and respect for families and teachers.
We need to make the teaching profession respected enough to attract and retain the most highly qualified, motivated and passionate young people…and many of the teachers already in America’s schools.

 

The classroom scene in Finland is strikingly different from prevailing atmosphere reported in many classrooms in America, the U.K. and elsewhere, where teachers are routinely under-trained, micro-managed, surveilled, data-shamed, punished, overworked, disrespected and stressed to the breaking point by politicians, bureaucrats and non-educators….

 

We must not base our entire system of education on the staggeringly expensive, relentless standardized testing of children by faceless data collectors – make test design, administration and evaluation the job of the real experts – the classroom teachers who know our children best….

 

For example, Finland has discovered a crucial secret of education: Instead of flooding classrooms with graduates of unaccredited “alternative certifications” or six-week summer training courses as we do in the United States, teaching should be treated much more seriously, like an actual profession that’s critical to our nation’s future. Teaching requires rigorous, graduate-level training in both research and classroom practice.
It is a fantasy to believe, as the newly enacted federal Every Student Succeeds Act proposes, that we can improve our schools by requiring America’s teacher training universities to be evaluated by the standardized test scores of the children who are taught by their graduates. No high-performing school system does things this way.

Categories International, Teacher Education, Teacher Evaluations, Teachers and Teaching

Another Bad Report Card for Race to the Top

By dianeravitch
December 6, 2016 //
55

Back in 2009, when Arne Duncan announced the Race to the Top competition, he said we as a nation would literally be “racing to the top” of international competition by adopting his favored ideas: expanding charter schools, evaluating teachers to a significant degree by the test scores of their students, “turning around” low-scoring schools by radical measures such as closing them, creating state and national data storehouses to track students, and adopting “college and career-ready standards” (aka, the Common Core). Almost every state fell in line, because they had to do what Arne wanted in order to be eligible for a share of $4.35 billion.

 

But the report cards have not been kind to these “reforms.” When the National Assessment of Education Progress issued its regular report in 2015, test scores were flat or declining in most states.

 

Now the latest international test scores are out, and the U.S. has made no gains. We are not racing to the top. We are standing still. Why? Because Race to the Top did not address the root causes of academic failure: poverty and racial segregation. Charter schools have produced marginal gains at best, with some far worse than public schools. Evaluating teachers by test scores has been an abject failure, criticized by the nation’s leading scholarly organizations, including the American Statistical Association, which is not an arm of reformer-dreaded teachers’ unions or the “status quo.”

 

Here is today’s report from politico.com:

 

PISA RESULTS: BAD NEWS IN MATH: American 15-year-olds are getting worse at applying their math skills in the real world, when compared to their international peers. The 2015 Program for International Student Assessment results are out and they show a drop in “mathematics literacy” scores for U.S. students since 2012 and 2009. “Of particular concern is that we also have a higher percentage of students who score in the lowest performance levels … and a lower percentage of top math performers” compared to the international average, said Peggy Carr, acting commissioner of the National Center for Education Statistics, which released the results. The disappointing numbers come after results on another international study – the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study – recently showed gains made by U.S. fourth and eighth graders in math since 1995.

 

– U.S. science and reading literacy scores weren’t much different from previous years. Boys outperformed girls in science and math, while girls outperformed boys in reading. Scores for Massachusetts, North Carolina and Puerto Rico were broken out for international benchmarking purposes, and revealed that Massachusetts students, on average, are outperforming students in the U.S. and worldwide in all three subjects. North Carolina students were comparable with U.S. average scores and Puerto Rican students fared worse. PISA measures the performance of 15-year-olds every three years in three subjects across dozens of education systems worldwide. Check out the results here .

 

– Education Secretary John B. King Jr. is in Massachusetts today to hail the state’s success with PISA – while noting that the nation as a whole is “losing ground.” According to prepared remarks, King will say that it’s “a troubling prospect when, in today’s knowledge-based economy, the best jobs can go anywhere in the world. Students in Massachusetts, Maryland, and Minnesota aren’t just vying for great jobs along with their neighbors or across state lines, they must be competitive with peers in Finland, Germany, and Japan.” King will say that Massachusetts embodies the importance of perseverance. “The PISA results announced today for Massachusetts didn’t happen instantly or by accident,” he’ll say. “It has taken years of people showing courage – principals, teachers, parents, students, and state and district leaders. It has taken years of overcoming challenges. It has taken years to make real and meaningful change happen. And it will take time to see the work we are continuing to do today truly pay off for students.” More on King’s visit.

 

– Other noteworthy highlights: U.S. students value a career in science and have high expectations of having a science career, but they’re falling short when it comes to skills. Countries like Finland, Germany, Switzerland and Japan are also seeing better student outcomes than the U.S., while investing fewer hours in actual teaching – giving teachers more time for professional development and advancing their careers.

 

As I have often written before, the international test scores do not predict the future of our economy or anything else. Scores on standardized tests measure family income and income inequality. If you want to know more, read my chapter in “Reign of Error” on international tests and what they mean and do not mea.

Categories Duncan, Arne, Failure, International, Race to the Top

Uganda: High Court Orders Closure of Gates-Zuckerberg For-Profit Schools

By dianeravitch
December 4, 2016 //
21

As I have reported on many occasions (see here and here and here and here and here and here), a for-profit company called Bridge International Academies has been building a market for low-cost, for-profit schooling in Africa. It has been negotiating with the government of Liberia to take charge of all primary education and expanding in Uganda. Investors in BIA include Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg.

 

Last summer, the Ministry of Education and Sports ordered the closure of 87 for-profit academies, including the 60 or so managed by BIA, on grounds that they did not meet minimum standards or appropriate facilities for students. Teachers’ unions objected to the academies’  use of un-credentialed teachers. This month, the Uganda High Court ordered the closure of all of BIA’s schools in Uganda.

