High Stakes Testing for Tracking, Promotion, and Graduation (1999) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
2 Assessment Policy and Politics
2 Assessment Policy and Politics
Pages 29-49
The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.
From page 29... ...
2 Assessment Polic ~ and Politics Current concerns about proper test use represent only the latest round in a continuing debate over the use of stanciarclizec3 assessments to ac3' Vance education policy goals.1 Beginning with the introduction in the mic3~19th century of written examinations given to large numbers of stu' clents, stanciarclizec3 tests have served as an instrument for accomplishing a variety of policy purposes, including determining the types of instruction incliviclual students receive, shaping the content anc3 format of that instruction, anc3 holding schools anc3 students accountable for their per' formance. Stanciarclizec3 tests are believed to be one of the most powerful levers that elected officials anc3 other policymakers have for influencing what happens in local schools anc3 classrooms.
|
From page 30... ...
They warn that, if test scores are used to bestow rewards or impose sanctions, there are several risks: widening the gap in educational opportunities between haves anc3 have-nots, narrowing the curriculum, centralizing educational decision making, anc3 cieprofessionalizing teachers (Haertel, 1989; Airasian, 1987~. TWO PERSISTENT DILEMMAS The tension between the enthusiasm of policymakers anc3 the caution of experts is symptomatic of two fundamental dilemmas posed by stanclarclizecl tests when they are used as policy strategies.
|
From page 31... ...
Relying on tests was seen as fairer anc3 more efficient than the prevailing system, in which children of varying ages anc3 levels shared classrooms, anc3 essay exams received widely varying gracles from different teachers (Office of Tech' nology Assessment, 1992; Haney, 1984~. The introduction of wiclespreac3 intelligence testing cluring World War I allowed schools to begin measuring what testers believed to be students' aptitude for future learning, the IQ, in abolition to using achieve' ment tests to measure their past learning.2 As the technology of intelli' 2In her history of the IQ test, Fass (1980)
|
From page 32... ...
It was almost inevitable that it be adopted by the schools, which were the arena in which these problems were played out and which were also expected to solve them. The IQ established a meritocratic standard which seemed to sever ability from the confusions of a changing time and an increasingly diverse population, provided a means for the individual to continue to earn his place in society by his personal qualities, and answered the needs of a sorely strained school system to educate the mass while locating social talent.
|
From page 33... ...
But some form of stanciarclizec3 diagnostic test is typically used as one basis for clecicling whether students are eligible for services proviciec3 by a variety of programs, including those related to the Inclivicluals with Disabilities Education Act anc3 state programs for stu' cients with disabilities, state anc3 federal bilingual education programs for English language learners, anc3 the federal anc3 state compensatory ecluca' tion programs for poor, underachieving students. Testing is thus used to Although we have cast this discussion in terms of seven distinct purposes, we do not mean to imply that this is the only way of looking at the question.
|
From page 34... ...
To provide a context for interpreting information about student achievement, NAEP also surveys students, their teachers, and school administrators about their backgrounds and the teaching in their schools.4 Similarly, 46 states administer standardized assessments in three to five core subjects and publicly report the results, usually disaggregated to the school building level. The purpose of these assessments is to inform the public about how well the schools and students in their communities are performing over time and compared with those in other places.
|
From page 35... ...
The most wiclespreac3 use of stanciarclizec3 testing in program evaluation is in the federal Title ~ program, first en' acted as part of the Elementary anc3 Secondary Education Act. For over 20 years, the law has required that local districts test Title ~ students yearly anc3 report the results.
|
From page 36... ...
Although standardized tests have long been used as an education reform strategy for changing classroom instruction, this use has become more central with the advent of the standards-based reforms now promoted by states and the federal government. This movement seeks to improve educational quality by setting high content standards that define the knowledge and skills that teachers should teach and students should learn, and by holding educators and teachers accountable for meeting performance standards that set the expectations for proficiency.
|
From page 37... ...
Currently, 18 states require that students pass an exit examination before they graduate from high school, and 4 offer honors diplomas on the basis of examination results (Bond et al., 19961. The requirement that students pass a test as a condition for high school graduation is typically imposed by states, but some local districts use tests to ciecicie whether students should be promoted to the next gracle.
|
From page 38... ...
States can now usually point to test score gains, particularly in the proportion of students passing high school graduation tests between the time they are first tested in gracie 8 or 9 anc3 when they must finally pass the test in gracle 12. Scholars (e.g., Koretz et al., 1991)
|
From page 39... ...
