standards-schmandards

A great friend and brilliant educator recently shared this frame for learning with me - it is about observation, reflection, documentation, and exhibition. This is powerful. It fits well with the beginnings of learning, where each master taught their student according to that child’s unique shape, ability and needs. He or she realized that their pupil would eventually replace them as master, and acted and taught accordingly. Each apprentice paid attention, was engaged and focused, because this was the real world, and they easily saw themselves as adults doing this work. Learning happened.

In time, the shape of learning "evolved" to the point where “schools” were built. They may have begun teaching religion or language, but they soon expanded to contain many masters, each tasked with creating proficiency in their particular subject. As schools grew, overseers defined “a complete education,” and students were required to complete a rigorous and structured process, accomplish a specified result, and then “credentialed” to move forward – either to further education, or the workplace.

This new shape of learning was deemed “better” because it allowed teachers to reach many students at once, and it freed the “value creators” (the original masters) to focus on their work without the "distraction" of apprentices. In time, the politically-anointed “overseers” of the these schools identified “core” skills that could be "extracted" from original subjects, and taught independently of any craft or discipline (carpentry, medicine, farming, etc.). These core skills, literacy and numeracy (which in a bizarre fit of illiteracy are referred to as the "3 Rs"), were deemed of greater importance to educational success (both institutional and personal) than proficiency in a given craft.

The present day education system has "progressed" to the point where teaching is highly specialized, a big part of curriculum is focused on these "core" skills, and in the spirit of scale and mass production, school systems also have an objective and common way of assessing proficiency. Relative performance is deemed to matter more than individual need, ability, or potential; and schools, teachers and students alike are measured on the basis of student performance. "They" have found a "fair" way to do this - it is called Standardized Testing.

Standardized Failure

Each State in America for example has its own standardized tests to judge aggregated student performance. This then translates to how schools get funded, and how teachers and administrators get paid. As anyone would, teachers are forced to make sure students are taught exactly how to do well on the tests. Moreover, the State overseers, knowing that Federal funding depends on performance, have lowered the bar to raise pass rates. The result is embarrassing; students have "passed" these standardized tests, but not learned anything. More than a third require remediation if they are even able to get accepted into college or university in the first place. Worse, despite lowering standards, student achievement has not improved, class participation and attendance are declining, and most of the students and even some of the parents no longer respect the institution.

In effect, teachers are required to treat students on a "micro" basis, so that they have the specific tools to pass their test. There is very little scope or latitude for the teachers in the mainstream school system to create a complete, integrated learning experience with project-based outcomes, like High Tech High for example where students actually publish books, owning all aspects (writing, photography, editing, layout, production, etc.), or Seattle Girls' School, where the students conduct a full simulation of a mission to Mars (from the press conferences to space station docking to landing on Mars), and what many other charter and choice schools do around the country. This "macro" idea of treating a student as a complete person, building an integrated curriculum that develops core skills but also does so much more (create a broader, real world context and deeply engage the student) is simply not possible in the micro-brained-standardized-testing public school system.

But it's actually worse than this - the process of teaching (again a reaction to the tests) is also an issue. Because each teacher is measured on the performance of the student in their class, they in effect compete for the students' attention against other teachers in the school, making the student the victim of this mess. The teacher does this against their better judgment because they understand that rote/memorization/etc. is not true learning, but it is the way their curriculum is developed, and what they're told is the way to create students that pass tests.

Standardized tests are arbitrary judgments that move based on political and economic will and not academic efficacy or the best interests of the student. They force a micro-mentality that is not dissimilar to worst of the commercial world.

Shape of Things to Come?

Is the American education system unique? How about the American automobile industry? Their equivalent of standardized testing is the EPA and trade protection. Knowing that the Big Three couldn't compete directly with foreign companies given their manufacturing (in)ability and the burden of their union contracts, they changed the nature of environmental protection (ostensibly safeguarding best interests of their citizenry) to deem "light trucks" (which are the most profitable segment of the Big Three's portfolio) exempt from emission standards! By allowing the Big Three to blithely continue to produce badly-engineered products and marry them to incentives to make them even more attractive, they solved a problem in the short term, but as the last months have shown, the lasting effect is bankruptcy, job loss, and a massive increase in the nation's carbon footprint.

This cutting your nose off to spite your face approach is a mirror to standardized testing. Combine recent studies that show how uncompetitive American students are vs. their counterparts abroad; the relative power of the union bases; the ease with which politicians "game" the system by altering standards for convenience; and worst of all, the de-funding of schools due to the economic downturn, and you have a perfect storm that is portentous of a dire and ominous fate for Edu Americana...

"I'm not dead yet!"

Want more proof? Can you think of the most pervasive implementation of standardized testing in America? I say it's drivers' licensing. Theirs includes both a written exam and a practical street driving test. Almost every American over the age of sixteen has taken this particular test.

How successful do you think it's been? Do you think Americans are good drivers? Are they safe drivers? Are you TOTALLY confident as a pedestrian, passenger or driver that all the other drivers on the street are completely safe, trustworthy and predictable because they successfully completed their standardized test?

Life and Death is NOT Standard

Now think of your police or fire department, the military, and even your physician. What does their training look like? Are randomly-created and arbitrarily judged standardized tests their approach to creating successful graduates? Emphatically no! They are all required to observe both theory and practice, reflect and understand how things actually work, document their understanding and insight, and then extensively exhibit their proficiency in simulated or real-world settings that provide their masters with the ability to not only judge success, but also fine tune to create proficiency.

When it really matters, we do have a pretty good way of educating people for certain disciplines. There are schools that work this way in this country. Two that I've had the pleasure of visiting are High Tech High in San Diego and Seattle Girls' School; there are others (though not enough others). If you are nearby do visit them - you will be blown away.

Why then are all our children not educated this way? Why then do we resort to standardized tests that are proven failures? We must all rise together to emphatically decry this approach to education "oversight" and implore our politicians to finally do the right thing.

Are there better ways, I think so. This, this and this are where I would start.