Across the nation, states and districts have greatly expanded the use of
standardized tests to hold schools and districts "accountable" for student
learning. The pending 2001 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary
Education Act (ESEA) will most likely further expand and intensify the role
of testing.
The U.S. already tests more children more often than any other nation.
Despite this, many claim that more testing and accountability based on
those tests will improve education, particularly in schools serving
predominantly low-income and minority-group children.
FairTest disagrees. We believe there is an
important role for good assessment of student learning. The public deserves
to know how well schools are doing, schools need to use information about
student learning to improve teaching, and there should be intervention in
schools which are unable to improve even when they have been provided the
resources and tools to do so. None of this requires heavy reliance on
results from state or commercial standardized tests. Focusing on those
tests will not lead to high quality education for all children, but will
instead turn schools into test-prep assembly lines that will leave many
children behind. The emphasis on test results will undermine, not improve,
the quality of education in schools now providing good education, and will
not improve the quality of schools which most need help. It will diminish
in particular the educational opportunities and outcomes for students of
color and low income students.
High Stakes for Students. Decision-making about students
in which a test score can override all other information--so that not
passing a test leads to retention in grade or denial of a diploma
regardless of other information about the student--contradicts the
recommendations of the National Research Council and violates the Standards
for Educational and Psychological Testing. Low-income, minority-group,
special needs, limited English proficient, and vocational students are most
likely to suffer from this unfair use of tests. Such policies should be
stopped.
Opportunity to Learn. Too many students attend
underfunded schools in which they are denied a fair opportunity to learn.
Schools serving low-income children often lack prepared teachers and good
libraries, labs and technology, and they have over-crowded classrooms in
dilapidated buildings. Too many schools buy test prep materials instead of
real books, or force teachers to teach narrowly to the test. Neither
students nor teachers should be held accountable for meeting learning
goals, including test results, unless they have been given adequate
resources. Once given the resources, the goal should be powerful education,
not test scores.
Teaching to the Test. Many people understand it is unfair
to make major decisions based solely on a test score and unreasonable to
expect improvement without providing the means. Teaching to the test is
more complex. "What's wrong with teaching to the test if students are
supposed to learn that material?" they ask. Unfortunately, research
continues to show that tests fail to assess many important areas of
learning and too often focus on trivia instead of important topics.
- The group Achieve, which supports testing, found that current state
tests do not match state standards and fail to assess whether students
are learning higher order thinking skills.
- Studies of tests that supposedly do a better job of measuring more
complex learning, such as the MCAS in Massachusetts, show they also fail
to adequately assess the standards. They, too, often emphasize
unimportant bits of information or rote procedures and thereby discourage
thoughtful work and in-depth learning.
Schools that serve students from higher-income communities do not reduce
teaching to test prep. They know their students need far more than can be
measured by a standardized test. Fear that their schools will dumb-down to
match the tests has led many parents in well-to-do suburbs, such as
Scarsdale, NY, and Marin County, CA, to actively oppose, even boycott, the
tests.
If teaching to the tests is not good enough for the wealthy, it should not
be good enough for poor and working-class children. The knowledge of how to
provide all children with as high quality an education as the wealthy now
get exists, but the will to provide it does not.
Still, some reply, the tests will jump-start improvement, will make really
weak systems better. While some schools and districts have no doubt
responded appropriately to accountability demands by introducing higher
quality curriculum and instruction, too many have narrowed curriculum to
focus on test prep. The Center for Policy Research in Education has found
this is most common in "low-performing schools." Thus, schools often move
in the wrong direction, merely intensifying low-level programs that fail to
produce sustained or higher-order learning. Additionally, since the tests
do not assess much if any higher order learning, we have no way of knowing
whether the schools are successfully making meaningful changes.
The narrow focus on test scores has not and will not lead to sustained
improvement for low-income and minority-group students. Civil rights
activists, parents, educators and all those concerned about education must
understand that the regime of testing too often leads us away from, not
towards the goal of high-quality learning for all children.
An alternative. High quality assessment is indispensable
to good education, and the public deserves genuine accountability. If
testing won't do the job, what will? Across the nation, in some schools,
networks of schools, and districts, authentic assessment and accountability
exist. FairTest can provide information about these approaches.
In Massachusetts, the Coalition for Authentic Reform in Education (CARE)
has proposed an authentic accountability system that focuses on the actual
work teachers assign and students do in school. It also would include
limited standardized testing and regular independent school reviews.
Decisions about students would be made by schools and not be based on any
one test score. You can obtain a copy of the plan from FairTest or at www.fairtest.org/care/accountability.html.
What you can do. Across the nation, parents, educators,
civil rights activists, students and other members of the community are
beginning to organize to replace high-stakes standardized testing with
authentic assessment and accountability. FairTest's Assessment Reform
Network links together activists from many states and districts (see www.fairtest.org/arn.htm) and provides resources to help advocates
in public education, media work, and organizing. We also have research and
bibliographies on standardized testing and authentic performance
assessment.
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Reprinted with the permission of the National Center for Fair and Open Testing.
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