BCT Editorial – 8/21/06

This page was last updated on August 26, 2006.

Testing; Editorial; Beaver County Times; August 21, 2006.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“Sanity finally may be coming to the test-test-test mentality that in recent years has dominated what passes for education reform in America.

“The Associated Press reported that after years of building steam, the drive to make students pass a test to graduate from high school has stalled.

“Not a single state adopted a new graduation-exam requirement in 2006, and no other states are thinking about doing so. In fact, Utah even took a step back, abandoning plans to withhold diplomas for children who failed its test, the news service reported.

“One reason states are pulling back from the testing brink is fear of failure. Utah dropped its plans once it became evident that many students were going to flunk the test, and Utah usually does well on standardized tests.

“What’s happening now is just a preview to what is likely to take place in 2014. That’s the year the federal No Child Left Behind Act has targeted for every child to test proficient or better.

“Without a significant amount of fudging, it’s not going to happen.

“Let’s hope this pause in graduation testing marks a step toward a common-sense approach that will be grounded in the understanding that any successful change must address children’s educational, familial and societal environments.”

[RWC] It should be no surprise a liberal media outlet would oppose measuring the effectiveness of a government program via testing. After all, to a liberal, results don’t matter, only intentions. In the eyes of the Times, as long as public education has good intentions – itself a debatable topic, that should be enough.

Regarding the “educational, familial and societal environments” BS, that’s the kind of “common-sense approach” that gave us the likes of “new math” and classrooms without walls. Don’t get me wrong. There’s little a teacher can do if a kid’s parents aren’t engaged. It’s the idea we need to make sweeping societal changes for education to be successful I find to be BS. It’s only an excuse.

While education requires effective teachers, there’s nothing complicated about educating children. If you listen to the Times, however, you would think teaching is more complicated than splitting the atom.