And speaking of NCLB on steroids, the President announced his intentions to overhaul NCLB and our education system. From the White House:
The President discusses his blueprint for an updated Elementary and Secondary Education Act to overhaul No Child Left Behind, the latest step from his Administration to encourage change and success in America’s schools at the local level.
Another “feels good/looks good on paper” unfunded mandate on the horizon, it sounds like. As titillating as Texas Hold ’em on Texas objectives is, this situation is far more serious. This appears to be another huge, omnibus education plan where one size fits all.
Here is the link to the Core Curriculum State Standards Initiative. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
When the politicians and the ivory tower gang admits that not every child learns at the same rate, the same depth, the same material, and for the same reasons all kids will be better off. This concept is not rocket science. Cookie cutter expectations must stop. A kid with a reading disability is expected to learn the same material that a gifted child learns, in the same amount of time. What’s wrong with this picture?
Scrap NCLB. It was a good idea gone bad.
I think you might want to consider the value of these “proposals” as being basically to start the discussion, not to create any immediate policy. I do question the wisdom of starting too many “conversations,” but let’s remember our civics lessons: the President doesn’t legislate.
“the President doesn’t legislate”
Good point, P Wynn.
If more people remembered that (or even knew that), we might have a shot at reforming Congress–those people who passed the original NCLB.
Now, I understand why states should have common standards. When a student from Virginia can fail a SOL test in Virginia but breeze through a FCAT in Florida, there’s an obvious discrepancy in assessment and education systems. (I’m just throwing that out there as an example, BTW. Not picking on VA or FL.)
In the past, I’ve approved of a general, national exam that does not force teachers to teach to the test. In order to graduate, students must pass the exam plus complete 12 years of schooling. I think of it as a cumulative final exam designed by educators, not politicians. But it must be a test on the basics, and it cannot be culturally bias.
It doesn’t make sense to me that we can have a standardized GED, a Civil Service test, SAT’s, GRE’s and a Citizenship test but not a national K-12 test.
BTW, anyone think this first line on the CCSSO website is funny? “Today we live in a world without borders.” THAT should send some people over the edge.
P Wynn, not sure I understand your point.
Are you suggesting I shouldn’t have put up the thread?
Pinko, let’s see…you want a test for all kids that is designed by educatiors (which educators?), covers the basics (by whose determination?), and cannot be culturally bias (By whose determination?) You don’t want much, do you? 😉
That’s sort of the rub. Getting just those 3 conditions to jive nationally is a problem. Some kid in Appalachia or in some slum in Chicago is not going to have the same idea of ‘basics’ or ‘cultural bias’ as a kid in NoVA.
There already are national tests. I don’t know the answer but building anything on the back of NCLB is not a good idea.
The international comparisons have always been questionable in my mind. The students selected from most countries aren’t quite as random as they would have you think.
If our education system is so tragically awful, then why are international students from around the world lined up knee deep to get accepted into our colleges and universities? It doesn’t make sense. I will pit our brightest and best against any the brightest and best from any other country.
To avoid cultural bias, ask questions about U.S. History…I mean the basics. For example, “Who was Thomas Jefferson?” Ha ha! That’s how we ensure Jefferson stays in the curriculum.
Seriously, though, if they powers that be (the educators) can write a GED, why can’t they write a national exam that makes sense? That test doesn’t have to coincide with NCLB. It should be one requirement for graduation. I believe other countries have similar exams.
Then you will have ‘dumbed down’ the curriculum. (I hate that sound byte)
And to seriously answer your question, I don’t expect anyone cares too much about the GED test politically. It is an afterthought in the grand scheme of things.
Pinko, do you really want the graduation of every kid in America turned over to the feds? Can you only imagine the political prizes for that one? If people reject the feds involved with health care, can you only imagine if they hold the power of a high school diploma? 🙄
I am not ready to turn that one over to them and I am much nicer about the feds than many people. I am sitting here imagining the abuses now that could be infiltrated into a national exam.
Thanks Rez. I actually have to go in and do the DST by hand. And look who forgot.
