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Randi: Without Major Corrections, the Common Core Standards Will Fail

By dianeravitch
May 2, 2014 //
49

Randi Weingarten sent representatives to the Pearson shareholder meeting in London to complain about the gag orders that keeps the tests secret, after they are administered.

In a wide-ranging interview with Josh Eidelson in Salon, Rani reaffirmed her support for the Common Core but predicted that the rush to implement it has generated an anti-testing backlash that could cause it to fail.

She also said that the Newark teachers’ contract, which she once hailed as a model, has been hijacked by the Christie administration.

She blamed much of the backlash against the Common Core and the testing on the intransigence of State Commissioner Zjohn King. She said: ” The implementation of the Common Core has been worse than the implementation of Obamacare. And Obamacare, people adjusted and adjusted, adjusted when they saw problems. In New York state, at least, when they saw problems in terms of the Common Core … unfortunately what the state education commissioner did is put his head in the sand …”

Categories Common Core, Testing

New York Parent-Educator Groups Call for Resignations of Commissioner John King and Regents Chair Merryl Tisch

By dianeravitch
May 2, 2014 //
23

This just in:

 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: May 2, 2014
More Information Contact:
Eric Mihelbergel (716) 553-1123; nys.allies@gmail.com
Lisa Rudley (917) 414-9190; nys.allies@gmail.com
New York State Allies for Public Education (NYSAPE) http://www.nysape.org

NYS 3rd Grade Test Invalid, Chancellor Merryl Tisch & Education Commissioner John King Must Resign

The leaders of the New York State Allies for Public Education (NYSAPE), a coalition of more than 45 parent and educator groups from throughout the state, are calling for the NYS 3rd Grade math test to be deemed invalid, since many questions were missing today from one of the four forms. This week, once again, parents are reminded of the grossly inappropriate practice of subjecting 8 and 9 year olds to 6 to 12 hours of testing over the course of six days. In light of the high stakes attached to these tests for children, schools and teachers, an error of this magnitude calls NYSED’s leadership and relationship with Pearson into serious question. This is yet another major misstep by our Commissioner of Education and the Board of Regents who oversee NYSED.

Commissioner King and the Board of Regents have been criticized extensively for not listening to parents or educators on the need to revamp the Common Core standards, lessen the focus on testing, and to cease and desist from thrusting one-size-fits-all statewide curriculum on local schools. And despite repeated issues with its testing vendor, NYSED has failed to take meaningful action, ignoring criticism from all corners of the state.

After repeatedly witnessing NYSED and the Board of Regents leadership fail to act within their authority, New York State Allies for Public Education now calls for the termination of Commissioner John King and the resignation of Regents Chancellor Merryl Tisch. The concerns of parents and educators throughout New York State have been casually dismissed at the detriment of their children for far too long.

“This comedy of errors has gone on too long. From the overly long, obscure and confusing ELA exams, with commercial product placements, and now with missing questions from the math exam, it is clear that the educrats at NYSED who have flunked, not our children,” said Chris Cerrone, Springville parent, Western New York Educator and founding NYSAPE member.
“While NYSED is eager to impose high-stakes on our schools and our teachers, where’s the accountability for them?” asked Jeanette Deutermann, North Bellmore public school parent and founder of Long Island Opt Out, “We need to stop the excessive testing and test prep, with defective modules and exams, and get back to educating our children once again.”

“Even as Louis CK has brought attention to the inherently flawed nature of the Common Core test prep materials this week, parents throughout the state are opting out their children in even larger numbers. In our school district, more than 48% refused to take the math tests. But it is unfair to all children and teachers to be assessed and compared with others through an invalid exam with missing questions. Enough is enough! John King and Merryl Tisch, resign!” said Stacey Serdy, Worcester Central School District parent and founder of Worcester Community for Education.
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Categories Accountability, Education Reform, New York, Parents, Resistance, Testing

More on Houston Lawsuit Challenging VAM Methods to Evaluate Teachers

By dianeravitch
May 1, 2014 //
12

As readers of this blog know, using value-added-assessment is a very poor way to gauge teacher quality. The research and evidence do not support this methodology. Teacher quality cannot be judged by computers. Test scores reflect only a small part of what teachers do. And as the American Statistical Association recently said, teachers account for about 1-16% of the variation in test scores, yet their rating will be heavily influenced by test scores.