 

BIA has 63 campuses and 12,000 students in Uganda. They will remain open until December 8, when students take their exams.

 

CNN reported:

 

A legal tug-of-war between Ugandan authorities and a for-profit international chain of schools has led to the education provider being ordered to shut down in a matter of weeks, leaving the lives of thousands of pupils in limbo….

 

 

Bridge International Academies said it provides the best possible education to its students and that it will do whatever it can to make sure their schools continue to operate in Uganda.
Many students, parents and teachers protested after Uganda High Court ordered the closure of the low-cost private schools, which are backed by Microsoft and Facebook founders Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg.
Bridge International Academies has suggested that the opposition against their chain of schools was because the campuses competed against local state-run and private schools.
The Director of Education Standards for the Ministry, Huzaifa Mutazindwa, told CNN that the nursery and primary schools were not licensed, the teachers weren’t qualified and that there was no record of its curriculum being approved.
“The Ministry does not know what is being taught in these schools which is a point of concern to (the) government,” Mutazindwa said…

For its part, BIA — which runs more than 400 nursery and primary schools across Africa — has continuously denied the allegations that have been made by the government.
“There’s a lot of miscommunication and a lot of very serious, unfounded allegations. We would like to be given the opportunity to explain ourselves … The Ministry has been unwilling to give us an audience to set the record straight,” Uganda’s BIA director, Andrew White, told CNN.
In a statement, BIA addressed eight allegations that have been made about its operations. It said it teaches the Ugandan curriculum, all schools have good sanitation facilities and that the majority of their teachers are certified and registered. Those who aren’t certified and registered, it said, are attending in-service training.

 

When asked why the allegations were made if they weren’t true, White said: “We definitely feel like a lot of pressure has been applied to have a particular view of Bridge that is a negative one….”
One educational advocacy group agrees with the Ugandan authorities’ decision to close BIA.
President of the Global Campaign for Education (GCE), Camilla Croso, told CNN that the quality of their schools is “totally inadequate and unacceptable.”
“They are profit making enormously,” she said. “It’s very indecent because they are looking at poor people as a profitable market.”
“It really is incompatible to have human rights and profit making because you are motivated and act in completely different ways.”

 

 

Categories Accountability, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, For-Profit, International, Privatization

Yong Zhao: How Did the U.S. Do on the Latest International Tests?

By dianeravitch
December 1, 2016 //
13

Yong Zhao is one of the foremost experts in the nation on international comparisons. He was born and educated in China, but has worked in American universities for a number of years. He recently moved to the University of Kansas, where he holds a Distinguished Professorship.

He analyzes here how U.S. students in fourth and eighth grades performed on the TIMSS, which is focused on mathematics and science. Politicians like to bemoan the fact that U.S. students are not #1 in the world on this test or on PISA. As I have previous written, American students were never #1 on international tests. Back in the mid-1960s, when these tests began and fewer nations participated, we were dead last. I wrote about it here and here and also in my book Reign of Error, where I documented in detail how poorly we have always done on these tests, how little it means, and why these tests have zero predictive value for our economy. Also, see here.

Open the links to see the scores and graphs.

Zhao finds little change in the relative standing of American students, despite 15 years of berating teachers, students, and public schools. We changed the standards, the curriculum, and the tests, but none of that made much difference.

Zhao writes:

Reflections and Questions

Can we ever catch up? Is it necessary to catch up?…
It seems clear that after tremendous efforts to catch up to the high performing education systems in test scores, the U.S. has not succeeded. Two questions arise. First, can the U.S. ever catch up? Second, is it really necessary to catch up? My answer to both questions are no. Interested readers can read my books Catching up or Leading the Way: American Education in the Age of Globalization and World Class Learners: Educating Creative and Entrepreneurial Students.

Is it worth the cost?

While test scores went up in math in both the U.S. and East Asian countries, more students lost confidence in math and valued math less. If it is true that whatever policies and practices that resulted in higher test scores also make students less confident and less interested in math, are these policies and practices really educationally sound? Don’t we want more people have confidence in math and value math?

How much does curriculum matter?

The U.S. has “fixed” its curriculum but has not narrowed the gap. All the efforts that went into fixing the curriculum did not produce the results promised by those who adamantly believed and argued that American schools have lower standard and fragmented curriculum. Was the diagnosis wrong? Does curriculum and standards really matter that much?

Should we keep “fixing” American teachers?

TIMSS and other international tests have resulted in waves of teacher bashing in America, suggesting that they are less qualified and less mathematically knowledgeable than their counterparts in East Asian education systems. Bashed have also been teacher education programs in the U.S.. But the data does not really support the blames. Perhaps American teachers are great at doing something more important than simply raising test scores.

My Conclusion
I have questioned the value of international tests, and for that matter any standardized test, for improving our children’s education in many places. Test scores simply do not reflect what our children need to live in the future, let alone what they need to defend and improve a democratic society. Test scores are simply the indicator of one’s ability in taking the test. We should never read too much into it and attempt to draw conclusions that fuels actions that could affect the future of millions of children and the future of our society.

I have also raised questions on many occasions about copying policies and practices from other systems. It is not to say that we cannot learn from others. But education is both deeply rooted in and an integral part of culture, hence they mutually enhance and perpetuate, as I have argued in my book Who’s Afraid of the Big Bad Dragon: Why China has the Best (and Worst) Education System in the World. Different cultures impose different values and expectations on education. Different cultures also support and suppress different educational practices. Unless one is ready and able to redefine one’s culture and society, copying isolated educational policies rarely works.

The lesson from all these: Stop copying others’ past and start inventing our own future.

Categories Accountability, Education Industry, International, Testing
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