If standardized test scores went away at the K-12 level, how would you propose assessing student achievement as well as how teachers and administrators are doing?
Home » Question of the Week » If standardized test scores went away at the K-12 level, how would you propose assessing student achievement as well as how teachers and administrators are doing?
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Parents are the best judge of student achievement. Give them vouchers and let them decide which public or private school gets their kid and their funding voucher.
I believe portfolios of student work with standards of assessment would best serve K-5. From 6th grade on standardized assessment in the form of A test would be best to prepare students for exams for certifications which will be required in their careers and workplaces. One test a year would be sufficient!
I’m with Kubby on this one, parents will chose the best for their kids, they will raise the bar, public schools would have to adjust, and I believe they would.
Assessment tests probably still need to be done, but not so often, maybe every other year.
I totally disagree with Kubby and Care. Not all private school are good and not all public schools are bad. Where I live, one of the most expensive and sought after high schools does not require science for its students, beyond the absolute minimum (they won’t teach evolution for religions reasons) and often the private schools have higher scores simply because they kick out any kids with learning issues or who are getting the grades that will raise their test scores. I believe that standardized test should just be ONE of the factors used to evaluate teachers, but not the only or even most important. Some student are lousy test takers but great students and the teachers and the schools should be rewarded for creative teaching and not having to teach to the test.
As for careers,I work in high-tech and have never once been required to take a test to further myself in my career.
Do you folks remember the Iowa Tests given for many years as a measure of learning? It was cheap, took 3-5 days, and gave a strong indication of what the students had learned.
It wasn’t good enough for the educrat establishment as it didn’t provide enough worthless jobs for the educrats.
Now they have built an empire just on these semi-worthless tests further diverting money from the real job of educating our students. It is only going to get “worser” as the educrats gain more control.
Good point Wittt, a huge business has grown out of testing, and it’s always hard to go backwards.
It would be a good thing in this country, if we could learn to cut or losses, and stop things that are not working.
Reduce testing, don’t drop it all together.
Test Kids in 3rd grade when they are starting to Read (Elementary baseline)
Test Kids in 5th Grade when are leaving Elementary and Entering Secondary (This will show Elementary progress and establish a baseline for Intermediate School)
Test Kids in 9th Grade when they are entering High School (Intermediate progress and High School baseline)
Test Kids in 12th Grade (High School progress)
Schools would only keep scores for kids who remain in any single school between any two baseline/progress periods (i.e. for a student who stays in the same school for Elementary but switches schools in High School the School District would keep the student’s 3rd grade, 6th grade and 9th grade tests to measure progress of this student’s Elementary and Intermediate Schools and would only use the High School test to show the Student’s individual progress but could not be used to measure the High School’s effectiveness as the student wasn’t consistently in this school.
We could eliminate testing in 4th, 6th, 7th, 8th, 10th and 11th grades and save a bunch of money.
To me the real indicator of a school’s success is how many kids graduate, get jobs or go to college and finish with a degree. Everything else means the student didn’t graduate, didn’t get a job or didn’t go to college and graduate and is effectively a failure for that student and their family.
My Two Cents
-Local Yokle
I went to school in Hawaii, with some of the worst education in the country. People were graduated without knowing how to read. As any level. Other students were very well educated. It depeded on bad the mokes (gangsters) were in each school. We ha’ole kids did not go to the bathrooms in the pulic school. Not if you wanted to get out with your earrings and lobes solid.
The point is, the union teachers would just keep passing the kids knowing full well they were learning nothing. Without standardized tests, that could continue. And our billions of tax dollars are tottally gone to waste for the teachers who don’t care and union leaders who get their cut no matter what.
There was never STAR testing when I was in school and we all turned out fine, with a lot of us in high level professions. I think WAY to much emphasis is put on test results and our kids aren’t being properly prepared for their future! Unless you test well in math and language arts, your schooling is limited to only math and language arts all day, every day! WRONG!!!!!
The problem is not so much the testing once a year. It is that the whole rest of the year is geared toward getting ready for the test because the schools lose money and the principal and teachers risk losing their jobs if the scores aren’t better each year. The only learning not geared toward test taking happens during the last month of school after testing is over. Yearly testing could still measure student progress without demanding that the whole school improve to avoid “No budget left uncut”.
I wonder how accurate the claims of ‘spending time on the test not the education’ are. If they are true, we have a problem.
I am not sure how many people know this, but your student is not required to take these tests. You can say ,”No”. I personally feel that the state tests strip our teachers of of their expertise..to teach. Anyone can proctor but to actually teach is a gift. Arts,drama,electives etc. have been taken away from our kids so that they focus on whether to select a b c or d. Elementary kids need to have more creative freedom so that they do not loose their love of school. Teachers need to not feel as if their job is on the line every year. I have a college degree by the way and the only test I have ever taken for evaluation was the SAT. My teachers were able to always have a personal connection with me to know whether or not I needed help in a subject. We are losing this student/teacher rapport to governmental funding.
Robot, the claims of spending time on the test and not the education are very true. I am not putting down our schools here in SLT, the problem is what “No Child Left Behind” has done to many of our public schools. Between it, and all the budget cuts, the smartest kids, the best hope for this countries future, are the ones who get left behind. Many people with “gifted” kids, as well as educators, refer to it as “No Child Gets Ahead.” If your child is clearly going to excel on the test, they are given far less attention then the kids who need to be brought up to the basic standards. Plus, so many gifted programs have been cut due to shrinking budgets. We are wasting the potential of our smartest youth by letting languish in class instead of sprinting ahead. But, that is where the parents have to step in and do the extra work at home. Whether your child is gifted or a little bit behind, the extra enrichment the parents to at home is more important now then it has ever been.
“No Child Left Behind” was a Bush boondoggle from its’ very beginning, thereby becoming “teaching to the test”, as if testing was the only way to tell if a child has learned anything – how about asking one something ?
It would be better to move this discussion along to the recently introduced – (bipartisan, no less)- “No Child Left Inside Act” – a very worthy effort.
Having worked on the national level on this bill for two years now, I also have discussed this Act as a savior for Tahoe’s flat economy, as a shift away from the now-disinterested gaming industry to one more socially fruitful.
We might actually be able to use science as a “legacy issue” for next generations, instead of its’ just its’ current use as a ‘political football’ to justify the forlorn Clarity budget.
As STEM will require more use of science, how about using our natural environment to teach it, especially since science and nature are still way marginalized in our schools ? Children will need to know much more about their surroundings than they do now. . .
In this way, we could also offer workshops for teachers, vice-principals, principals, and even superintendents on what they will need to know in a sustainable society, versus the unsustainable one we have now. . . Change. anyone ?
Like a dog chasing it’s tail. The schools get money for enrollment, so they allow south of the borders in because they want to get ADA money. Then they wonder why their test scores are down and loose funding??? Lets cut the money given out to schools for enrollment and watch our test scores go back up.
typo “lose”
Soooo…. we stop educating the ‘south of the borders’ in the name of increasing test scores?
We already have enough uneducated/undereducated ‘North of the borders’ bringing us down as a society.
Have you seen ‘Idiocracy’? It could happen.
Welcome to Costco. I love you.
tEsting smetchking…. our skools are a joke anyway.,. why test…we should go backe to fun at school until middle school… then no skool for 12-14… then hygh skool kids go professiional or blew collar tracks… no jobs anyway so let the kids enjoy young life…. I REALLY AM A TEACHER in SLT… AND I REALLY DO FEEL THIS WAY… rally !!