Here is a press release about the lawsuit filed in federal court in Houston, challenging VAM:

 

For Immediate Release
May 1, 2014

 

 

 

Contact:
Gayle Fallon, HFT
713/623-8891
Janet Bass, AFT
301/502-5222
jbass@aft.org

Seven Houston Teachers, Houston Federation of Teachers File Lawsuit
Challenging Constitutionality of Value-Added Measure for Evaluations
HOUSTON—Highly recognized, good teachers are receiving poor evaluations because of a grossly flawed value-added algorithm that should be changed, seven Houston teachers and the Houston Federation of Teachers said today in an unprecedented lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas.
　
The lawsuit details numerous problems with the Houston Independent School District’s Education Value-Added Assessment System, or EVAAS. Its statistical methodology uses a student’s performance on prior standardized tests to predict academic growth in the current year, though what is considered a sufficient level of growth is not defined. A teacher’s EVAAS score is supposed to measure the effect, or added value, of a teacher on a student’s academic growth over the school year. The school district uses this deeply flawed methodology for decisions about teacher evaluation, bonuses and termination, yet it is a “black box” system in which the methodology is considered proprietary and confidential.
　
“Due to a faulty, incomprehensible and secret formula, good teachers like the ones filing this suit are being labeled failures and our entire education system is being reduced to a numbers game,” said American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten. “Testing isn’t aligned with the purposes of public education. It doesn’t measure big-picture learning, critical thinking, resilience, creativity or curiosity, yet those are the qualities that great teaching brings out in a student. The fixation on testing has literally drained the joy out of learning. We’ve always been leery of value-added models, and we have enough evidence to make clear that not only has VAM not worked, it’s been really destructive and it in no way helps improve teaching and learning.”
　
Daniel Santos, an award-winning sixth grade social studies teacher at Jackson Middle School, said the evaluation system is failing him, his students and his profession.

“It’s dispiriting and insulting to be told I’m ineffective, a judgment that doesn’t mesh with my classroom performance or the time and effort I devote to my students. Texas is using a broken evaluation system that isn’t properly identifying who really needs help to improve,” Santos said, adding, “My students are being tested on material that is not aligned with our curriculum.”

While there have been other suits challenging VAM, the Houston suit is unique because it was brought by highly recognized teachers who contend their poor EVAAS ratings do not correlate with their actual performance nor take into account socioeconomic or demographic variables in predicting student performance. The complaint also charges that the district directed and/or pressured school administrators to “manufacture deficiencies or otherwise find fault with the instructional practices” by teachers who received low EVAAS ratings. Those teachers would be placed on a growth plan to correct the supposed faulty instructional practice.
　
Myla Van Duyn, who teaches ninth grade biology at Davis High School, received an unwarranted low EVAAS score and contends her classroom observation scores were artificially lowered to be aligned with the EVAAS scores.
　
“This is demoralizing,” said Van Duyn, who is leaving the school district at the end of the school year, a decision motivated in part by the flawed evaluation system.

“EVAAS is driving out great Houston teachers because they’d rather work in a place that respects　teachers. Everybody can do better, but the EVASS method does not accurately account for all of the variables that go into a child’s ability to answer questions on a multiple choice test,” Van Duyn said.
　
Andy Dewey, another plaintiff, is a history teacher at Carnegie Vanguard High School who developed the curriculum for two history courses and has been consistently rated well by his administrators. “Houston’s evaluation system is sold as a system to support and strengthen teaching, but it’s actually a bait and switch sham that’s weakening instruction and not helping teaching or learning at all,” Dewey said. “Teachers are told their scores are low but are not given information about what they did or did not do to cause their students to perform less than predicted.”
　
Gayle Fallon, president of the Houston Federation of Teachers, said: “The district is using a woefully inaccurate, educationally destructive evaluation system. If a car had as many design defects as the EVAAS system, it would be recalled as a lemon. EVAAS should be replaced with a fair and meaningful system that will actually help improve teaching and learning.”
　
AFT’s Weingarten said the real culprit is school districts’ fixation on testing, noting none of the top-performing countries subjects their students to as much testing as the United States.
　
“The testing obsession has turned kids into test scores and teachers into algorithms. Rote memorization and testing don’t prepare our students for the 21st century. We need to help kids problem solve, think critically, learn to be persistent and work in teams,” Weingarten said. “This country has spent billions on accountability, not on the improvement of teaching and learning at the classroom level, and value-added models are the leading edge of this misguided effort,” she said.
　
Weingarten said districts should develop, with teachers, a comprehensive evaluation system based on multiple measures that accurately identifies teachers needing improvement and that provides targeted help. To reclaim the promise of public education, she said there should be safe and welcoming neighborhood schools, access to early childhood education, wraparounds services at schools to address health, social and emotional issues, and project-based instruction.

