No, this post isn't about choices on a ballot, although it could be. The connections are unmistakable, and I've often wished for a "none of the above" choice. This time, though, it's the title of a piece in Newsweek by Anna Quinden.
Painfully humorous, delightfully sarcastic, she's taking the standardistos to task. You know, the ones who want standardized tests to justify every self-serving, destructive policy they enact. Finally, more and more people are beginning to connect the dots between the school test score mandates under NCLB and the shaping of the way future voters think, or don't, and the whether or not they bubble obediently on their ballots, rather than voting outside the box.
As an educator, I say thanks, Anna Quindlen. I hope the rest of the world is listening, too.
<snip>
Feb. 20, 2006 issue - The presidential commission is allegedly concerned about analytical skills, although one of its members runs a big test-prep company, which my analytical skills tell me means he has a vested interest in more testing. But testing the capability of college students surely isn't enough. If, as the commission suggests, colleges and universities are under pressure to prove their worth because they're pricey, Congress clearly has something to prove.
A few ground rules for standardized testing for members of the House and Senate: test-prep fees cannot be paid by lobbyists. No one can accompany the legislator into the testing room—no press secretaries, no aides, no special assistants in charge of health-care policy. Health-care policy won't be on the test anyhow because there are no clear answers to any question. There will, however, be a math portion for those legislators who think you can increase spending, cut taxes and yet still bring down the deficit. They'll be able to use their calculators. Their magic calculators.
The president has a lot on his plate, so he will be asked to take only the same achievement tests that American high-school students already take. European and American history, and maybe biology, so that he can have an introduction to pure science, as opposed to the political kind. He should probably also take the new SAT writing sample: "Benjamin Franklin once said, 'Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.' Discuss, using examples from your own foreign or domestic policy."
Think of all the job creation going on here: test writers, test monitors, test graders. And what about the underlying lesson learned, that it doesn't matter if you really resonate to knowledge, only if you can manage to spit it back over the course of a single, long, tedious session? That should be useful in much of the work world. Naturally, the commission must be tested as well, perhaps with this short essay question: "In recent years learning is said to be plummeting while at the same time the use of standardized testing is skyrocketing. What's the point? Discuss."http://msnbc.msn.com/id/11298636/site/newsweek/page/2/
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