High Stakes Standardized Tests Help Fuel Drug Company Profits

Don't you just love how the entire education industrial complex is intertwined with  corporations like pharmaceutical companies?  Just think of all the stress, physical ailments and behavioral problems that will result from the continuous test and punish, value added, and merit pay for high test scores education deform can yield. Even the rich kids of the 1% find drugs can help them compete and perform better in high pressure environments.

In a society that values competition over collaboration, privilege over justice and test scores over children's health and well being, what do you expect?

A class in Tae-Kwon-Do or music, or art, or dance, or drama would probably help these kids improve their learning abilities and overall health and emotional well being. However, what would happen to the pharmaceutical company's profits if all those ADHD kids were suddenly actually doing well and didn't need drugs to get through life in the U.S.A.'s version of education reform in 2013?

Until Citizens United is overturned and our elected representatives begin to focus on the best interests of the children, our nation's future will be bleak. These stories about corporate abuse will proliferate, but not on the corporate owned evening news stations on television but online where journalists are still free to report. 

As 2014 begins, watch out for the upcoming battle over net neutrality as the crescendo of voices speaking truth to power is scrutinized more closely by the powers that be and the monied interests.  The only thing that counts these days in this for profit education universe, at the expense of the 99 percent, is how much money Governors like Chris Christie can funnel to his friend's pockets. In fact, Governor Chris Christie's high school buddy caused a major traffic jam on the first day of school as retribution for the Mayor of Fort Lee's refusal to back Christie in the gubernatorial election.  Let's see. How many value added points should we deduct from those schools where the children lost the first day of school as they sat on school buses in traffic for two to three hours?

Luckily, we still have freedom of speech and access to the Internet where most of us educated and curious people get our information. So, sit back and enjoy some real journalism, from real reporters in real media about ADHD drugs and their overuse and abuse for boys and girls who just don't know how to sit for 7 or 8 hours in school at desks filling in bubbles or staring at a computer screen.

As Bill Gates and David Coleman altruistically prepare this generation for sitting at the computer 10-12 hours a day to collect all that data on how their peers, teachers and schools are doing, overprescribing ADHD drugs is a good education strategy for raising test scores.

Merry Christmas. 

From Democracy Now!

But a new report in The New York Times questions whether these staggering figures reflect a medical reality, or an over-medicated craze that has earned billions in profits for the pharmaceutical companies involved. Sales for ADHD drugs like Adderall and Concerta topped $9 billion in the United States last year, a more than 500 percent jump from a decade before. The radical spike in diagnoses has coincided with a 20-year marketing effort to promote stimulant prescriptions for children struggling in school, as well as for adults seeking to take control of their lives. The marketing effort has relied on studies and testimonials from a select group of doctors who have received massive speaking fees and funding grants from major pharmaceutical companies.

Democracy Now! is joined by four guests: Alan Schwarz, an award-winning reporter who wrote the New York Times piece, "The Selling of Attention Deficit Disorder"; Jamison Monroe, a former teenage Adderall addict who now runs Newport Academy, a treatment center for teens suffering from substance abuse and mental health issues; Dr. Gabor Maté, a physician and bestselling author of four books, includingScattered: How Attention Deficit Disorder Originates and What You Can Do About It; and John Edwards, the father of a college student who committed suicide after he was prescribed Adderall and antidepressant medications at the Harvard University Health Services clinic.

Bloomberg-Klein Achievement Gap Miracle Another Mirage

 Anyone can make an honest mistake, but this ain't one of them.  The Bloomberg Team knew exactly what was happening with the manipulations of cut scores in New York, and they continued to spread their propaganda nonetheless.  The lies worked long enough to assure Prince Mike has another term as Dictator of Schools.  From the NY Times:

Two years ago, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and his schools chancellor, Joel I. Klein, testified before Congress about the city’s impressive progress in closing the gulf in performance between minority and white children. The gains were historic, all but unheard of in recent decades.

“Over the past six years, we’ve done everything possible to narrow the achievement gap — and we have,” Mr. Bloomberg testified. “In some cases, we’ve reduced it by half.”

“We are closing the shameful achievement gap faster than ever,” the mayor said again in 2009, as city reading scores — now acknowledged as the height of a test score bubble — showed nearly 70 percent of children had met state standards.

When results from the 2010 tests, which state officials said presented a more accurate portrayal of students’ abilities, were released last month, they came as a blow to the legacy of the mayor and the chancellor, as passing rates dropped by more than 25 percentage points on most tests. But the most painful part might well have been the evaporation of one of their signature accomplishments: the closing of the racial achievement gap.. . . .
. . . .
New York City’s progress in closing its achievement gap on those tests drew national attention as a possible model for other urban school districts. It won praise from President George W. Bush as evidence that No Child Left Behind was working. In 2007, the city won a prestigious urban education prize from the Broad Foundation, which cited the city’s progress in narrowing the racial achievement gap.