Weingarten first questioned the fairness and accuracy of value-added metrics in 2007. It also has　been criticized　as inaccurate and an unstable measure of teacher performance by, most recently, the American Statistical Association, as well as RAND Corp. researchers, the National Academy of Sciences and the Economic Policy Institute. The ASA said the majority of the variation in test scores is attributable to factors outside the teachers’ control.
　
The federal lawsuit states teachers’ due process constitutional rights are being violated because the EVAAS system is not an accurate or reliable indicator of teachers’ performance and because “a cloak of secrecy” prevents teachers from verifying or challenging their EVAAS score. The suit also contends teachers’ equal protection constitutional rights are being violated because the school district directs and/or pressures school administrators to align teachers’ instructional practice scores with their EVAAS scores—two separate evaluation components—so those with below-average EVAAS scores receive arbitrary, harsher instructional practice scores. The suit also contends that the standards for acceptable growth are arbitrary, vague and constantly being recalibrated.
　
In addition to the Houston Federation of Teachers, Daniel Santos, Myla Van Duyn, and Andy Dewey, the other plaintiffs are Ivan Castillo (a fourth-grade bilingual teacher who has taught at　 Briscoe Elementary School since 1994, was the school’s bilingual teacher of the year in 2013-14 and is a finalist for bilingual elementary teacher for the Houston Independent School District) ; Paloma Garner (a ninth-grade biology teacher at David High School, has received several national awards recognizing her mentoring skills and has a consistent record of strong performance); Araceli Ramos (a ninth-grade English teacher at Austin High School who was selected in 2014 by a school official to tutor teachers on the Texas English Language Proficiency Assessment System) and Joyce Helfman (an eighth-grade English teacher at Johnston Middle School who has had a consistent record of strong performance and is well respected by her colleagues).

 

 

Categories Accountability, Teacher Evaluations, Testing, Texas

Why the Tech Industry Loves Common Core

By dianeravitch
May 1, 2014 //
16

A teacher sent the following comment in reference to the requirement that all Common Core testing must be done online. Schools will lay off teachers and cut programs and services to pay for technology for testing:

“My campus has 1200 students and 32 computers in the lab. You do the math. We have to buy HUNDREDS of new computers, so that our primary-aged kids can take a test in the spring. Our district has frozen our salaries, cut staff, and cut our benefits…because our funding was also cut by our state…but we still have to come up with the $10 million that these computers will cost our district.”

Categories Common Core, Education Industry, For-Profit, Technology, Computers, Testing

NY Passes Law to Limit Test Prep. What a Joke!

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2014 //
81

New York passed a law to limit test prep, but it won’t make any difference.

Because high-stakes are attached to the tests, who will dare to limit test prep? Teachers and principals will be evaluated and possibly fired based on the scores. Schools may be closed based on the scores. The test prep will go on, as frenzied as ever.

Only the NY legislature would be so naive as to believe that passing a law against too much test prep will negate the high stakes they have attached to it.

Oddly enough, the law exempts charter schools from its limits. They can engage in test prep 100% of the time, and that’s okay.

“This month, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and state legislators passed a law, intended to take effect by the next school year, setting a 2 percent limit on the amount of classroom time that could be spent on test preparation, or about three and a half days in a school year. Charter schools, some of which are known for an almost religious devotion to test preparation, are not obligated to comply, officials said.”

Makes sense, right?

Categories New York, Testing

TeacherKen Writes a Letter to President and Mrs. Obama (LINK ADDED)

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2014 //
11

TeacherKen is a veteran social studies teacher who has a passion for teaching and a passion for justice.

He wrote a letter to the President and Mrs. Obama, politely asking them to reflect on what they want for their own children and what they are inflicting on the nation’s children. I don’t think he used the word “inflict,” but how else to describe the federal mandates that impose endless hours of standardized testing on children? It would not be tolerated at Sidwell Friends in D.C, or at the University of Chicago Lab School, where the Obama girls were students.