I think SOLs are written by educators for the most part but I think all things like that have some political influence. I will also say that Va’s SOLs are a cut above most states.
As for the education experience, who knows? If you work for a textbook company is that ‘educational experience?’ I have got to say, it isn’t just right wing politics I fear here. I also fear left wing politics. I have seen some mighty stupid things over the years.
Let’s just start with something so freaking common sense it has me rolling my eyes. Many years ago..say 20 or so, someone came up with the notion that kids felt left out because all the kids in textbooks were named Mary, Sue, Dick, and Jane and that kids of other ethnicities felt left out. 🙄
So some clowns got in there an inserted all these names that NO one has ever heard of and cannot pronounce. Pick up your kid’s book, especially math books where names get inserted into the problems, and you will see names you don’t have a prayer of being able to pronounce. How has this helped anyone? Perfect example of what happens when someone gets a ‘good idea.’ As if trains moving in different directions weren’t enough of a challenge. Now you have to have 2 people on the trains whose names you cannot even say. You aren’t even sure if they are names or part of the problem.
But I digress….
Let’s have some national goals for students to achieve. No problem with that. A goal is a whole lot different than an unfunded mandate or passing a national exam in order to graduate.
I always thought that SOLs were written by educators and not politicians. Am I wrong in this? Or did you mean government employees?
And I guess the next logical question is that if you indicate it was government employees (or some contract arrangement), aren’t these people with education experience?
By the way, it looks like the company providing this website hasn’t updated its clock for daylight savings time.
Give something to the Federal Government that is not their job, and they will screw it up. It’s just that simple….IT’S NOT THEIR JOB! And you folks want to hand over health care! Brilliant idea!
Rez, done. Thanks. I had to fix it by hand. I forgot. My post is now above yours because I changed the time. More bizarro world.
Capt–I am going to agree with you that this is not the fed’s job. Get UP off the floor. If NCLB is an example of what can happen, I don’t want them to have another chance.
I think kids and schools were so much better off when teachers could be original, deviate off topic a little to make things more interesting and when there weren’t a million criterion referenced tests.
Did you notice in the video that the Pres. mentions there would not be teaching to the test? This statement shows he really is clueless about this subject (and so are the rest of the politicians)
If your standard says you will be able to recite the Gettysburg Address, then you teach the Gettysburg Address and then test the kid on reciting the Gettysburg Address. Duh! That is what he is calling ‘teaching to the test.’ It makes sense to teach the Gettysburg Address and to test on it than to teach The Gettysburg Address and test on the Washington’s Farewell Address.
I am not sure I am on the right track with the following since I have not focused on No Child but I often hear that one problem with No Child is that it was never funded. Well, I guess I would say “let’s see what happens when we do fund it for awhile.”
In a pure sense, I think one needs standards but I hate to see people being rated on standards that they don’t entirely control. I am speaking of teachers since I think most people would say that teachers are one component of education. We made sure our kids not only did homework but also made sure that they understood what they might have missed, etc. Our kids turned out alright as one has a medical degree, another a masters, and one getting a BS degree. By saying this, I also recognize that some parents can’t do this as they are two busy with multiple jobs just to survive. But teachers can’t control that aspect.
Still, not knowing No Child, rather than “national standards”, why can’t states or local governments propose what their community believes as progress and some entity bless it? I am a believer that organizations closer to education (local school boards, for example) are better able to discern needs rather than a federal entity. These local boards many times also have to answer to an electorate close to them. (meaning us)
And before people think that I am saying that we should allow local governments to establish standards that are too easy but there is nothing wrong with achievable standards. The bottom line, if we wish that no child be left behind, is that we have to have standards to establish a minimum level for a functioning adult citizen by the time the person is finished 12th grade.
This won’t affect our future phi beta kappas as they will continue to strive for the highest level but ensures that our education system meets all the needs based on an individual’s capacity. So you establish an overall goal for the end, and lesser achievable goals along the way. After all, you don’t walk a mile in one step.
One final note, I would rather my kids knew the historical context of the Gettysburg Address and its meaning rather than knowing all the words. Just my humble opinion.
