Catching up a bit…

I haven’t been on this blog in a long time – my other one (Engaged Intellectuals) takes up most of the “spare time” I have for blogging.

But some folks keep stopping by this one looking for ways to stop the testing madness – or ways to pull their kids out of tests without facing legal ramifications. I wish I had the energy to keep up this blog – so many people need a place to share stories, vent, and find support to try to change things.

For the latest commenter:

I’m so sorry your 5th grader hates school now because of the FIVE POINTS that kept him from passing the test. You are like so many other parents struggling with this, it is incredibly painful and makes you feel helpless as a parent when an institution takes control over our lives like this – and our kids are paying such a huge price. There are processes that schools are supposed to follow when a child fails to pass the test, including holding a parent/teacher/principal meeting to discuss whether or not it makes sense to retain the child in the same grade or move forward with a strong plan to give them the academic support they need in the next grade. In other words, failing the test is not supposed to mean an “automatic” failing of the grade. There should be some serious conversations, and schools should be able to show how they are going to better meet the needs of your child in the future, whether in the same grade or in the next grade.

Check out EmpowerED Georgia – an organization of parents, educators, and concerned citizens about public education in Georgia.

And the National Center for Fair and Open Testing for important information and research against all this testing madness.

And send emails and letters to all the people you can who make policies in the state of Georgia.

Tell your personal story – tell them that these horrible testing policies are killing kids’ interest in school and formal learning, tell them about how these testing practices in school are creating conflict and hardship in your home for your family. Tell them everything you are experiencing, because you are not alone, you’re just one of the ones who happened to comment on a blog about testing. Others are looking in other places, telling their friends, crying on their own at home, and wondering what they can do to help their kids.

Maybe your child can write letters to – put their frustration and feelings of unfairness in words to their legislators. This can be a great educational experience too, they can learn about the General Assembly, learn about how policies work and how they impact citizens’ every day lives, and learn that they at least have a voice to speak out against policies that are counterproductive, or even damaging, to the citizens of Georgia.

Speak out.

And let me know what happens.

Child Labor in U.S. Schools?

Thanks to the AJC for publishing my op-ed essay about merit pay, high-stakes testing, and child labor.

 

Here it is!

Will Parents Begin Opting-Out of High-Stakes Tests?

Check out this article from “Teacher Magazine”

Nice op-ed on testing and assessments

Check out this op-ed by Susan Engel that reveals the nonsensical nature of our fill-in-the-bubble testing craze…

Georgia Education Alliance has been renamed Empower Education for Georgia

Due to legal issues related to GAE’s complaints that GEA was too similar in name and acronym, the grassroots movement formerly known as “Georgia Education Alliance” has been renamed Empower Education for Georgia.

Go See ‘Race to Nowhere’!!!!

“Race to Nowhere” is a film made by a mother who became increasingly concerned about her children’s and family’s emotional well-being resulting from pressures at school, loads of homework, and family time that was decimated by requirements from school.

This concern intensified and catapulted the making of the film when a 13-year old “perfect” child killed herself in the community over a bad math grade.

A 13 year old killing herself over a grade in school?

What do we expect?

We are guilty of allowing school’s competitive nature to infiltrate the bodies and psyches of our children (and even parents).

We are guilty of abusing children who are pushed to stay up late at night finishing  homework and who cry and complain of headaches, stomach aches, dizziness, and depression all related to school.

We are guilty.

Who is we?

Policymakers, educators, parents, citizens, test-makers, test-scorers, publishers of testing materials.

All of us.

Can we finally come together around protecting children’s right to a human existence inside and outside school?

Can we finally coalesce around a fundamental belief that children are human beings who do not exist in the world to “produce” for adults?

Go see this film – and then find a way to order it – and then find a way to get as many people as possible to watch it.

Then change how our children are experiencing the world.

