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CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

Picture the school you would like all children to Black students through the late 1970s and 1980s, attend. Do you envision a place where curiosity is the first cohort to accrue the benefits of the social piqued, creativity is developed, problems are reforms of the Civil Rights Era, experienced the debated and solved and multiple perspectives are most significant growth during that time.1 respected? What about daily drilling for standardized tests, exposure only to subjects that The era of accountability through the last two are tested (that leaves out social studies, art, music, federal , No Child Left Behind library, and ), reading passages (NCLB), and now , has greatly instead of books, and math and science procedures inflated standardized ‐taking and “test‐prep” but not unifying concepts? curricula without evidence connecting it to real learning. Standardized testing grew out of the American tradition of using quantitative attempts to measure ‘’ as a pretext for racist and exclusionary policies.2 Today’s tests still discriminate and together with inequities in housing, employment, education, and health care, contributes to the “achievement gap”. Overreliance on standardized‐tests has led to reduced graduation rates among students of color, narrowed the curriculum in all subjects and grade levels and ill‐ prepared our students for fulfilling careers and civic engagement. The reforms of the accountability era are harmful policies that lead to neither short‐term successes nor long‐term prosperity for students.

Politicians have become increasingly “outraged” at In the last twenty years, the U.S. has made a the number of low‐income children, and students of dramatic shift toward a reliance on standardized color who are not academically prepared to attend test scores as a measure of teaching effectiveness college. Instead of looking at some of the many and school improvement. The “accountability serious issues these students face on a daily basis, movement” began in the 1970’s but spread rapidly or looking to decrease societal inequities or in the 1990s and became consolidated into by instituting research‐based strategies for school No Child Left Behind in 2002. Led, not by improvement (such as smaller classes), the educators, but by the business sector, the major corporate‐led “reform” movement is blaming the players in education “reform” legislation were . This “business model” approach to members of the Business Coalition for Education education is data obsessed and purports that the Reform, the Business Roundtable, the U.S. Chamber solution to inequities in education is to fire teachers of Commerce, and many state chambers of whose students have low test scores and reward commerce. teachers whose students have high test scores. They continue to promote top down approaches to Prior to the accountability era, the educational quick fixes, ignoring decades of research. The way reforms with the most momentum were influenced to achieve sustainable improvement is through by the Civil Rights Movement. Desegregation, long‐term processes such as developing teaching , and programs like quality, empowering community and families, challenged the inequities of American society. mandating smaller class sizes, improving resource Scores on the National Assessment of Educational access for schools and communities in need, and Progress (NAEP) show that the achievement gap implementing a joyous, critical, inquiry‐based and shrank through the 1970s and 1980s. Teenaged creative learning experience for students.

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CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

High stakes testing & the achievement gap

Corporate reform groups such as Advance Illinois an increase in placement, limited and claim teachers are the main content and a decrease in access to merit‐ factor in student . Recent based and thus a bigger economic research shows otherwise: as much as 90% of barrier to attending college. It has also been shown variation in student growth is explained by factors that earning a low performance label attached to outside the control of teachers3,4 . Children who do low results can discourage urban not have access to health care, who are hungry, low‐income students from enrolling in college.9 who are exhausted from night‐time symptoms of asthma, who are fearful of violence in their communities, who do not have books or access to other informal learning at home, whose parents have limited education, whose families are constantly stressed by economic problems, and “Many public officials, along with who do not go to libraries and museums in their free time are at an academic disadvantage. like‐minded journalists and other observers, are apt to minimize the These factors are highly related not only to testing outcomes, academic achievement, future education matter of resources and assume that and socio‐economic success, but also to the racial, everything deficient about education ethnic and class origins of individuals. The inequitable history of American society, politics, for poor and minority children can be and economic relations are at the root remedied by more forceful demands of these relations. As a result, when academic that we ‘raise the bar.’ The outcomes are averaged across subgroups such as race and class, glaring gaps appear. implication here would seem to be that teachers and students could be Corporate reformers use the academic achievement gap to justify increasing the frequency and doing a better job but have, for some consequences of high‐stakes testing. These policies reason, chosen not to do so and have nothing to do with addressing the root causes of how such gaps arise and persist in society, nor do need only be bribed or threatened they improve student learning. In fact these policies into improvement…The focus among typically worsen academic outcomes for students has been on standards of impacted by them. 5 outcomes rather than standards of According to the National Center for Fair and Open opportunity,” Testing, Black and Latino students, especially those from low‐income families, have suffered 5 Alfie Kohn enormously from the nation’s increase in high‐ stakes testing and the inordinate amount of time spent on test prep.6 The tests have resulted in an increase in drop‐out rates for these populations,7 an increase in expulsion and “counseling out” of schools seeking to increase their test scores, an increase in grade retention,8 cheating by principals,

