Dan,

I think you’re a little harsh on Sarah here. There’s a lot of frustration today from teachers both young and old. Here in Philadelphia where Grade 3-8 students are given city-wide benchmark multiple choice exams in English, Math and Science every six weeks and high school students get those tests four times a year all in the name of aligning instruction to prepare for the PSSAs, there’s a lot of frustration over the amount of time we spend on testing, and there’s a louder and louder chorus asking “What have we lost?”

There’s a lot of questioning about the validity of the tests… the fiscal costs of all this outside assessment… and what companies are benefiting from all this this assessment. And those questions need to be asked.

All of this is done because NCLB is a test-based system, and the tests are what is measured, and what is measured is what is taught. And yes, I am more cynical than you, and I would urge you to question the creeping influence of the corporations in public education. I think if Eisenhower were alive today, he might just caution us to “beware the education-industrial complex.” (And I’m finding that reading “Education and the Cult of Efficiency” is a brilliant read on this topic, it was written in 1962 and it details the period between 1900-1930, looking at how Taylor’s ideas of Scientific Management moved from business to education and the effect that had on our schools.)

I’m 35 years old, and I’ve only been in education for 11 years, and there have been plenty of times when those older than I am have suggested that my youth meant that I didn’t know what I was talking about, and certainly, I’ve railed against those folks too. But I also have learned to listen to the folks who have been in the game long enough to realize that I still have to listen.

This job gets easier in some ways, and it gets harder. When I was 25, I could pull 70 and 80 hour weeks, and I didn’t mind getting in at 6:30 am and leaving at 6:30 pm. And I could go to the coffee shops and grade for hours on the weekends. Then I found that I didn’t have the stamina I used to have. Then I had kids, and I found that 60-65 hours a week was about all I really could spend working, and that I had to find a way for that to be enough. And I read your words, and I think about the teacher I was and how impatient I was toward any teacher who didn’t view the job as a calling the way I did (and still do.)

Saying that teachers are underpaid and overworked is a cliche, but it’s important to say in this context — we don’t have enough people in this country who are willing to view this job as a calling — so there has to be some ability to feel good about what we do. Those of us in urban classrooms face every shortage and frustration out there, you know them as well as I do. What keeps many good — even great — teachers coming back is the ability to feel good about their jobs, themselves, their kids. What NCLB has done is create a deficit model with what I believe to be very faulty metrics where it’s very hard for hard working teachers to feel good about anything they do. It’s increased the amount distrust the public has in education, and it’s set up a series of punishments that would do little (at best) to improve education for the students in “failing” schools. In other words, the beatings will continue until morale improves.

I believe we need to reform education — as I hope you know from everything I write. And I have no tolerance for teachers who believe that this is a 10 month a year, 40 hour a week job. And I’ve seen some teachers who need to leave the profession now. And I am as mad as you at any organization that would protect bad teachers.

But I’ve also seen teachers who did everything they could in near impossible situations only to be told that their kids couldn’t pass the test. And I’ve known brilliant kids who were powerful readers and writers score a 62 on a NY State Regents test, and be told they weren’t “proficient” enough to graduate, despite four years of hard evidence to the contrary.

Sometimes, you need to rage a bit. I’ve done often enough. Sometimes, that’s what gives you the strength and energy to go back in the next day.

I agree that we, as educators, have to be held accountable for the work we do. At SLA, we have a standard rubric, and we examine those benchmark project rubrics *and* our grades *and* our units all the time. I think the days of the close the door to your classroom and shut out the world need to end, and not because of NCLB, but because I believe deeply in collaboration.

I am commenting to you right now while I’m in a principal’s staff meeting, and Kaplan is presenting to us about how to use “Understanding by Design” to teach kids essential understandings of test taking strategies. It’s a bastardization of UbD if I’ve ever heard one. And Kaplan — KAPLAN — is presenting to us about NCLB and how we are to deal with the political reality we live in. Offended? Yep, you bet I am. And because I brought my laptop, and I’m able to write to you, it means I’ve only raised my hand to challenge this speaker four times instead of forty-seven.

