Forget Evidence: White, BESE, and Corporate Reform Ideology
Last week, the NCTQ report of teacher training programs was published in US News and World Report. Mind you, NCTQ doesn’t bother with anything so real as mandatory site visits to the programs it rates, which can make for a really embarrassing moment when a site that receives high marks doesn’t exist except on paper.
I have been thinking about Kate Walsh and NCTQ, about how it is that they continue to push their poorly investigated judgments of teacher training program “quality” onto an unassuming public. My musings have led me to the following conclusion:
NCTQ adheres to ideology, not to evidence.
To ideologues, evidence only matters if it supports one’s position. The quality of the evidence doesn’t matter. Shallow, pseudo-studies will do. Outright lies and deception do not matter, either, so long as they lead to the goal of promoting the ideology.
If the evidence contradicts the ideology, then the evidence must be suppressed, or distorted, or denied,
I have been thinking about Kate Walsh and NCTQ, about how it is that they continue to push their poorly investigated judgments of teacher training program “quality” onto an unassuming public. My musings have led me to the following conclusion:
NCTQ adheres to ideology, not to evidence.
To ideologues, evidence only matters if it supports one’s position. The quality of the evidence doesn’t matter. Shallow, pseudo-studies will do. Outright lies and deception do not matter, either, so long as they lead to the goal of promoting the ideology.
If the evidence contradicts the ideology, then the evidence must be suppressed, or distorted, or denied,