Categories Obama, Standardized Testing, Testing

Carol Burris: The Danger Done by “Fools with Tools”

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2014 //
58

Carol Burris here explains the deep, dark secret of standardized testing.

Whoever is in charge decides what the passing mark is. The passing mark is the “cut score.” Those in charge can decide to create a test that everyone passes because the cut score is so low and the questions so simple, or they can create a test that everyone fails. In fact, because of field testing, the test makers know with a high degree of precision how every question will “function,” that is, how hard or easy it is and how many students are likely to get it right or wrong.

As Burris shows, New York’s Commissioner John King aligned the Common Core tests with the SAT, knowing in advance that nearly 70% would not pass. That was his choice. Whatever his motive, he wanted a high failure rate. As King predicted, 69% failed. It was his choice.

Policymakers in Kentucky chose a more reasonable cut score and only about half their students failed.

Are students in Kentucky that much smarter than students in New York? No, but they may have smarter policymakers.

Knowing these shenanigans gives more reason to opt your children out of the state testing. The game is rigged against them.

.

Categories Common Core, Kentucky, New York, Testing

John Thompson: Who Does More Damage to Public Education: The Tea Party or Arne Duncan?

By dianeravitch
April 30, 2014 //
59

John Thompson raises a provocative and important question: who is inflicting more damage on teachers and students? Tea Party extremists like North Carolina Governor Pat McCrory or Secretary of Education Arne Duncan?

Thompson, a teacher and historian, describes the assault on teachers in North Carolina, whose governor and Legislature seem determined to destroy public education by expanding vouchers and charters and to dismantle the teaching profession by eliminating tenure, laying off teacher aides, and keeping salaries stagnant.

Thompson writes:

“Which sets of school reforms are inflicting the most damage on teachers and students? Has the right wing Tea Party’s most extreme assaults on public education hurt schools the most? Or, has the Duncan administration’s ill-conceived corporate reforms done the most harm?

“North Carolina was once touted as an exemplar of standards based reforms, and Wake County was praised for its socio-economic integration. Tea Party Governor Pat McCrory and Republicans are phasing out tenure and gutting salaries. As a result, mid-year teacher resignations in Wake schools have increased by an “alarming” 41% this school year. The number of resigning teachers who said they are moving to other North Carolina schools dropped, as there was an increase in teachers leaving for other states. Early retirements have tripled.

“The problem is so extreme that Doug Thilman, Wake’s assistant superintendent for human resources, said at a press conference, “Good teachers are having to make hard decisions to leave our classrooms for a better future somewhere else or in another line of work, in another profession – not in our public schools and not in our state.”

But then there is Arne Duncan’s mad idea that the way to “fix” schools is to fire half or all the staff.

Thompson writes:

“The mirror image of Wakes’ crisis is found in Chicago “turnaround schools.” Chicago’s Catalyst quotes Michael Hansen, senior researcher for the American Institutes for Research, who explains that the Duncan administration’s School Improvement Grant (SIG) are “under-researched.” High attrition following a turnaround has the potential to produce “more harm than help.” (emphasis by the Catalyst)

Ignoring educational research, these expensive turnaround campaigns begin with the mass dismissal of teachers. This immediately reduces the number of African-American teachers serving African-American communities, as well as reducing the experience levels of teachers. Catalyst reports, however, that “large chunks of the new staff–teachers who were hand-picked and spent weeks over the summer getting to know each other, becoming a team and learning how to spark improvement when the school reopened–leave within a few years.”

Catalyst reports “At 16 of the 17 schools that underwent a turnaround between 2007 and 2011, more than half of teachers hired in the first year of the turnaround left by the third year.” Moreover, “Among all turnarounds, an average of two-thirds of new teachers left by year three.” (emphasis in the original)

As the Consortium on Chicago School Research (CCSR) explains, such high levels of attrition is problematic because, “It can produce a range of organizational problems at schools, such as discontinuity in professional development, shortages in key subjects and loss of teacher leadership.”

I say that the answer to Thompson’s question is clear. McCrory is gutting public education in his state, and only in his state. Duncan’s idiotic idea of “turnaround” is harming schools and communities across the nation, laying off veteran teachers, reducing the number of African-American teachers, and generating harmful turmoil.

