Re: [Phys-l] WHY VALUE ADDED TESTING IS A BUSTWAS:Re: [PTSOS] Teachers' Test scores to be made public

["John Clement" <clement@hal-pc.org>]

The problem is one of quality control.  So the sorts of things which are
used to control the quality of cars are applicable to teachers.  The US auto
industry for years used a top down system, which resulted in much more
defective cars.  The Japanese by comparison used a system which enlisted the
workers in controlling quality.  This is a system that they copied from US
research.  So they beat us in quality control.  And as far as I know they
use no high stakes testing for the teachers.  Actually the Japanese system
is strongly based on keeping people, and on 100% social promotion in the
lower grades.

As long as the system is just a punitive system, the quality will not go up
appreciably.

If testing is to be used, then it needs to have input from the researchers
and not just be more of the same stuff.  Then it needs to be used to help
make decisions about what are specific things that can be done to improve
the situation.  But if you just put educators under the gun, cheating and
test review will be the norm.  The result will in the end be worse
education.

Take a look at medicine.  The MDs have bought into research, and the whole
system is designed to use the research to evaluate what physicians do.  But
there are not the same types of controls that are being envisioned for
schools.  That is what needs to happen in education.

As to uniform assessment, why not use the testing to put things into the
student records, rather than into the teacher's records.  Make the students
responsible.  Then provide statistical information about the grades and the
test scores for each class that the student took.  So you know that the
student got a 91, with an STD for that class of 5 points with the average
grade being 90.  The end or course state testing showed an average grade of
65 with and STD of 20 points for that class, and that student got a 50.  The
state average for that test was 50 with and STD of 30.  This way each
student is evaluated much more exactly.

But if a teacher lectures the correct material, and gets coverage, the
current system will completely approve of what they do.

My point is not that testing should be dropped, but that it should be used
appropriately.  And then the American system (which we copied from the
British) needs to make teachers more collegial, and have methods for them to
get together and exchange ideas.  This is happening in Modeling.  But in the
average school teachers are not communicating with each other about
important things that might make improvement.  They are not reading the
research.  On evaluations they are asked to put down what they did for
improvement, and one thing is journal reading.  I know most put down a list
of journals, but were they good journals?  Did they actually read them?  MDs
generally do read journals, but teachers don't.

I suspect that 95%+ of college professors do not read journals in research
into their field of education, so how can they improve their teaching
without having a clue?

By the way the teacher's unions are not the major problem.  Look at which
states have weak or nonexistent unions, and then look at which states have
the poorest performance.  TX has lay down and play dead unions with only
tenure in a few districts.  But TX is also near the bottom of the heap.  As
top down control increases, the resistance at the bottom will also increase.
But if we used quality control based on a team approach the way it is done
in Japan, we might improve things.

I admit there is no good solution to making sure the money has been well
spent.  Do you know if your MD is better than average, average, or below
average?  Can you even find out?  But you trust them because they are
"professionals".  Teachers are in the main professionals, but they are being
turned into assembly line workers with an increased line speed.  I only
encountered one teacher who was somewhat incompetent in high school, and she
moved from the English classroom to the library.  The number of incompetent
teachers is generally not that high.  The education schools have weeded out
the lower students, but at the same time the brilliant ones have also left.
The brilliant students have decided that the manure and low pay you have
take in teaching is not worth the effort.  They all go into some other
field.  This actually came from a report.

My son complains that virtually every professor he has is not good at
teaching.  I spoiled him by using research based methods to push up his
thinking and understanding of material.  How are they being evaluated?  This
is at a public university that aspires to tier 1 status.  Be careful what
you ask for as you might get it.

John

> After all the 'test bashing' the question still remains:
>
> How do you evaluate both teachers and school systems in a fair and
> consistent way that is relatively transparent to the tax payers who are
> paying their salaries, and to the state, city, and local administrators
> who
> are charged with making such evaluations?  What will the unions tolerate?
> Most importantly, but maybe the most difficult to quantify, what is best
> for
> the students?  As schools rely on (are bribed and accept) more and more
> federal funding, uniform assessment will become increasingly sticky
> point--as though it hasn't already.
>
> Rick  (who objects to my federal taxes being unevenly distributed for
> educational purposes)