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CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

High‐stakes tests, even when aligned to standards, cannot adequately measure

Test scores fail as measures of learning when high‐ “…all of the testing has taken away from stakes testing dominates curricula and instructional teaching content knowledge to the practice. When practices driven by testing are children, for various subjects, which forces widespread, test score gains do not represent a teachers to teach to the test and skim the corresponding growth in the broader domain of knowledge that tests are supposed to sample and surface of the subjects,” measure. With extensive use of coaching, test rd scores may not even reflect true gains in the narrow ~ CPS 3 grade . subject matter of the particular test.10,11

QUICK FACTS: • Since NCLB the testing industry has experienced • 3 out of 5 community college students need at double‐digit growth. In 2008 K‐12 testing was a $2.6 least one remedial course because they are ill billion industry.12 prepared for college. Less than 25% of these students earn a degree within 8 years.14 • Errors in standardized tests resulted in thousands of students flunking, not passing college entrance exams, • Excessive reliance on standardized tests results and incorrect state rankings.13 and test prepping makes for a poor transition from K‐12 to college. • CPS candidates in the National Board Certification program reported spending in some cases 10 full school days per year (48 hours) on standardized . (CTU, NBCT Candidates internal survey)

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CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

High stakes testing takes up valuable instructional time, with negative impacts on student learning

“Results from the test are not always valid, Constant high‐stakes testing causes students to because of the burn‐out my students interpret all their assessments as summative rather experience. Preparing for tests takes away than as interactions meant to help their learning process, eroding the of formative assessments from instructional time…my students to the teacher and student.18 19 develop testing anxiety. They often complain about the amount of testing and perform poorly,”

~ CPS Language Arts teacher, grades 6 – 8. “Ironically, test prep is not always the In a comprehensive survey, CPS teachers were best preparation for taking tests. found to have devoted large amounts of time to prepping students for the ACT; typically, over a Children expand their vocabulary and month of instructional time was devoted to test‐ improve their reading skills when they prep. The outcome? More test prep was associated learn history, science, and literature, with lower ACT scores.15 just as they may sharpen their Research shows students who are tasked with mathematic skills while learning intellectually demanding work that promotes disciplined inquiry and relevance to their lives score science and geography, and the arts 16 on standardized tests. CPS teachers have may motivate students to love reported being forced into teaching their students testing strategies, at the expense of teaching learning.” content and processes to enable students to meet 19 ~ Diane Ravitch standards.

“Strategies like skimming for information, eliminating irrelevant answers, reading answers first then checking for content in the question. Students are not taught to think critically or deeply at this time. They are presented with so much information over a broad range of topics that is loaded into their short‐term memory to be forgotten as soon as the standardized test is completed,” reported a CPS teacher of environmental science, and pre‐.

The frequency of standardized testing, and the instructional time devoted to test prep, crowds out the use of authentic formative assessments that help teachers carefully advance student learning. 17

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CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

Testing Scandals

Schools and districts across the country have been associations, such as the National Board on caught cheating (changing test answers or giving Educational Testing and Public Policy27, the National their students test problems ahead of time), Academy of Sciences28, the American Educational including in Atlanta, Philadelphia, Washington D.C. Research Association29, the Economic Policy and Texas. A March, 2011 USA Today investigation Institute, The Association of Childhood Education proved that the dramatic rise in Washington, D.C. International,30 and the Education Sector have been test scores was due to cheating, not to Michelle writing for decades about the pitfalls of both Rhee’s “no excuses” administration. 20 Statisticians standardized testing in general and the over‐ have said that the probability that the number of reliance on standardized testing, especially in using erasures on tests from specific schools and specific these tests to make major high‐stakes decisions grades could be due to anything but cheating is as such as high school graduation or teacher likely as winning the lottery’s Power Ball. There . 31 have also been instances where tests were scored incorrectly, failing and sending students who had The policy makers have not listened. Even though actually passed the tests to summer school.21,22 the media reports on testing scandals, the editorial boards of the nation’s newspapers still support a In October 2010, the Chicago Tribune reported that system of “increased accountability” which they when Illinois adjusted the ISAT scoring system in equate with test scores. This type of response is not 2006, it “lowered the number of points required to new. When score inflation became apparent in the pass” resulting in more students appearing as if early 90’s in response to what were relatively low‐ they were “proficient” than before. 23 A recent stakes accountability the policymakers refused to study by the Chicago Consortium on School acknowledge the problem. Research found that, after correcting for the differences in assessments and changing The important lesson about these scandals is that demographics, there was essentially no increase in standardized testing and accountability policies scores of elementary students over two decades of make test results useless for making valid test‐driven reform. inferences about real student learning and hurt students. Some tests, such as in Mississippi, have such low thresholds for scoring high that despite ranking high on the percentage of students meeting state standards they were at the bottom based on the 24 NAEP test results. There were 35 states that set “The reaction in the policy world was the proficiency level on state tests in 2009 way below what would be considered ‘basic’ on the quite uniform. It was not, ‘Oh, test NAEP equivalent score.25 accountability doesn't work as well

