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Obviously tests are imperfect, but it's silly to dismiss them as useless. Standardized tests are the best tool we have to ensure our schools are providing all c

Obviously tests are imperfect, but it's silly to dismiss them as useless. Standardized tests are the best tool we have to ensure our schools are providing all children quality educations regardless of economic or racial background or disabilities. Making education policy without measuring outcomes in a rigorous way is like doing science without running experiments. Children of priveleged families will always do fine. Their parents have the knowledge and bandwidth to take a proactive role in their children's educations, but we can't leave behind all the kids who aren't so lucky.

piva00 5y ago
> Standardized tests are the best tool we have to ensure our schools are providing all children quality educations regardless of economic or racial background or disabilities. It's a work of fiction but I'd like to refer to "The Wire Season 4" and how they portray standardised test taking to get you a fresh perspective outside of the utopian thought about curricula.
quadrifoliate 5y ago
> Making education policy without measuring outcomes in a rigorous way is like doing science without running experiments. It's worse to present an experiment as objective without properly measuring its error bars. As I have pointed out, there are a million different factors that can influence performance on tests. Claiming that you are "measuring outcomes in a rigorous way" from these tests without putting in the time and money to assess and control for all those factors makes for bad public policy. Worse, you'll end up providing incentives to focus only on test scores to the detriment of actual classroom learning.
- onion2k 5y ago
  As I have pointed out, there are a million different factors that can influence performance on tests. For individuals, yes. But for the entire cohort not really - the results are being compared to previous years, so the error bars should be approximately the same. Children are, on average, the same as two, five or ten years ago, so the test outcomes should be about the same. The article suggests that all children are now doing worse on tests than previous years.
  - quadrifoliate 5y ago
    > Children are, on average, the same as two, five or ten years ago, so the test outcomes should be about the same. The mental state of children today is not the same for those five or ten years ago, for a myriad of reasons; this should be obvious. > The article suggests that all children are now doing worse on tests than previous years. Yes. I am also sure they will do worse on a rubric for mental well-being. Unfortunately no one seems to have thought about measuring or improving that, since most of the standardized-test focused measures probably worsen it.
- istjohn 5y ago
  I read you to be dismissing tests outright. If you merely want to stipulate that the test scores are subjected to rigorous statistical analyses that "properly measure its error bars" we are in total agreement.
  - quadrifoliate 5y ago
    > If you merely want to stipulate that the test scores are subjected to rigorous statistical analyses that "properly measure its error bars" we are in total agreement. I am saying that the system should fail open in their absence. "Students' achievement dropped 50 points!" makes for a really potent policy cudgel. "Students' learning dropped 50 points, +/- 40" is silly and meaningless. The former should never be available, unless the +/- is explicitly mentioned. This is similar to prescription medicines. We have a lot of prescription medicines that do great things, which no one is debating. But without a proper evaluation process, you have zero access to them. Test assessments should be similar in my opinion.

piva00 5y ago

> Standardized tests are the best tool we have to ensure our schools are providing all children quality educations regardless of economic or racial background or disabilities. It's a work of fiction but I'd like to refer to "The Wire Season 4" and how they portray standardised test taking to get you a fresh perspective outside of the utopian thought about curricula.

quadrifoliate 5y ago

> Making education policy without measuring outcomes in a rigorous way is like doing science without running experiments. It's worse to present an experiment as objective without properly measuring its error bars. As I have pointed out, there are a million different factors that can influence performance on tests. Claiming that you are "measuring outcomes in a rigorous way" from these tests without putting in the time and money to assess and control for all those factors makes for bad public policy. Worse, you'll end up providing incentives to focus only on test scores to the detriment of actual classroom learning.

onion2k 5y ago
As I have pointed out, there are a million different factors that can influence performance on tests. For individuals, yes. But for the entire cohort not really - the results are being compared to previous years, so the error bars should be approximately the same. Children are, on average, the same as two, five or ten years ago, so the test outcomes should be about the same. The article suggests that all children are now doing worse on tests than previous years.
- quadrifoliate 5y ago
  > Children are, on average, the same as two, five or ten years ago, so the test outcomes should be about the same. The mental state of children today is not the same for those five or ten years ago, for a myriad of reasons; this should be obvious. > The article suggests that all children are now doing worse on tests than previous years. Yes. I am also sure they will do worse on a rubric for mental well-being. Unfortunately no one seems to have thought about measuring or improving that, since most of the standardized-test focused measures probably worsen it.
istjohn 5y ago
I read you to be dismissing tests outright. If you merely want to stipulate that the test scores are subjected to rigorous statistical analyses that "properly measure its error bars" we are in total agreement.
- quadrifoliate 5y ago
  > If you merely want to stipulate that the test scores are subjected to rigorous statistical analyses that "properly measure its error bars" we are in total agreement. I am saying that the system should fail open in their absence. "Students' achievement dropped 50 points!" makes for a really potent policy cudgel. "Students' learning dropped 50 points, +/- 40" is silly and meaningless. The former should never be available, unless the +/- is explicitly mentioned. This is similar to prescription medicines. We have a lot of prescription medicines that do great things, which no one is debating. But without a proper evaluation process, you have zero access to them. Test assessments should be similar in my opinion.