But the latest state math and English tests show that the proficiency gap between minority and white students has returned to about the same level as when the mayor arrived. In 2002, 31 percent of black students were considered proficient in math, for example, while 65 percent of white students met that standard.

Handing Over the High School Curriculum to Corporate Control in New Jersey

NJ MISSTEPS ON SECONDARY REFORM PLAN
NEW TESTS, NO NEW RESOURCES
Stan Karp

On April 25, the New Jersey High School Redesign Steering Committee released its long-awaited recommendations for secondary reform in a report entitled NJ Steps: Re-designing Education in NJ for the 21st Century. In a presentation to a joint meeting of the State Board of Education and the NJ Commission on Higher Education, Governor Jon Corzine and Commissioner Lucille Davy outlined a major increase in state graduation requirements, including six new high stakes end-of-course exams that would be required to earn a high school diploma by 2016.

Although the report urges "a fundamental change in public education in the state that will affect students in all grades," the committee did not propose any new resources to support its recommendations. The absence of new funds in a time of tight budgets and continuing controversy over the state’s new school funding formula raised serious questions about how the committee plans to reach its goal of "preparing every student for success." There is also debate about how that "success" should be defined.

Aside from the costs of implementing the plan, education advocates raised concerns about the impact of the proposed tests and standardization of courses on school programs and student options, and about the top-down process that has so far shaped the HS Redesign effort.

End of Course Exams

The plan offers little direct help to the state’s large urban high schools that are already struggling to meet existing state standards and the escalating benchmarks of the federal No Child Left Behind Law. NJ Steps promises "special consideration" to such schools declaring, "The extra supports required by these students...must be front and center of any efforts to raise expectations." However, these supports are not described in detail in the proposal or backed with committed resources.

By contrast, the new standards and tests are outlined in charts and timelines that leave little room for alternative visions of reform. To receive a high school diploma, students would be required to take and pass end-of-course exams in Language Arts, Algebra I & II, Geometry, Biology and Chemistry. The plan includes references to "individualized attention, more relevant coursework," and "restructured learning experiences." But the heart of the proposal is a largely conventional plan to ramp up traditional academic course work in a "one-size-fits-all" framework that will be difficult to impose and costly to implement.

As a report on exit exams from the Center on Education Policy notes:

"The direct costs of developing and administering the tests themselves make up a tiny fraction of the total costs of implementing an exit exam policy. The bulk of the costs go toward other ‘hidden’ expenses necessary to give students a strong chance of passing the mandatory exams. These include remedial services for students who fail, programs to prevent failure, and professional development to upgrade the skills of teachers who must prepare students for the exams....The true costs of an exit exam policy are often invisible to state policymakers, because the expenses are being borne mostly by local school districts—and often by shifting existing funds away from other educational priorities." (“The Hidden Cost of High School Exit Exams,” Center on Education Policy, May 2004)

Currently only 35% of all NJ districts require Chemistry, less than 45% require Algebra II, and less than 70% require Algebra I, Geometry, and Biology. Moving these numbers up to 100% within eight years, as NJ Steps proposes, would require major increases in educational investment. The report acknowledges that "New Jersey is currently facing a shortage of qualified math, science, and special education teachers" and that "Teacher attrition...is especially acute in low-performing, high poverty schools where experienced, expert teachers are most needed."

Under the plan, freshman entering high school in September 2008 would need to pass tests in Language Arts, Algebra I and Biology to get a diploma. Two years later, Geometry and Chemistry would be added. The following year’s freshman class would also have to pass an Algebra II exam.

Advocates for vocational ed programs are concerned that required courses will squeeze out the applied electives and practical real world training that attract students to such programs. Others are concerned that an expanded system of high-stakes exit tests will negatively affect graduation and dropout rates, especially if they are not matched by dramatic improvements in secondary programs and performance. Currently, New Jersey has the nation’s second highest graduation rate according to Education Week. Neighboring New York state, which adopted a similar series of tests several years ago, is number 40.