Even without high‐profile scandals such as those as we had hoped.’ It was, ‘Test‐ mentioned above, the use of test scores for based accountability was the way accountability threatens the of test results. to go; we were just using the wrong Daniel Koretz, a scholar in educational measurement, has been testifying about the effect tests’.” of high‐stakes testing on narrowing instruction and its harm to student learning for over two decades26. ~ Daniel Koretz, of Education, Highly regarded national institutions and Harvard 31

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CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

policy, large investment in educating the majority of Conclusion: working‐class children does not make economic sense. As educator Lois Weiner has succinctly put it, Why do corporate interests continue to push global‐scale Wal‐Mart jobs require no more than an towards a test‐centered public education system 8th grade education.34 The missteps of corporate that is clearly harmful to students? The reality of education reformers are not due to their oversight their agenda is to align the outputs of public of evidence but are simply cold calculation. If the education with the needs of an unequal and highly standards and livelihoods they envision for our polarized economic system. The soaring income children are limited to “McJobs,” it seems they do inequality in recent decades that continues to not need the kinds of inter‐disciplinary, authentic benefit the upper class has been driven primarily by project‐based learning and critical inquiry that are job polarization.32 There has been rapid growth in prevalent in the prestigious schools the privileged low‐skilled low‐wage work while middle‐wage jobs send their children to. Teachers and parents have are disappearing under global competition. Even much higher expectations and demands for the jobs requiring post‐secondary education are driven public education of all children. down into low‐wage work33. Within such an economic system, for the people who control the majority of wealth and the direction of public Notes

7 1 National Center for Educational . (2000). NAEP Amrein, A.L., Berliner, D.C. (2002). An analysis of some 1999: trends in academic progress. NCES 2000‐469, by J.R. unintended and negative consequences of high‐stakes testing. Campbell, C.M. Hombo, and J. Mazzeo. Washington, DC: 2000. EPSL‐0211‐124‐EPRU, Research Unit, College Retrieved from of Education, Arizona State . Retrieved from http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/pdf/main1999/2000469. http://nepc.colorado.edu/files/EPSL‐0211‐125‐EPRU.pdf pdf 8 Research has definitively shown that grade retention 2 Gould, S.J. (1983) The hereditarian theory of iq. The harms student learning, Roderick, M., Nagaoka, J. (2005) mismeasure of man.W.W. Norton & Company, New York, NY. Retention under Chicago’s high‐stakes testing program: helpful, 3 Schochet, P. and Chiang, H. (2010). Error rates in harmful, or harmless? Educational Evauation and Policy measuring teacher and school performance based on student Analysis 27 (4): 309‐340; Retention also increases dropout test score gains (NCEE 2010‐4004). Washington, DC: National rates, Allensworth, E. (2004). Ending social promotion in Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance, Chicago: The effects of ending social promotion in the eigth Institute of , U.S. Department of Education; grade on dropout rates. Chicago: Consortium on Chicago School Rockoff, J.E. (2004). The impact of individual teachers on Research. student achievement: evidence from panel data” American 9 Papay, J.P., Murnane, R.J., Willet, J.B. (2011). How Economic Review, 94(2): 247‐252 performance information affects human‐capital investment 4 These “effects” are calculated by statistical models that decisions: the impact of test‐score labels on educational account for the multi‐level nature of factors that influence outcomes. (NBER Working Paper No. 17120) Cambridge, MA: student achievement. Students are nested within classrooms, National Bureau of Economic Research. Retrieved from which are themselves nested within schools and particular http://www.nber.org/papers/w17120 communities. Researchers attempt to isolate the effects of 10 Koretz, D.M. (2008) Measuring up: what educational each level, while controlling for other factors that affect testing really tells us. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard student achievement at each level using the quantitative University Press measures that are available to them. However these measures 11 Koretz, D., (2005). Alignment, high stakes, and the are unable to fully account for the disadvantages faced by inflation of test scores. In Herman, Joan L. and Haertel, Edward students. To get an overview of the inadequacy of these H. (Eds.). Uses and misuses of data for educational methods, see the CTU position paper on the CPS Value‐Added accountability and improvement. Malden, Massachusetts and Metric. Oxford, . Blackwell Publishing. 5 Kohn, A. (2004) What does it mean to be well educated? 12 Nightly Business Report. (2008). The New Business of Boston, MA: Beacon Press Education – Standardized Tests.[PBS Video] Retrieved from 6 The National Center for Fair and Open Testing. (2007, http://video.pbs.org/video/1532038731 August). How standardized testing damages education. 13 Rhoades, K., & Madaus, G. (2003). Errors in standardized FairTest.. Retrieved from http://fairtest.org/how‐standardized‐ tests: A systemic problem. (Report of the National Board on testing‐damages‐education‐pdf, Educational Testing and Public Policy.) Chestnut Hill, MA:

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CTU Position Paper: Debunking the Myths of Standardized Testing

Boston College Center for the Study of Testing, Evaluation and http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/features/koretz03212002.h Educational Policy. Retrieved from tml http://www.bc.edu/research/nbetpp/statements/M1N4.pdf 32 Autor, D., Katz L.E., Kearney, M.S. (2006) The 14 Adams, C. (2010, September 9). Community colleges get polarization of the U.S. labor market. (NBER Working Paper No. creative with . Edweek 11986) Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research. 15 Allensworth, E., Correa, M., Ponisciak, S. (2008) From Retrieved from http://www.nber.org/papers/w11986 33 high school to the future: ACT preparation – too much, too late. Brown, P., Lauder, H. Ashton, D. (2010) The global Chicago, IL: Consortium on Chicago School Research. auction: the broken promises of education, jobs and incomes. 16 Newman, F.M., Bryk, A.S., Nagaoka, J. (2001) Authentic Oxford University Press 34 intellectual work and standardized tests: conflict or Weiner, Lois. (2010, May 12). Think globally, privatize coexistence? Chicago, IL: Consortium on Chicago School locally: public education is under attack around the world. The Research. Indypendent. Retrieved from 17 Black, P., William, D. (1998). Inside the black box: raising http://www.indypendent.org/2010/05/13/education‐under‐ standards through classroom assessment. Phi Delta Kappan. attack/ 80(2):139‐148. 18 Harlen, W., Crick, D.K. (2002). A systematic review of the impact of summative assessment and test on students’ motivation for learning. (EPPI‐Centre Review, version 1.1). In: Research Evidence in Education Library. Issue1. London: EPPI‐ Centre, Social Science Research Unit, Institute of Education. 19 Ravitch, D. (2010) The death and life of the great American school system. New York, NY: basic Books 20 !"#$%"&' Gillum J., Bello, M. (2011, March 30). When standardized test scores soared in D.C., were the gains real? USA Today 21 Gabriel, T. (2010, June 10). Under pressure, teachers UNION tamper with tests. The New York Times. 22 Toch, T. (2006). Margins of error: the education testing Created in‐house by union staff industry in the No Child Left Behind era. Education Sector Reports. Washington, D.C.. 23 Rado, D. (2010, October 18). New ISAT lets kids pass with more wrong answers: test experts question point decline state officials cite statistical adjustments. Chicago Tribune. 24 Ravitch, D. (2010), p. 106 25 National Center for Education Statistics (2011). Mapping state proficiency standards onto the NAEP scales. NCES 2011‐458. Washington, DC. 2000. Retrieved from http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/pdf/studies/2011458.pdf 26 Koretz, D. (1998). Testimony before the Committee on Education and the Workforce, US House of Representatives, February 23 27 Rhoades, K., & Madaus, G. (2003). 28 The National Academies, Division of Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education: Board on Testing and Assessment. (2009). Letter Report to the U.S. Department of Education on the Race to the Top Fund. Washington, D.C. 29 American Education Research Association. (2000). Position statement on high‐stakes testing in Pre‐K – 12 education. Retrieved from http://www.aera.net/policyandprograms/?id=378&terms=high +stakes+testing 30 Perrone, V. (1991). Position paper on standardized testing. Childhood Education 67: 132‐142. 31 Harvard of Education. (2002) High‐ stakes testing – where we’ve been and where we are. An interview with Professor Daniel Koretz. Retrieved from

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