Educators and activists opposed to the high-stakes testing that has come to dominate education reform have reason to be concerned, but they may have picked a losing strategy to make their point.
More than 450 teachers and activists are gathering in Washington for the Save Our Schools March and National Call to Action, a four-day conference and rally at the White House on Saturday. The point is to push back against the administration's school-reform agenda -- particularly the reliance on high-stakes testing to evaluate students and teachers -- before the government finishes its reauthorization of No Child Left Behind.
High-stakes testing systems have come under increased scrutiny after revelations that teachers and principals in 44 Atlanta public schools cheated on the 2009 statewide test. Some gave inappropriate help to students taking the test, while others had changed students' answers. In March, Washington, D.C.'s schools chancellor Kaya Henderson announced an investigation to look into suspicious gains in test scores in the District's public schools. Similar scandals have cropped up in Baltimore, Philadelphia, and other cities. An investigation into the Georgia scandal reported that administrators “put unreasonable pressure on teachers and principals to achieve targets. A culture of fear, intimidation and retaliation spread throughout the district” and that the system “emphasized test results and public praise to the exclusion of integrity and ethics.” Activists opposed to high-stakes testing jumped on the scandal, and especially the findings of Georgia's investigation, as a way to bolster their case. Kenneth Bernstein, a high school teacher in Maryland and one of the Save Our Schools organizers, told The Washington Post, “High-stakes testing inevitably winds up in distortions like this.”
For groups like Save Our Schools, using these scandals to further their arguments against testing puts them awfully close to defending the indefensible: the teachers who cheated. Portraying teachers as "inevitable cheaters" sells them short in a movement whose main selling point is the dignity of educators as more than test-teaching robots. But it also distracts from their more considered arguments; namely, that too much testing strips teachers of their agency in developing curriculum and robs students of access to enriching subjects, like art and music, that don't align with what's on most standardized tests. Those wary of reform have good reasons to be, and they should stick to their best.