If they just knew, “our fathers brought forth a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.” Those two sentences are the most important of the entire address and teach so much about our history.
@Moon-howler
And notice I did NOT say “it’s not the Democrats’ job”, I said “it’s not the federal government’s job”. Neither party has any business in education.
Rez, I agree about the Gettysburg Address. I was simply trying to illustrate how the President was off the mark on ‘teaching to the test.’ but I definitely agree with you.
I can’t find fault with any thing you said. I think we do have standards, and we had standards in the form of the SOLs before NCLB came on the scene. It does allow states to use their own testing vehicle. The problem is that NCLB creates this bizarro world (my word of the weekend) and hold schools to a standard where the gifted, the learning disabled, the emotionally disturbed, the austic, those who can barely speak English, and those who come from extreme poverty all are supposed to learn the same material in one year. Unrealistic expectations abound. furthermore, those special kids, as a group, are supposed to make adequate yearly progress. By 2014, every child in America is supposed to pass state standards by x%.
If there is a school like Central Falls out there (and there are many in the United States) where you have a dirty poor community struggling to make ends meet, and 1 school, and no middle class, the school fails using NCLB criteria. So all the teachers are fired. The same poor bastards who have been out there busting their chops trying to help kids in a poor town that is 50% immigrant have been fired for being incompetent. If those teachers didn’t care they would have gone to teach elsewhere, in all probability.
I go back to what Lucky Duck said. If you bring in Nobel Prize winners, the situation won’t change. That is why I hate NCLB. Artificial standards are put in place that don’t address the child, the school, or the community.
I agree with you but again I don’t think the Feds should be involved in the standard. It is a local responsibility. I don’t there is anything wrong with every child meeting state or local standards even if there is an overall Federal standard that requires the state/local to develop the standard that results in basic arithmetic (to take care of money issues like paying for something and getting the right change) or reading (to basically function in everyday life like driving a car, etc.).
What is probably wrong then is the state or local standard and not a basic law mandating whatever standard the state/local develops for its community.
If the Feds are proscribing specific standards, then that identifies that which the Feds should not be involved–if you agree, welcome to conservative thought that the best government is the one closest to the people.
So my question is who is developing the “artificial standards”, it is the Feds, the state or local government?
The feds have developed the artificial standards.
The state developed the curriculum known as Standards of Learning about 15 years ago. They devised tests. It was all part of state accountability. It boiled down to: Teach xyz. reteach if necessary. Test xyz. After a couple years, there were benchmark tests in certain grades. I want to say 3, 5, and 8 (maybe) and then year end tests in core high school subjects.
Along comes NCLB. That legislation said use your own test or develope one that tests your state curriculum because we are going to hold you accountable. So the feds squeeze the state and the state squeezes the jurisdictions and the jurisdictions squeeze the schools.
It all boils down to, every child except maybe first, 2nd year ESOL students have to test on the same material So you have special ed, regular education, gifted and talented, esol, all minorities, EVERYone, taking the same test at the same grade level.
I think the state should set standards and I think it should expect kids to master the standards. I think there should be flexibility for special learners. Not a problem. Local jurisdictions are welcome to have their own standards.
The feds need to back off. They tried. They screwed it all up. Now they need to go away.
Now I am going to go out on a big limb…I see no reason for the Dept of Ed. If someone can think of a good reason to have it, I am all ears. I think at most, an education agency would be maybe ok. Maybe not. Maybe nothing is needed other than an office of coordination.
I don’t care if there are some national standards that states might want to consider posting…things that make America stronger. But there should be no mandates.
As for unfunded mandates, I think money is dumped into this endeavor but it isn’t nearly enough to provide for all the tutors and extra teachers needed for the special sub groups who aren’t making the grade.
MH, you make me smile. 🙂
Nope, no reason for the Department of Ed.
Here’s something that I think is amusing. We say we need a national standard for K-12 education but one doesn’t exist for the undergrad or graduate level. Each school determines it’s standard and accredits itself with a regional accreditation board that works outside of the government.
