As spring emerges in the Puget Sound region, students, parents and educators alike are turning their focus to the latest and greatest version of Washington state’s student assessments. While standardized tests can be a productive measure of certain aspects of a student’s competency, they are by no means a panacea or always an accurate predictor of a student’s success in the future.
Each and every child has a unique and special gift; however, it is an absolute fallacy to believe that we all possess the same abilities or that we have been given the same opportunities to thrive. Some of the greatest athletes, musicians, artists, inventors and scientists have been academically challenged. Case in point: it has been reported that Albert Einstein suffered from dyslexia and did not flourish during his early education.
Many of our children are coming from environments that contain abuse and poverty of some form or another that can also inhibit a student’s educational progress. There is a direct correlation between a parent’s education level and the academic success of their children. That is why we typically see higher test scores in Bellevue, Mercer Island and Medina, as opposed to White Center, Enumclaw or Auburn.
A child’s education is the cumulative sum of a host of factors, including the parent’s involvement and educational levels, socio-economic levels, dysfunction within the home, competent teachers throughout their education, appropriate district resources and inherent intelligence and abilities. The movement to evaluate a teacher’s competency based upon many issues that the teacher may not have any control over is blatantly unfair and shortsighted.
If a student arrives at school and is affected with a learning disability and their family has been forced to move four or five times in the previous three years due to financial issues, there is a greater likelihood that this student has gaps within their basic educational foundations. When parental substance abuse is factored into this equation, this becomes an insurmountable obstacle to teach this student the fundamentals within a fifty minute class period; they are playing catchup throughout the year. This does not even begin to address the students whose parents speak little or no English.
The states that have adopted the Common Core standards have reported that within 21 states submitting information, up to 70 percent of students fail these tests upon their first attempt. This is certainly not a rousing success and does not necessarily provide the data required to make appropriate adjustments to the overall curriculum. It should also be noted that not all teachers will be evaluated based upon these test scores because these tests only encompass math, science, reading and writing. This means that all other teachers, including art, music, P.E., history and computer science will not be under the same scrutiny as their colleagues and this is disparate treatment.
While standardized tests can be a productive means to track student progress, they should never be used to determine a student’s intelligence or a teacher’s competency. A test cannot measure the virtues of imagination, ingenuity or work ethic. It is imperative that we keep these assessments in perspective, lest we somehow overlook the next great Thomas Edison.
Bill Young spent more than a decade working in the public school system as a school safety officer. During the past twenty years, he has taught classes, developed curriculum, lectured within universities and consulted throughout the U.S. on school safety issues and school disciplinary matters.
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