American Diploma Project

Although the plan was presented by the New Jersey High School Redesign Committee, its origins lie in the American Diploma Project (ADP) sponsored by Achieve, Inc. Achieve is a national educational consulting group created by business leaders and the nation’s Governors to align K-12 curriculum with the needs and expectations of the business world and higher education. Art Ryan, retiring CEO of Prudential and a national co-chair of Achieve, has been a leader of the NJ effort. Ryan, Corzine and Susan Cole, the president of Montclair State University, are co-chairs of the Redesign Steering Committee. According to NJ Steps, the "ADP benchmarks have become the foundation for change and redesign of high schools in New Jersey."

In August 2006, the HS Redesign Steering Committee was formed with representation from the state’s major professional education organizations, including the New Jersey Principals and Supervisors Association, the New Jersey Association of School Administrators, New Jersey School Boards Association, New Jersey Commission on Higher Education, and the New Jersey Education Association. The Chamber of Commerce and the business-led New Jersey United for Higher School Standards were also represented. Parent and community groups, school-based educators and others were limited to asking questions at a series of public meetings designed to win support for the plan.

Now that the plan has been formulated and endorsed by "New Jersey’s higher education and business communities," it is being submitted to the State Board of Education for approval. The plan also calls for creation of a "P-16 Council" of "key stakeholders to create a seamless, aligned system of public education in New Jersey." The recurring theme of "aligning" the K-12 system from the top-down to meet the needs of higher education and business has sparked concerns that the plan does not represent the full range of interests that public education must serve and could reinforce new types of tracking and other forms of educational inequality.

Secondary Education Initiative

Throughout the process, the concerns of urban "Abbott" advocates been marginalized. A Court-ordered mediation agreement did lead in 2004 to the creation of the Secondary Education Initiative [SEI] which required the 31 "special needs" Abbott districts to develop plans to provide college prep curricula, small learning communities and student/family supports for all middle and high school students. But this effort was consigned to a separate, lesser track in the NJ Department of Education’s since-dissolved "Abbott division" and only belatedly folded into the HS Redesign effort. As it became clear that the Administration was developing a new school funding formula that would eliminate the Abbott framework, hoped-for supports for SEI, including formation of technical assistance teams, inclusion of SEI in district budget planning, and development of a research plan to evaluate the reform, did not materialize.

NJ Steps does pledge to continue SEI and even declares, "with the implementation of the new school funding formula in January 2008, these reforms will be expanded to districts throughout the state." However the substance of these commitments is uncertain and the DOE’s record of sustaining secondary reform, especially in urban districts, is not strong.

NJ Steps says that "with strained local and state budgets, any additional resources will have to be found through strategic reallocations." Yet for nearly 15 years the State has assumed full control of NJ’s three largest urban districts during a period with the highest, Abbott-mandated levels of funding for urban secondary schools in the nation. But little has been accomplished in the way of "reallocation" or sustained investment for secondary reform, particularly in the large comprehensive high schools. When the SEI regulations were first adopted in 2004-2005, four districts were selected as "phase one pilots" to test the assumptions of the plan and apply its lessons to other districts. But only one limited pilot, in Orange, went forward and a systematic evaluation of the results has not been done.

As it retreats from Abbott commitments, the Department is circulating a scaled-back, draft version of the secondary regulations for use under the new School Funding and Reform Act. Where the original SEI regulations required implementation of small learning communities and a defined program of student/family supports, the draft regulations ask districts to pick from a list of "personalization strategies" that include "adult mentoring programs" or "other practices." Substantive elements like a requirement that teacher teams working with cohorts of students over multiple years receive two-three hours per week of common planning time have been removed, (even as NJ Steps declares that: "New Jersey’s schools must design and offer sustained, intensive, job-embedded professional development to enable teachers, superintendents, principals, and supervisors to support high student achievement.")

Unfortunately, these are signs of the recurring pattern of reform failure. New plans drop from the sky without summing up the lessons of previous ones or addressing the real experience of school communities with past reform efforts. Those parts of the plan that can be moved "on paper," such as standards and tests, are adopted by the State, with increasing detail and prescription, in the name of "accountability" and "higher expectations." But the more difficult efforts to build local capacity that can address issues of school climate, improve professional practice and create inclusive, credible process don’t receive the sustained attention and resources needed to put them in place. The rhetoric of "higher expectations" substitutes for the real changes needed to achieve them.

There are too many examples of this in NJ Steps. In proposing that Chemistry, now required by just 33% of all NJ districts, be made mandatory for all students, the report says, "The Steering Committee recognizes that a Lab Chemistry course, as it has been traditionally taught, would require facilities that may not be available in many schools for dramatically increased numbers of students." Yet instead of linking this recommendation to the need for equalizing educational opportunity, the report cites ways "to reorient how Chemistry is taught so that extensive capital investment by districts may not be required." Such approaches raise doubts among educators, parents and equity advocates about the real intent and potential impact of the plan. A plan that relies so heavily on "raising expectations" through high-stakes exams has a special obligation to address the true costs of passing them.