Let’s face it. Duncan has inflicted incalculable harm on public education, especially in urban districts. He became Secretary of Education after eight unsuccessful years as superintendent of schools in Chicago, which was and remains a low-performing district. He was unqualified to be Secretary of Education. In the past, we have had governors with no education credentials, but they at least had the good sense to recognize the reality of federalism, the limitations on their powers, and fact that control of education is a state and local function. Duncan has recognized none of these factors and has used federal funding to impose his will and his bad ideas on districts across the nation. It seems he won’t be satisfied until every teacher is inexperienced (preferably certified by Teach for America), every public school has been turned over to private management, every decision is tightly tied to test scores, and every teacher education institution is run by charter school teachers who grant advanced degrees to one another.

Duncan is a terrific basketball payer but a disastrous Secretary of Education. The real test of public education is whether it can survive two more years of his failed and harmful policies.

Categories Charter Schools, Chicago, Closing schools, Duncan, Arne, Education Industry, Education Reform, Privatization, Teach for America, Testing

Kindergarten Show Canceled so Children Can Get “College-and-Career-Ready

By dianeravitch
April 29, 2014 //
75

Yes, you read that right.

School officials in Elwood, Néw York, canceled a kindergarten play scheduled for May 14-15 because it would take time away from getting the little tykes “college-and-career ready.”

Washington Post journalist Valerie Strauss called the school for confirmation. It sounded too crazy to be true.

But it is factual. The interim principal sent a letter to parents of children in kindergarten canceling the annual show. The letter said, in part, “The reason for eliminating the Kindergarten show is simple. We are responsible for preparing children for college and career with valuable lifelong skills and know that we can best do that by having them become strong readers, writers, coworkers and problem solvers.”

A member of the district staff vouched for the letter’s authenticity.

This is nuts. Blame Duncan. Blame Obama. They know nothing about child development. Their poll-tested policies hurt little children. Their policies have no basis in research. Children need time to play. They need time to socialize. Five-year-olds should be allowed a childhood.

Categories Childhood, Pre-K, K, Duncan, Arne, Obama, Race to the Top, Testing

Mercedes Schneider: Who Are the 24 People Who Wrote the Common Core Standards?

By dianeravitch
April 28, 2014 //
102

A few days ago, I posted the names of the members of the “work groups” that wrote the Common Core standards. There was one work group for English language arts and another for mathematics. There were some members who served on both work groups.

 

Altogether, 24 people wrote the Common Core standards. None identified himself or herself as a classroom teacher, although a few had taught in the past (not the recent past). The largest contingent on the work groups were representatives of the testing industry.

 

Mercedes Schneider looked more closely at the 24 members of the two work groups to determine their past experience as educators, with special attention to whether they had any classroom experience.

 

Here are a few noteworthy conclusions based on her review of the careers of the writers of the CCSS:

 

In sum, only 3 of the 15 individuals on the 2009 CCSS math work group held positions as classroom teachers of mathematics. None was a classroom teacher in 2009. None taught elementary or middle school mathematics. Three other members have other classroom teaching experience in biology, English, and social studies. None taught elementary school. None taught special education or was certified in special education or English as a Second Language (ESL).

Only one CCSS math work group member was not affiliated with an education company or nonprofit….

 

In sum, 5 of the 15 individuals on the CCSS ELA work group have classroom experience teaching English. None was a classroom teacher in 2009. None taught elementary grades, special education, or ESL, and none hold certifications in these areas.

Five of the 15 CCSS ELA work group members also served on the CCSS math work group. Two are from Achieve; two, from ACT, and one, from College Board.

 

One member of the work groups has a BA in elementary education but no record of ever having taught those grades.

 

Almost all members who had any classroom experience were high school teachers.

 

Schneider concludes:

 

My findings indicate that NGA and CCSSO had a clear, intentional bent toward CCSS work group members with assessment experience, not with teaching experience, and certainly not with current classroom teaching experience.

In both CCSS work groups, the number of individuals with “ACT” and “College Board” designations outnumbered those with documented classroom teaching experience.

 

The makeup of the work groups helps to explain why so many people in the field of early childhood education find the CCSS to be developmentally inappropriate. There was literally no one on the writing committee (with one possible exception) with any knowledge of how very young children learn. The same concern applies to those who educate children in the middle-school years or children with disabilities or English language learners. The knowledge of these children and their needs was not represented on the working group.

 

 

 

 

Categories Childhood, Common Core, Education Reform, Special Education, Teachers and Teaching, Testing
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