Race to Nowhere Website,  Film Trailer, and Organizing Ideas

Themes in this film that are related to recent hot topics in Georgia:

Stress and cheating

Testing

Homework

Get out the Vote!! Tuesday is Primary Day…

Hey everyone out there -

Tuesday is primary day and it’s a REALLY important primary – to make sure the candidates who support educators, children, families, and not the craziness we’re tied to at the moment (read: get some folks into offices that realize merit pay based on test scores is insane, that realize the CRCT madness is killing schools and children and teachers and administrators, etc.).

I don’t have to do it here, because the Georgia Education Alliance (a grassroots movement in Georgia that is VERY impressive) has done it for me – check out their website with candidate details and their endorsements.

Atlanta Journal Constitution piece on standardized schooling and testing

Thanks to Maureen Downey for publishing my opinion piece in today’s ajc (online here). I have received many supportive emails today and one email from a critic who raised important issues about the quality of schooling and its relationship to the health of the U.S. economy. After responding to the reader personally by email, I am posting my response here as well because it’s a nice extension of the ajc piece…

Dear Reader,

Thank you for taking the time to locate my email address and respond to my piece in the ajc. I empathize with your perspectives and agree that public confidence in schooling is a train wreck and there are many reasons why the public should be angry with what is happening in schools. Most of our current “problems” in schools have roots in the Standards movement that gained much steam under the Clinton administration and led to hyper testing and high-stakes “accountability” that backfired and turned many classrooms and schools into places where getting students to fill in the correct bubble on a test is more important than knowing whether a student understands or has “learned” anything.

I am not against tests. I am against using tests as the single measure in a high-stakes environment.

There is much evidence that doing so puts the adults in schools in positions where they may do unethical things (cheat, for example) they would have never done under different circumstances to keep their jobs rather than focus their energies and interests on student learning. And, unfortunately, plenty of evidence that students are suffering – and learning less – under such conditions.

Schools have always been the scapegoat for the United States’ economic woes. Economic policies, however, driven by neoliberal economic theories since the 1970s that have widened the gap between the rich and poor, driven down wages of the working-class, rewarded businesses that move operations out of the U.S. to exploit cheaper labor, etc. must be held accountable for, as you put it, “transforming us into a pauper nation.” I would add that this has transformed us into a service-oriented economy that relies too heavily on finance and too little on manufacturing and production – two pieces intimately connected to U.S. debt to China.

I wish education could fix this. Trust me, as a person in education I really do wish that what happened in schools could make a significant difference in the problem you state well. It might be a piece of the solution – educating a smart, innovative, knowledgeable, hard-working citizenry should certainly help – our legislators, however, and the leading economists advising our legislators, have some changing to do before our economic woes can begin to turn around.

I assure you this, our education students here are not being shuffled through the higher education program and we are doing everything in our power to recruit, prepare, and retain the highest quality teachers in the nation. We have professors committed to teaching undergraduate students in education (something that too often gets handed over to graduate students to do), and we are well aware of the challenges we – and future teachers – face.

One of those challenges is to get policy makers to understand the damage high-stakes testing mandates are doing to our schools and our students’ futures. Talented teachers, who can and do “turn the light on in young minds” (as you put it) are leaving by the busloads because they haven’t had the freedom to use their talents since 2001. Those who have stayed are faced with ridiculous requirements daily that have nothing to do with educating young people.

Thank you, again, for writing. You have given me a nice opportunity to think through and respond to your legitimate concerns, many of them also concerns of mine.

All my best,
Stephanie

Join the Georgia Education Alliance!

Check it out – and join if you’re inspired. It seems a real grassroots movement of educators across the state is emerging to fight against high-stakes testing…

http://www.gaedalliance.org/

Important essay from Teachers College Record on “accountability” “testing” and “individualism”

Educators have long been concerned about the move toward competition in education that inherently propels people away from collaboration, sharing, and doing the best “for the common good.”

Thanks to J.E. for passing along this terrific essay by two folks who believe in testing and who are against the high-stakes use of tests. Their argument is a very important one that could also be tied to so many “contests” we have out there right now with the biggest one being the Race to the Top.