November 29, 2005--Don't Know Much About Geography
I’m not talking about students not knowing geography, but rather about their educators not knowing much about education.
They have been attempting to perpetrate a fraud on students, their parents, tax payers, governments, and the rest of us. Here’s how this massive fraud works.
There are about 45 million children in the nation’s public schools. By various measures it is conservatively estimated that at least a third of them, 15 million, are not receiving an adequate education—they are being left behind by the educational system and will not as a result be viable in the 21st century economy.
The NY Times reported recently about the most recent scam—how as the result of the No Child Left Behind legislation, in order for states to receive their share of federal money, they have to demonstrate, via achievement testing, that students in their states are making satisfactory academic progress (see link below). If the tests show that the students aren’t, the states do not get the money. The whole idea behind this was to hold states and local educators accountable for student achievement—set standards and then test to see if students are progressing.
So what have the states done? They’ve dumbed-down the tests, thereby making it easier for students to do well so they can claim that their schools are improving.
They got caught at this shell game because the federal government also administers a much more demanding test to a statistically significant sample of students in all states—the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). If you compare how students are doing on NAEP versus the state tests you find that though they are doing “well” on the latter they are doing miserably on the former. Here’s an example or two to illustrate—In Tennessee, 87 percent of 8th grade students tested proficient in math on the state test but only 21 percent did as well on the federal test. In New York, 70 percent of 4th graders were proficient in reading on the state test while just 34 percent did as well on NAEP. This sad reality is true for literally every state in the nation.
It gets worse. Even more cheating goes on at the high school level. Here it’s a matter of definitions—how do you calculate high school graduation rates, a critical measure of student achievement considering the kinds of jobs that are available in the US. The most legitimate way to do this is to track how students entering 9th grade fare four years later—what percentage of 9th graders graduate. Sounds simple. Well, not one state does it this way. More typically, states determine high school graduation rates by calculating what percentage of 12th graders graduate at the end of the 12th grade, 10 months later. This is an obvious fraud because students entering the 12th grade are in effect the survivors of a failed system and so it is not surprising to find states reporting graduation rates of 80-90+ percent, whereas if they gathered data more honestly, by tracking 9th graders through high school, they would find statewide graduation rates hovering at about 50 percent, with youngsters from inner-city schools doing about half as well as that.
How do the educators respond? They begin by attacking the methodology, saying, for example, that the state and national exams are testing for different things; and thus by comparing the two sets of scores, you are comparing apples with oranges. There is some truth to that, but the magnitude of difference between the test results is so great as to counter that claim—it is well known, and even openly acknowledged, that under pressure from No Child Left Behind, states have lowered testing standards in order to make themselves look good.
If this statistical argument fails then educators blame the children and their families—what do you expect of us if the children arrive at school under-motivated and not speaking English? Considering how little we are paid and appreciated by society what can you realistically expect us to do?
How about doing what my mother and her contemporaries did in the public schools of New York City—teach the kids to read, write, and do math so they can make lives for themselves. Those children also came from low-income families who did not speak English at home, but somehow their teachers (most not even college graduates, but still well trained) managed to get the job done.
It is time to stop the excuses; stop blaming the children; and, most important, to stop the deceit and the lying.
They have been attempting to perpetrate a fraud on students, their parents, tax payers, governments, and the rest of us. Here’s how this massive fraud works.
There are about 45 million children in the nation’s public schools. By various measures it is conservatively estimated that at least a third of them, 15 million, are not receiving an adequate education—they are being left behind by the educational system and will not as a result be viable in the 21st century economy.
The NY Times reported recently about the most recent scam—how as the result of the No Child Left Behind legislation, in order for states to receive their share of federal money, they have to demonstrate, via achievement testing, that students in their states are making satisfactory academic progress (see link below). If the tests show that the students aren’t, the states do not get the money. The whole idea behind this was to hold states and local educators accountable for student achievement—set standards and then test to see if students are progressing.
So what have the states done? They’ve dumbed-down the tests, thereby making it easier for students to do well so they can claim that their schools are improving.
They got caught at this shell game because the federal government also administers a much more demanding test to a statistically significant sample of students in all states—the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP). If you compare how students are doing on NAEP versus the state tests you find that though they are doing “well” on the latter they are doing miserably on the former. Here’s an example or two to illustrate—In Tennessee, 87 percent of 8th grade students tested proficient in math on the state test but only 21 percent did as well on the federal test. In New York, 70 percent of 4th graders were proficient in reading on the state test while just 34 percent did as well on NAEP. This sad reality is true for literally every state in the nation.
It gets worse. Even more cheating goes on at the high school level. Here it’s a matter of definitions—how do you calculate high school graduation rates, a critical measure of student achievement considering the kinds of jobs that are available in the US. The most legitimate way to do this is to track how students entering 9th grade fare four years later—what percentage of 9th graders graduate. Sounds simple. Well, not one state does it this way. More typically, states determine high school graduation rates by calculating what percentage of 12th graders graduate at the end of the 12th grade, 10 months later. This is an obvious fraud because students entering the 12th grade are in effect the survivors of a failed system and so it is not surprising to find states reporting graduation rates of 80-90+ percent, whereas if they gathered data more honestly, by tracking 9th graders through high school, they would find statewide graduation rates hovering at about 50 percent, with youngsters from inner-city schools doing about half as well as that.
How do the educators respond? They begin by attacking the methodology, saying, for example, that the state and national exams are testing for different things; and thus by comparing the two sets of scores, you are comparing apples with oranges. There is some truth to that, but the magnitude of difference between the test results is so great as to counter that claim—it is well known, and even openly acknowledged, that under pressure from No Child Left Behind, states have lowered testing standards in order to make themselves look good.
If this statistical argument fails then educators blame the children and their families—what do you expect of us if the children arrive at school under-motivated and not speaking English? Considering how little we are paid and appreciated by society what can you realistically expect us to do?
How about doing what my mother and her contemporaries did in the public schools of New York City—teach the kids to read, write, and do math so they can make lives for themselves. Those children also came from low-income families who did not speak English at home, but somehow their teachers (most not even college graduates, but still well trained) managed to get the job done.
It is time to stop the excuses; stop blaming the children; and, most important, to stop the deceit and the lying.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
4:42 PM
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