I think in some programming languages (and maybe even in math, itself, I guess) you could call that an expression that evaluates to ‘true’ or ‘false.’
Cory,
I think the signifiers - “taxpayer,” “citizen” - are rather slipperier than you suggest. For instance, “client” might refer to a person in one form of interaction with the state (it’s becoming increasingly common in higher education, social services, and health services fields, for example); however, a person talking to their elected representative - a rep. who might otherwise broadly subscribe to the neoliberalist policies and practices you mention - might very consciously refer instead to that person as a taxpayer or citizen.
At the root of high stakes testing and the common core, amongst other neoliberal state practices, is the atomization of communities into individualized units - the dividing of sociocultural practice into discrete, identifiable and measurable transactions regardless of whether and how those units become labelled (taxpayers or clients or citizens or something else). The vilification of teachers’ unions is symptomatic of this alienation, which denigrates any sense of cooperation relating to common good or social purpose. “Common” core; what an ironic set of values. Social value does not - should not - lend itself to simplistic, numerical measurement.
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I’m surprised nobody has mentioned the critique offered by Ken Robinson:
It picks up on many of the points Cory makes.
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I taught in the NYC public schools for a couple of years, and the second year, during our end-of summer teacher prep session, there was a presentation by a Kaplan representative who came in to introduce the new ELA curriculum, which consisted of a Kaplan test prep book. Cover to cover, it was a set of short, meaningless, context-less passages with multiple choice questions. The rep was sure to let everyone know “do not cherry pick from this to supplement your lessons, to be truly effective, you have to do every lesson, in order, every day.” It was a dark day. I had an administrator who was the kind of person to visit all the kids homes, and make real relationships in the community, but she also played a hell of a game with standardized testing. She was rumored to have worked with her legislator buddies to get certain projects zoned out of her school to boost her test score, and renamed the school to something reflecting the meteoric rise of test scores in the school. Needless to say, I never heard a peep from her over the Kaplan visit. The games these money-for-standardized-test-scores introduce is corrosive and horrible.
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I’m not a fan of “teaching to the test”, but I struggle of thinking of a way of measuring progress without some sort of testing. I mean, you can’t improve something without saying why it’s not working or showing that your attempts to improve are actually working. Oh course, I don’t mean tying money into test outcomes (teacher bonuses, school budgets, etc) as that gives incentive to cheat.
I mean, ideally, you teach random groups of students with different techniques, follow them during their entire life, and see if the different methods lead to different outcomes in school, work, love, and life, even life expectancy and health, but that’s hardly practical and would be almost impossible to fine tune your methods.
I know… sorry if I sounded like I was trying to oversimplify. I do realize there is a very large web of factors at play.
it kind of depends on what you want to teach. If you think that education is really just about filling a head with knowledge, then I guess that’s fine. I’ve always thought of it more as being able to teach kids how to learn for themselves. Rote knowledge memorized for a test is going to fail you there.
In my field, learning facts about events in the past is just one part of learning history. There are concepts and ideas that are not really going to fit well into a standardized test. You can only go so far with showing change over time or in understanding how to use both primary and secondary sources through a standardized test. Again, I’m teaching at a college level, but right now, it’s largely freshmen.
And I think the truth is that you can actually teach these skills much earlier than we think is possible. I was talking to a friend of mine, who went to a rigorous private HS, and she was able to have a project where she actually interpreted primary sources. And in another class, they actually dug up a civil war soldier. And kids at the middle school level can read or engage with primary sources, too - think about a book like the Diary of Anne Frank. Or having kids watch a film their grandparents might have viewed in their schools - Duck and cover, maybe.
Testing can be helpful, but if that’s the only goal, where is the education in that? It seems to me, the main thing it teaches them is that they need to know facts, not how to learn.
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They will be well trained for most office jobs then. At least the few that remain after another 20 years of exponential automation of all forms of work. Perhaps they will be able to dust the machines or something.
Any schooling that doesn’t teach the kids how to innovate and be creative in complex and changing work/play/business/science environments is a failure for the kids and for us. We won’t need that many personal care attendants to give us sponge baths in our senescence. It would be nice if at least some of the kids were able to innovate and grow new ideas.
And I had thought that we had already discovered the primary reason that Japan kicks out butt in education is due to a lack of a common curriculum. http://sitemaker.umich.edu/arun.356/structural_differences
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I think it would be great to have alternate methods of evaluation of teachers besides students’ test scores. Fun fact: lots of teachers’ unions have opposed those also. So I’m supposed to assume all teachers are wonderful because I don’t have data because the Wonderful Teachers don’t want data to be collected because… they are embarrassed to show how wonderful they are? Come on. We both know there are crappy, crappy teachers out there. Being a student going through school would be enough to learn that. Being a parent would be enough. I’m not saying all teachers are crappy. I’m saying that when people try to defend ALL teachers from criticism/interference without acknowledging that some of them are doing a terrible job, we end up with terrible policy and more terrible teachers.
I don’t disagree on everything: maybe reducing workloads would help many teachers who are now doing a terrible job do an okay job, or a good job. I agree that the system prefers crap teachers in many cases, and I agree that it’s part of the problem.
Let’s be clear, I’ve known many good teachers who were nothing short of heroic in their efforts, and I’d have no problem if they were compensated like CEOs and given parades. But I think it’s really sad when people group around the teachers doing a bad job with these kind of excuses. How the hell do I think your hypothetical newb teacher should… well, actually, you never finished that sentence, but let’s assume you meant some variant on “do a good job teaching?” Education is way too important for this kind of poor-us thinking; if 25 year olds are not able to be good teachers, then we should fire the 25 year olds and require enough training so that they will be able to be effective in the position they’re being paid for.
You see, in principle, I don’t disagree with the idea that if you find your job overwhelming but you’re rising to the challenge, you deserve to be rewarded like any intense career. If it’s overwhelming and that’s hurting the quality of instruction, you should quit–because there are teachers who are doing excellent work, and we need more of them.
Well said.
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If I recall correctly, the New Math Tom Lehrer was complaining about is the technique most people reading this were taught. Which makes this new technique either New New Math or New New New Math depending on if there was another technique taught in between.
Of course, my technique now is this:
because despite what I was told, I do carry a calculator with me everywhere.
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The debate about administrators / teachers is a good one to have, as the relationship can potentially be complex. Administrators hire teachers, so their priorities have an effect on teacher quality. They also are the people who are doing evaluation, or should be. They should be the ones determining whether lesson plans and teacher effort and quality are serving their children. Administrators in NYC currently do not have to have extensive classroom experience, and I’m sure whatever requirements they have are eroding in favor of requirements of having business experience.
The problem with standardized testing is that it assumes that outcomes are or should be somehow uniform, and are the only thing that can be measured. This takes as a given that there is no way to measure the quality of inputs, i.e. that teachers and their knowledge, skills, talents, personality, empathy and dedication cannot be measured and evaluated. A good administrator can though, and needs to have the skills, knowledge and freedom (funds and authority) to hire and trust good teachers to do their damn jobs. Standardized tests remove administrators, and teachers to some degree, from the equation, and thus the priorities, requirements and in-depth evaluations that would measure whether they are the best person for the job wither and die on the vine, perpetuating the cycle.
Hire smart people, pay them well to do their jobs, give them the responsibility to positively impact children’s lives and and the kids will develop into smart adults. easy peasy.
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But I don’t think anyone has said that. We are saying that instead of focusing on the actions of individuals as the core problem, maybe we should look at the structural problems that reinforce the problem.
If we can’t identify the structural problems, then we can’t fix the actually problems.
My bad! Too many clauses in my sentence and I got lost! 
My point was that a 25 year old is in many ways, still kind of a kid (brains are forming till your late 20s. Veteran teachers are often overwhelmed, especially as the bureaucracy has changed around them in the past few years. How do you expect these newbs, as you say, to be able to stand up and say “this is what i need to do a good job”, when there is an inordinate amount of pressure to perform. Should we ban young people from teaching? No, they can be valuable assets, are less likely to be jaded, and often have the energy to work towards positive change. But, with the ability to work together and have a collective voice (yes through those supposedly “evil” institutions like unions), how the hell do you think a single person can change anything–young, old, man, woman, etc. Helping students get an actual education doesn’t happen like in those heartwarming movies, where one teacher saves a whole class or a whole school. You got the change the structure, or nothing changes, even if some individuals are changed.
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I bristle so damn hard when people say about government services “If I ran my business like the government does, I’d be bankrupt.” Well, there’s a reason we don’t run government like a business. It’s not one. It’s goal is not to maximize profit. It is to make the world better. That can be met with cynical sneers and jeers, as this goal is, at time, laughably far from reality, but it is still the goal. Profiteering from war, poverty, education, and other services has somehow become commonplace and acceptable, even desirable in public discussions. Oof.
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“The rise of standardized testing, standardized curriculum, and “accountability” are part of the wider phenomenon of framing every question in business terms.”
It’s worse than that. The terms used are characteristic of a failing business. You know a company is dying when the executives start talking about “accountability” and “measuring success”, as if these concepts aren’t intrinsic in a functional business.
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That’s why I think federal standards for education is not the way to go.
This is a massive country. One size never fits all.
“Well, there’s a reason we don’t run government like a business. It’s not one. It’s goal is not to maximize profit. It is to make the world better.”
Wow. Just wow.
No, the government’s job is to preserve the rights of the governed. It is the job of the people to pursue their own happiness.
Christ, I am just astonished that this is an attitude.
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Young teachers’ student teaching requirements are also a joke in many cases and mentoring is virtually non-existent. You spend years as an intern and then a few more as a resident before you can cut a person open, but to be responsible to 30-40 budding minds? Take your best crack, kid, we’re pulling for ya! There need to be more discernible levels and permutations of the job of “teaching.” This would solve two problems: The flat “advancement” structure of a teacher, and also the lack of mentoring and coaching. If master teachers could split their time between the classroom and and mentoring, or involvement in curriculum development, assessment and ed administration, we could have a lot richer school, and make better use of our good veteran teachers.
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Yeah, that’s the awesome thing about how much life has improved. We were always told - what about when you don’t have a calculator? Guess, what, I have one and so does everyone around me - all the time.
