I would like to start this blog with a question that
help me to introduce the topic, the question is “What is the role of high stakes assessments in
the schools?” There are many answers to this question but I would like to focus
in the role that the assessments play in the evaluation of the education
system. As a system, the education needs to
be evaluated. As mentioned the American Psychological Association, and National
Council on Measurement in Education (1999) “Measuring what and how well students learn is
an important building block in the process of strengthening and improving our
nation's schools… Some public officials and
educational administrators are increasingly calling for the use of tests to
make high-stakes decisions, such as whether a student will move on to the next
grade level or receive a diploma.” This role of evaluation of the system and
data to improve the education in a country is helping to create adequate public
policies in education. In my experience when I was working in the area of
education in an international organization, I can noticed the interes of the
countries to participate in standardized assessments like The Program
for International Student Assessment (PISA) to evaluate their Public
Education System and compare their systems with other countries. The problem is
the information collected with the assessment, the data tells one story, and
these test can only provide a "snapshot" of student achievement and
may not accurately reflect an entire year's worth of student progress and
achievement.
The data tells one history, but our students have many important strengths
and areas of need that are not collected in the assessments. As teachers we
know that children develop at different paces and in
different areas, our students have varied previous schooling activity, language
background and personal needs, but the assessment are the same for all. These
data from the assessments could show some needs of the students and teachers
needs to translate this information in effective information that help them to
create their educational plans for their students.
Continue
in the teacher’s level, the assessments a variety of roles but I would like to
refer specifically to the role of collecting academic data and evaluate the
teacher performance. Students’ assessments collect students’ data depending on
the grade level and area of knowledge. For example, in my case as a Spanish kindergarten
teacher in a bilingual school, I only have to test my students two times a year
to know the reading level in Spanish calls EDL (Spanish Reading Assessment for
dual language, bilingual, and immersion classrooms that helps Spanish-speaking
students become independent successful readers with tools to assess reading
engagement, fluency, and comprehension. EDL2 is the Spanish equivalent of DRA2 http://www.pearsonschool.com/index.cfm?locator=PSZwK4)
but in math we do not have a specific assessment. When
the students goes to other grades the number or assessment increase, for
instance in third grade they need to take the PARCC exam and a multitude of different
assessment for each area of knowledge. Also, the students’ assessments are part
of the evaluation of the teachers’ performance in some countries or states. In
the District of Columbia the results of the students’ assessments are part of
the evaluation of the teacher performance as a component of the IMPACT (http://dcps.dc.gov/page/impact-overview)
that is system for assessing and rewarding the
performance of teachers. The results of the students’ assessments are the 10%
of the evaluation and could help the teacher to be rewarded.
In a
teacher daily life the assessments require a lot of time. For example, in a
class of 30 students (like my current kindergarten class) the teachers can spend
around 20 minutes per student making a reading assessment or 1 hour in the higher
levels, so the total time to complete all the assessments is 600 to 1800
minutes, and more time to evaluate them.
The
other perspective of the assessments is the influence of the score in the
students. Some schools or teachers can use incorrectly the data collected and
define the students in a number or letters establish by their score. For this
reason, some parents are organized to request an education without assessments,
one clear example is the United Opt Out
National (http://unitedoptout.com/)
which has the goal to help educate parents on how to protest
high-stakes testing tied to school accountability and student progress.
Finally, I thing that the
education and educator need to rethink the evaluation process of their
students. Our goal as a teacher is help the students to learn and the current assessments
is not helping us in our goal.
Resources:
American Educational Research Association,
American Psychological Association, and National Council on Measurement in
Education (1999). Standards for Educational and
Psychological Testing.
Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association.
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