I want authentic assessment. I want students — and schools — to be judged by the work of their own head and heart and hands. I’m fine with some very basic state testing to insure inter-rater reliability. I just don’t think we should make these tests the end all and be all. Look at Nebraska, look at Vermont, look at Maine — there are states that are using NCLB in good ways.

In the end, teaching is part art, craft and (eek) even a little science. And every teacher can keep getting better, keep learning, keep listening. And yes, we need to keep working hard for our kids, but we also need to learn how to listen to ourselves, to our colleagues, to our kids… and not assume that a test tells us *more* than what we can see over time, in our classrooms every day.

Chris wrote: “What NCLB has done is create a deficit model with what I believe to be very faulty metrics where it’s very hard for hard working teachers to feel good about anything they do. It’s increased the amount distrust the public has in education, and it’s set up a series of punishments that would do little (at best) to improve education for the students in “failing” schools. In other words, the beatings will continue until morale improves. ”

Chris, I struggle with statements such as these. I do so because shit was very, very bad before NCLB, and that piece of legislature did not create those conditions of perpetual, generational, near-permanent not-learning. Rather, the legislation put labels on a pre-existing situation and did so in a way that is (arguably) rigid and binary, but nonetheless accurate. You mention deficit models, but the only one worth discussing is the deficit in instruction that poor kids, Black, Latino, SE Asian receive. That’s a deficit that exists independent of NCLB.

All of the negative by products that are laid on the doorstep of this bill are not the results of provisions therein, but rather actions taken by schools and districts to improve student achievement (or performance, if you think the test are invalid). Any aspersions we choose to cast at schools taking away electives, lengthening the school day, including test prep, and so forth, must be cast at the actual individuals making those choices; they are not the only choices to be made.

There’s much to be said, but I’ll limit it to this: If I were a parent of kids attending one those oft-discussed under-performing, under-resourced schools I’d be down on my knees thanking God this piece of law exists. Because of it, people actually give a shit whether my kid learns and how much of that learning he acquires. People are aware of him, and he will not remain an ignored data point. There is a light shown into those schools, and even if it is occasionally harsh and unyielding, we should always choose the light.

Hi Lori,

Do I mean to imply that pre-NCLB folks didn’t care, and that post- they do? No. I think the ones who didn’t care still don’t; it’s just harder for them to hide it.

Caring, of course, is a troublesome word, one I’ve written about on my own site quite a lot. When I use it I mean, taking the time/ initiative to determine what needs to happen for kids to learn, and making it happen. Many profess to care, with much hand-wringing and heart-bleeding, and maybe that level of caring is superior to mine, but I’m not sure it helps kids learn to read. My experiences working with a group of educators who care along these lines, taking the worst middle school in our chunk of California and transforming it into a model of how middle schools with ELLs should function confirms that while this is by no means easy, it is also nowhere near as impossible as the disastrous trends of, let’s be honest, failure would seem to suggest.

And things are very often rigid and binary. Whether my students have the level of English fluency to test into classes colleges accept for credit is binary. Whether these kids can fill out job applications, pass exit exams, and stay out of jail is binary. Are schools the only factor affecting these outcomes? Of course not, and we’ve discussed where the lines should be drawn before. What I struggled with in Chris’s statments is the idea that absent NCLB rhetoric these conditions, these deficits would somehow be less, or not as damaging, or prevalent. I think we can agree that is false, and it makes me go back to the type of teacher rhetoric that turns my stomach, the kind about how hard it is to hear that the kids didn’t perform well, that your school is failing or in need of improvement, that your efforts were insufficient. As hard as it is to hear that, how much harder, how completely and debilitatingly harder is it be a kid with no skills?

Are there additional nuances and levels to these issues? No doubt, and we should never shrink from exploring them in all necessary depth. We should likewise not lose sight of the fact one can perform a reduction that is likewise valid.

I never try to demean anyone Lori, but I likewise struggle to accept the culture of abdication that exists among my peers. Take, for example, my masters class from today, where groups were asked to list three reasons for the achievement gap. I heard 17 reasons that were under the control of teachers/ schools/ districts. I heard 47 that were about money/ poverty/ ELL/ NCLB. NCLB responsible for the achivement gap? My God, Lori, my God.

These are the people who will lead the schools in my community for the next 25 years.

Is it lame to just say “I agree” in a blog comment? If so, then I’m lame. I agree completely with Chris Lehmann’s last comment and can’t think of a way to say it better.

Chris is so good.

NCLB has done nothing to help elevate the teaching profession. Agree. “Delivering instruction” (what a wonderful observation) has become a common term in our district, especially at evaluation time. Certainly good teachers should be able to ignore this stuff, but how we talk about what we do is important. However, I’m not sure NCLB has really pushed education or the conditions of children in American cities to the forefront of the American consciousness. If anything, public education policy has been further marginalized as it has branded and packaged with the same slick slogans (“No Child Left Behind” — a bit Orwellian, really) that have reduced so many other important issues into subliminal assurances that things are handled (‘Mission Accomplished,” “Plan for Victory,” “Energy Security”). The State of the Union speech had one innocuous throwaway paragraph on education. NBC confused Transportation Secretary Peters with Education Secretary Spellings — and we’re to think education reform is a real priority in the Beltway? Poll after poll shows little public understanding of the law. Few in the teaching profession have any real knowledge of it, either, something Dan our sponsor here is quite right to highlight. But that’s a fundamental problem with both the law itself and the implementation at all levels. As education policy and funding is become federalized, schools and teaching and public involvement are still very localized endeavors. For much of our history our local schools have been where public life begins in this nation. As the feds assume more and more control, we must try to understand and confront the implications of this shift. If not, we create a huge void into which the privateers will swoop: when it becomes mostly about influence peddling at the top and distancing the public from how and where decisions are made, the corporate types will always prevail.

TMAO, you know I’m a huge fan–your writing is perceptive and important to me and my teaching. The successes your school has achieved are due in large measure to what has always worked both pre-NCLB and today: competent, committed, focused leaders who work hand-in-hand with their staff to establish a sense of mission and purpose for the entire school; talented teachers and support staff who work well together and are recognized, supported and appreciated by their leadership; creativity and people willing to take risks; teachers who really love to teach and who believe that what they do is transformative. Your school as it is operating today would be successful with or without the looming cudgel of API/AYP, although indeed those might be things that work to motivate and focus. Schools that operate like yours does now have always been successful, even with large numbers of ELL and poor kids. They have also been all too rare. NCLB has done nothing to change that–they are still all too rare, even in your own district.

That said, I’m a standards-kind-of-gal. Standards keep my teaching focused. They give me something to measure my teaching against. They have never sapped my creativity. I also love tests and assessment. I give them quite often…all kinds of tests: multiple-choice, free write, project-based, holistic. Assessment and accountability for what I do in my classroom doesn’t scare me in the least, in fact, I agree with Dan it is essential component of my professional competency.

But let’s also look at the reality of what happens in schools all over California as they prepare for the state standards tests and the exit exam. With the requirement that 95% of enrolled students be tested, charters start dumping kids for any number of reasons and don’t really have to tell anyone why. Publics dump kids who have been gone for 45 days. Extrapolating from what happens in my district, these are not small numbers of kids, but in a state that in ten years of trying still hasn’t figured out how to track students as they move from school to school, district to district, or drop-out altogether, we have no real idea how many kids are being left behind.

This is why I’m not as alarmed as you, TMAO, by the number of folks in your master’s class who cited poverty as a reason for the achievement gap (NCLB is another matter). They’re not wrong. But what we do from there is the rub. Effective school and district leaders, in my estimation, need to recognize what poverty means in terms of the services and programs schools need to offer, the funding decisions schools and districts need to make and the type of teachers and staff they need to hire. They also need to be willing to lobby at higher levels to help frame the political discussion and really begin to affect public discourse. The students at my school who disappear are almost all in very dire straits–my best teaching and the best teaching of my very good colleagues (I know only a few teachers who have embraced a culture of abdication) are sometimes still not enough to keep them coming to school on a consistent basis.