So, if such a system works for higher education why do we need the federales touching local K-12 schools? Just doesn’t make sense to me at all.
There are very few things the feds are good at and education is not one I have faith in them getting right.
National parks are great. National education is not.
Good point about the accreditation boards. There are standards between colleges. Not sure I know enough about them to address it and the person I called to find out more isn’t home.
Someone needs to just get the stones to tell Congress and the president its a bad plan. Piling anything on a bad foundation is bad business. It just isn’t needed.
What does the dept of ed do other than annoy everyone in the states in education?
The Fordham Foundation does a report called “The State of State Standards” every few years. The last report was done in 2006 (based on Virginia’s 2001 SOLS). Virginia got the following scores for each subject:
English B
History B
Geography A
Math C
Science A
Overall B+
Here’s the link ===> http://www.edexcellence.net/detail/news.cfm?news_id=358
Other than Math, we do OK. The math standards were ranked low because of calculators use in elementary grades. That hasn’t changed with the 2009 version.
One problem with state standards is how the tests are administered and we determine proficient. The definition of proficient in VA changes every year, for every test, for every grade level. Its generally around 66% correct, but sometimes it’s lower. According to the NAEP (National Association for Educational Progress), when compared with the other states in the nation, Virginia ranks in the bottom in the percentage correct to earn a proficient score.
For reading in 4th grade, VA’s proficient score puts us at 34th lowest in the nation.
For reading in 8th grade, VA’s proficient score puts us at 35th lowest in the nation.
For math in 4th grade, VA’s proficient score puts us at 31st lowest in the nation.
For math in 8th grade, VA’s proficient score puts us at 40st lowest in the nation.
So, while our state standards may be OK, (with the exception of math) how we grade and ranks students on the exams needs improvement.
Here’s the link ==> http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/pdf/studies/2010456.pdf
Someone, and I can’t remember who, mentioned special ed other students taking the SOL. Just to clarify, special ed students, depending on their disability, are given special care on the SOLs. Their scores are included in the overall district totals, but many of them aren’t given the SOL – the submit a binder of work for grading under a process called the VGLA.
Limited English Proficiency students are also treated differently for SOL purposes. LEP students are allowed to “skip” taking the SOL for a couple of years primarily because it isn’t fair to give a kid a test in a language he / she can neither read nor write. Several years ago some rocket scientist in the state decided that math really wasn’t language dependent so LEP students were required to take the math SOL and their scores were included in the district and school overall totals. It didn’t take long for districts to realize that that was a bad decision, but rather than reverse itself the state allows LEP students to submit VGLA binders in lieu of taking to SOL exams.
Kim, what does the Fordam Foundation base its assessment on? I am skeptical. I don’t think calculator use is necessarily a bad thing if it doesn’t replace learning basic skills. I suppose I am questioning their authority on such matters.
I am who mentioned special ed kids. They take the same curriculum regardless. They only get to do VGLA if it is in their IEP. VGLA is perhaps the greatest of all lies.
LEP kids get to take plain English versions of tests. I agree about the lame brain who thought math wasn’t dependent on knowing language. However, it just seems like more NCLB nonsense to me. I don’t think that LEP students can do VGLA in math, only English. I might be wrong, but I don’t think I am.
Thanks for putting all that out there, Kim.
I’m not sure how Fordham bases its assessment of state standards. The report provides a fairly detailed section on Methodology and the study is one of the few “independent” evaluations of state standards. It isn’t the final word, but it is a starting point indicating areas where improvement might be warranted.
Much of the testing stuff is related to NCLB nonsense, though that nonsense had hit in Virginia long before NCLB was passed. NCLB just made things worse because it required that schools ensure that a set (and increasing) percentage of students pass the state test. The net effect of that dictate was that schools primary concern was / is making AYP and ensuring that the dictated percentage of students pass the SOL rather than on ensuring that each child is challenged an learning at a pace that is acceptable for them. So, if you have a child who is at or ahead of what is expected at that grade level, they get significantly less individual instruction time than kids who are below grade level.