CURMUDGUCATION: Is Testing Accountability Dead Yet?

CURMUDGUCATION: Is Testing Accountability Dead Yet?:

Is Testing Accountability Dead Yet?

Today Education Next features a three-headed take on the question, "Is test-based accountability dead?" Three prominent reformy thinkers address the question. Do they come up with any useful answers? Let's see.

Why Accountability Matters, and Why It Must Evolve

Morgan Polikoff (USC Rossier) leads us off. Polikoff is a long-time Big Standardized Test supporter and logged some time with the Gates effective teaching project. And he is making a very creative case for the BS Test here.

What positively affects student outcomes, has "overwhelming" support of parents and voters, supports various policies and research, and has been used widely for a decade? "School accountability" is his broad and inclusive answer. But when it comes to test-based accountability specifically, I think he's only batting .500 here.

Does BS Testing work? It's a tricky question only because so much of the research is so bad, boiling down mostly to "ever since we started giving the BS Test for high stakes, students have scored higher on the BS Test." That may be true, but so what? That tautological progression holds whether the BS Test is a good test, a bad test, or a test of how well students can recite the Preamble to the Constitution.

Polikoff does pull off a masterful piece of data-juggling. You may recall a CREDO study suggesting CURMUDGUCATION: Is Testing Accountability Dead Yet?: