Monday, December 13, 2010
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In an article on the Washington Post's blog, The Answer Sheet, Queens teacher and writer, Marc Epstein, laments the use of achievement tests as a measurement of the effectiveness of teachers.
Harvard researcher derides standardized testing
In the article, Epstein explains that even after data outlining the ineffectiveness of achievement testing was gathered, based on the research of a Harvard professor, the New York City department of education still wants to use test results as a barometer of teacher performance.
Now, Professor Daniel Koretz's research couldn't be clearer. In one section of his 42-page report, Koretz writes:
". . .test scores are generally incomplete, and they are fallible in two senses: in the traditional statistical sense that they include measurement error, and in the sense that they are vulnerable to corruption or inflation."
Vulnerable, corrupt and inflated don't sound like positive ways to assess students. Koretz, though is far from finished. His report also says:
"Scores can be inflated if teachers transfer instructional resources from important material that is untested or little emphasized by the test to material that is emphasized by the test."
Transferring instructional resources from important material seems like what good teachers do every day. Yet a respected Harvard researcher says that this sort of efficient teaching may actually hurt students on an achievement test.
Still, the New York Board of Regents is steadfast in its belief that these tests will help measure the performance of teachers.
This begs the question: Why don't so-called education leaders see what the rest of us see so clearly?
