Geaux Teacher!: Louisiana/Tennessee Embargoed Test Score Coincidence?

Geaux Teacher!: Louisiana/Tennessee Embargoed Test Score Coincidence?:

Louisiana/Tennessee Embargoed Test Score Coincidence?

So Supt. White has embargoed test scores.  Seems he is not the only superintendent with "that problem."  His Chiefs for Change comrade Kevin Huffman of Tennessee is following his lead.  And I thought White was the copy cat of all his Ed policy.  I guess I didn't give him enough credit.

This re- post explains the "coincidence."

http://norinrad10.wordpress.com/2014/05/23/more-on-the-tennessee-tcap-fiasco/comment-page-1/#comment-39

Dad Gone Wild

“We must make this the decade of education reform,” he wrote in January 2010, later citing initiatives he favors: decisions driven by “transparent data on student achievement,” differentiated pay for high-performing teachers and, perhaps most telling, “taking seriously who needs to leave the system” to upgrade the teaching profession. (http://archive.tennessean.com/article/20131125/NEWS04/311250021/Chorus-criticism-doesn-t-stop-reform-minded-TN-education-chief-Huffman)

The above is the most telling paragraph in an article written by Joey Garrison on Kevin Huffman in November of 2013. Everything in that statement frames the situation Mr Huffman and the Tennessee Department of Education now find themselves embroiled in. He says that student achievement data needs to be transparent. Currently it most certainly is not. We have no idea about what’s on the test or how scores are calculated and apparently those rules are being written on the fly. Meanwhile it is the time to apply his assertion about “taking seriously who needs to leave the system.”

This has been the year of heavy scrutiny upon standardized tests. Parents are paying more attention then ever to what kind of testing their children are being subjected to and have started to raise questions. Its fair to say that a level of distrust has begun to ferment. Criticism’s have been leveled that testing reduces a child to just the measured and that “cut scores” are merely political machinations. If there ever was ever a time for a process to run smoothly and error free, now was the time.

Unfortunately, the Tennessee Department of Education failed to rise to the challenge. What they’ve created is akin to telling a heart patient they have six months to live but you can get them their medicine in 7 months. Think that’s hyperbole? Talk to some Tennessee families about the stress they’ve endured this spring over testing. Talk to some teachers and administrators about the pressure they’ve felt over the upcoming tests and their effect on their livelihood. I think the illustration is spot on and in this case the patient has “done died”.

Think about it. How valid can we really consider these scores to be? You may call it “post-equating” but to me it sounds like manipulation. We’ve all taken tests given by teachers. They write the test, hand it out, grade it in a timely fashion and return itGeaux Teacher!: Louisiana/Tennessee Embargoed Test Score Coincidence?: