Policymakers may convince themselves it’s so. School administrators, hired to sing from a state-issue hymnal, will say it’s so.
Any parent who pays attention will know it’s not. “School accountability,” as the term implies, is not about the students.
From its birth in the 1980s — the immaculate conception in the mind of Ross Perot when tasked by Texas lawmakers — the cult of “accountability” has been based on standardized tests that provide scarce diagnostic help to teachers and the children they serve.
Diagnostics, of course, were not the tests’ objective. They were meant to compare schools and teachers, even when such comparisons were false and defamatory based on populations served.
It’s about the students? Only to the degree that they are props in a hyper-costly state production aimed not at raising their sights toward excellence but focusing on someone’s baseline of competency.
That’s why Colorado parents opt out of the state test, as is their right.
At this point, few of them do. Considering the pressures they and their children face, that’s easy to understand. Remember, though, it’s not about them.
Consider a letter distributed to Weld County School District 6 employees advising what to tell parents who say they don’t want their children taking part in the Colorado Student Assessment Program.
The first reason: “Opting out hurts the student.” How so? In depriving the student of important education? Not at all. In keeping with the spirit of “accountability,” the “what’s in it for you” is wholly punitive — the threat of a “no score” on the student’s permanent transcript. Cursed. Marked for life. You’ll never work in this town again, kid.
The rest of the reasons recited by Weld County Schools are all about things other than the student’s needs — that opting out could hurt the school’s test scores or participation rates, with possible state sanctions to come. It even mentions that the community’s real estate values hinge on schools’ scores.
Home resale — wow. This gives a whole new meaning to “high stakes testing.” One might also worry that sugar beet net proceeds will decline as well.
This type of intimidation motivates Colorado House Bill 1049. Under the measure, which sadly appears to be bottled up in the House, parents or their children no longer would be on the spot in this way. It would change laws that penalize schools or districts that have less than 95 percent participation on the CSAPs.
If “accountability” is about the students, the service offered should earn its way into parents’ hearts by demonstrating it, rather than by threatening them.
Of course, since the system is not geared toward serving the students’ needs, the system couldn’t care less.
That, seemingly, would reside on our shoulders as citizens. State Rep. Judy Solano, a former grade school teacher who is co-sponsor of HB 1049, is one of few voices in the state Capitol speaking up against the absurdity of the system. That absurdity not only includes standards that aren’t anything approximating excellence, it’s also about cost.
Consider: As Colorado struggles to meet its basic needs in any number of ways, it prepares to spend $80 million on CSAP’s next-generation successor. This next test is supposed to be about higher-order thinking, and will be more rigorous. Parents should ask: So?
A test of higher-order skills, one that challenges every student and is diagnostic, is already in place. It’s called the Iowa Test of Basic Skills. Dump CSAP. Save millions. Administer ITBS in the fall (for the expressed purpose of diagnosing each student’s needs) without advance notice to students, without the pressure, and without the teeth-rattling drum roll.
Solano would not be so alone if her cohorts imagined their own children in the stifling, test-heavy environment of policymakers’ own making. What we’ve done is not something one would wish on any student.
Then again, if actions are to be believed, it’s not about the students.
John Young of Fort Collins (jyoungcolumn@gmail.com) is an English instructor at Front Range Community College.