I’ll end this too long comment with Chris’ quote: “Let’s keep the debate going, let’s keep demanding better schools, but let’s find ways for the conversation to be richer, deeper and more productive than the conversations that NCLB provides.”

Wow Dan great blog. Thanks so much.

Hey, TMAO,

If we can’t even teach to the test right, how can we demand the freedom and autonomy to teach whatever we want?

I don’t know about you, but when I give an assessment and a huge number of my students fail, I tend to try and figure out what went wrong with the assessment. My first instinct is that I somehow tested the students on something that they weren’t prepared to answer based on my teaching, and I base my teaching on my assessment of my students’ needs. So it becomes a question of Did I assess crucial knowledge in a way that makes sense with the ways in which that knowledge was imparted/arrived at?

If, on the other hand, I give an assessment at which most of my students succeed (and success can be interpreted in many ways), I feel as though I have given a real assessment of what they know. And I now know what they know, what they still need to learn or discover, and how quickly we can move on.

If “teaching to the test” isn’t helping more students pass the test, and thus show that more teachers and schools are doing their jobs, and if so many teachers are really trying to teach to the test, I wonder if that means these tests can’t be taught to.

Hi TMAO,

Yes, we do agree. Poverty is the mountain. There are others too, of course, but poverty is probably the most profound. Can we get across that mountain? Of course. But we have to at least acknowledge quite forthrightly that it’s there. We are in quite a state of denial about this at this time in our history …and there are many deniers who have fashioned themselves as prominent ed policy experts.

That’s why I do think it probably is nitpicking for you to bemoan the fact that your colleagues want to “list poverty first, but not the insufficient response.” (I’m having a hard time understanding where you’ve encountered the culture of abdication you talk about. It certainly can’t be prevalent at your school. Have you taught elsewhere and found it so? If that’s the case, you were wise to get out. Your masters class? I’m asking not be a smart ass, but because I really don’t find this to be a prevalent trait among the teachers I’ve encountered in my still rather young career.)

Do folks really want to avoid discussing insufficent responses? Maybe they just don’t know how to have this discussion. Are you simply assuming abdication on their part because you don’t like their responses to what might be a rather lame assignment in your masters class (and what is almost always the lame and shallow way we discuss public policy in this nation at this point in our history). Why not ask this: Yes, poverty is a major obstacle. Now, how can we as teachers and aspiring administrators best respond to the circumstances? Don’t bemoan. Speak plainly and steer the discussion. We so very rarely ask each other questions like this–whether it’s about education or energy or much else. Folks working in schools that don’t resemble yours probably don’t get much of a chance Most of our leaders certainly don’t challenge us. As a result, we all probably need a little practice and sense of good faith.

Two quick comments: I thought Dan’s comments on Sarah’s blog entry were perhaps a little rude, but his questions were valid and deserved an answer. Yet, as Dan has reiterated his questions several times over several blog entries and again in comments, it seems he has yet to receive a satisfactory response.

In terms of ideology or teaching philosophy, I think I’m in the opposing camp, rather than Dan’s, but what concerns me is that the two camps seem to have so much trouble talking to each other. It’s like ships passing in the night.

On the other hand, I think Dan is a little naive, and needs a little perspective. There are such things as schemes that are intended to SOUND like they are solving the problems, while actually being designed to EXACERBATE them. I suspect that many who are sceptical of NCLB are those who have been around a while and seen things like this (yet another “back to basics” campaign) come and go so often that they can see the political machinations behind them.

I wouldn’t assume that everyone (or anyone) who has reservations about testing is a lazy bum who doesn’t care about their students and doesn’t want to be held accountable. They may just know something that you don’t. The whole debate may be about more issues than you think it is. Keep an open mind, be cool, and don’t be an asshole.