Some states, including Maryland anc3 New York, are now implementing high school graduation assessments tied to clemancling state stanciarcis anc3 requiring greater mastery of more complex skills. A few other states, including North Carolina, are moving toward requiring high school students to pass stanciarclizec3, statewide enc3-of~course exams in all the subjects algebra, English, U.S.
|
From page 40... ...
At the federal level, Title ~ of the Elementary and Secondary Eclucation Act anc3 the Inclivicluals with Disabilities Education Act of 1997 are being used as levers to ensure that students participating in these programs take tests that incorporate the same content anc3 performance stanciarcis that apply to other students. They are also to be incluclec3 in state assessment systems, and the states are to determine whether local districts anc3 schools are helping these students make adequate yearly progress toward meeting the common stanciarcis.
|
From page 41... ...
But the criticism most relevant to our charge comes from civil rights groups: that implementing national tests could harm poor students anc3 minority students if test scores are linked to high stakes consequences for incliviclual students, unless there are protections to en' sure that all students receive access to high~quality curriculum anc3 in' struction. From this perspective, the VNTs are surely problematic: uncier the proposed arrangement, in which the test would be licensed to private test publishers, the federal government would be unable to regulate how states anc3 local districts would use the test results.6 The education policy landscape is also clominatec3 at present by ef' forts to end social promotion, in part through testing.
|
From page 42... ...
It was the first large district to announce its intention to end the practice, basing promotion decisions solely on a test that its developers maintain was not designed for that purpose. In other districts that are moving to end social promotion, debate has focused more on the merits of the policy, because test scores are only one criterion for clecisions.
|
From page 43... ...
POLITICS OF ASSESSMENT With the growth of testing as a policy strategy, discussions about its use have moved more anc3 more from the technical realm to the political world of electoral campaigns, interest groups, anc3 public opinion. It is now quite common for those running for public office to call for greater test~basec3 accountability, to take stancis on which tests should be used for which students, anc3 to support the use of testing for specific purposes, such as encling social promotion.
|
From page 44... ...
Similarly, a 1998 PACE/Fielc3 Institute poll of Californians found that 62 percent favored setting uniform student promotion requirements "based on students passing an achievement test, rather than leaving this up to teachers" (Fuller et al., 1998~. Likewise, 82 percent of the general public and 67 percent of teachers surveyed in South Carolina in 1997 felt that stanciarcis for promotion from elementary to micicile school should be raised and that students should be allowed to move ahead only if they pass a test showing that they have reached those stanciarcis (Immerwahr, 1997~.
|
From page 45... ...
has called the use of testing as a sole criterion for the nonpromotion of students and the use of competency testing for high school graduation "another way of blaming the student victim." Rhoncia Boozer, the NAACP education coordinator, reports that the organization is on record as opposing "the use of testing results in an adverse fashion and any movement geared to [the] use of scores on a national test as [a]
|
From page 46... ...
It argues that the test cienies diplomas to students without sufficient proof that the policy will enhance students' education or life opportunities, anc3 that the test does not correspond to what is actually taught in schools in many minority communities. The National Association for Bilingual Ecluca' tion has more specific concerns about the nature of stanciarclizec3 tests: students should be assessed with appropriate, performance~basec3 tests, anc3 English language learners should not be assessed with tests that are inappropriate at their level of language competency.8 The contrast between strong public support for high~stakes testing of ncliviclual students anc3 the more qualified positions of major education interest groups suggests a significant disjuncture between these organize' tions anc3 their constituencies.9 Whether this gap reflects incomplete information on the public's part or true differences between organizational policymakers anc3 the public is unknown.
|
From page 47... ...
Fundamental questions about what constitutes equal treatment anc3 who should receive valued societal benefits come to the forefront. Moreover, high~stakes test uses force us to confront tradeoffs between potential societal benefits, such as a better~trainec3 workforce anc3 a more informed citizenry, anc3 potential costs to inclivicluals who c30 not meet the common performance stanciarcis as measured by an assessment.
|
From page 48... ...
Shepard 1991 The Effects of High-Stakes Testing on Achievement: Preliminary Findings About Generalization Across Tests. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association and the National Council on Measurement in Education, Chicago, IL.
|
From page 49... ...
1998 Consequences of Assessment: What Is the Evidence? Vice Presidential Address for Division D, annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association, San Diego.
|
Key Terms
This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More
information on Chapter Skim is available.