Education suffers from so much test-based accountability

[tonysam]

A voice in the wilderness, since this person knows what she is talking about:

There is a simple reason our child poverty, school failure and incarceration rates are higher than any other country in the world: We have not chosen to provide the health, education and welfare supports for our poorest children that other countries have provided. Millions of youth continue to get sicker, poorer, less well educated, more depressed and angry. Meanwhile, the rest of the world looks on, wondering why we don't care for one another when we are so generous in coming to the aid of earthquake victims in other countries.

Politicians are complicit in leaving children behind when they fail to represent us and instead side with their corporate sponsors. After standing with hundreds of people at health care vigils and rallies who do want comprehensive health care for all people, I know politicians do not represent us when they say we do not.

Having talked with many parents, teachers and students, I know that politicians who push for more testing, standards and competition, rather than high quality, holistic, personalized and engaging education in our schools are not representing us.

They are selling out to profiteering testing and curriculum corporations, and obstructing the function of education, described well by the Rev. Martin Luther King: "to teach one to think intensively and to think critically ... intelligence plus character."

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[ananda]

1. All so sadly true.

nt

[stray cat]

2. How should we evaluate whether students are learning to think sufficiently

to engage an educated world wide community?