New Jersey is in urgent need of a robust reform effort that promotes multiple pathways to success for an increasingly diverse student population. But such an effort must rely less on state standards and high-stakes exams and more on credible resources, school-based change, and an inclusive, collaborative reform process. Unless the NJDOE and the HS Redesign Committee heed the lessons of past rounds of failed reform, this new plan could do more harm than good or be "dead-on-arrival" in the schools and communities that need reform most.

For more info contact skarp@edlawcenter.org.

Prepared: April 30, 2008

Copyright © 2008 Education Law Center. All Rights Reserved.

More dropouts? You bet. What is going to help the tens of thousands of poor kids pass multiple exams, the ones who can't pass the current single high school graduation test? "Thowed away."

One curriculum "choice" for all, no excuses, no ifs, ands, or buts? You bet--that's what the economy of scale demands.

The arts and music and history and constitutional government? If it can't be used to pump consumption in the global economy, who cares?

What's it all based on? Propaganda from the Fordham Foundation and Manhattan Institute. There is not a single refereed source in all of the Report to substantiate any of the proposed actions.

Where is environmental awareness in this Exxon/Mobil science curriculum that ignores the approaching ecological calamity? Nowhere in sight.

Where are the university schools of education in this discussion? Waiting for their marching orders.

Where was the NJEA as all this was unfolding? Right up there in line at the same feeding trough. Ditto for the NJ School Boards Association.
JH

__________________________

Published and unpublished commentary or essays from educators, parents, grandparents, students, and even politicians and other bloggers will be considered, too.

Please send your post as a Word attachment, include your name (no pseudonyms, please), return email, and phone number. I will, at your request, post your entry anonymously if you indicate that is what you prefer.

Save the Republic and the Earth,
Jim Horn
ontogenyx@mac.com

Confusing Rigor With Rigor Mortis in High School Reform

A new paper by Professors Grubb and Oakes calls out the Business Roundtable agenda for taking over American high schools. Here is the Executive Summary. Download the entire paper (pdf) here.

‘Restoring Value’ to the High School Diploma:
The Rhetoric and Practice of Higher Standards

W. Norton Grubb, University of California, Berkeley
Jeannie Oakes, University of California, Los Angeles

Executive Summary
A new wave of commission reports since 2004 has attacked the high school and called for its “reinvention.” Four themes emerge from the fray: that standards and rigor are too low; that the high school has lost its relevance, particularly to future employment; that the high school is inequitable; and that the high school is simply boring.

The movement for standards and rigor has generated the most response, especially in higher state graduation requirements and exit exams. The case for high standards rests, in part, on two arguments. One is that economic catastrophe and competitive decline await the nation unless rigor is enhanced. A second and more persuasive case is simply that all too many graduates—and certainly dropouts—lack the competencies necessary to be successful in postsecondary education or to be competent workers, civic participants, and community and family members.

In formulating solutions, the major commission reports promote standards on the apparent assumption that rigorous assessments, including exit exams, can motivate students and teachers into improved learning and performance. Yet proponents of higher standards and rigorous testing have little to say about how their imposition will enhance student performance generally.

To some extent, the arguments for rigor are simplistic. Two conceptions of rigor are dominant: test-based rigor, requiring higher scores on conventional tests; and course-based rigor, requiring more demanding courses (like Algebra II and AP courses). However, these conventional academic conceptions neglect several other conceptions of rigor: as depth rather than breadth; as more sophisticated levels of understanding including “higher-order skills”; and as the ability to apply learning in unfamiliar settings. In addition, while promoters stress “college and workplace readiness,” in fact very few strategies link to the workplace. Ultimately, these arguments really call for high schools to do a better job of college preparation.

Recent legislation has forced the translation of rhetoric into practice. Most states have increased their graduation requirements, and half the states have adopted exit exams. With very few exceptions, both graduation requirements and exit exams replicate the conventional academic curriculum of the late nineteenth century. In addition, most state exams are written at the seventh- to ninth-grade levels—not at what proponents would label as high standards. The conventional response to student failure has been to provide remediation, an approach that also undermines learning beyond basic skill levels and narrows the curriculum to a few tested subjects, and which may have even contributed to lowering standards and reducing graduation rates.

Overall, then, the push to enhance rigor and standards behind the high school diploma is seriously flawed. Moreover, any gains come at the expense of other goals for high school reform, including equity, curricular relevance, and student interest. A more promising approach to reshaping the high school involves pathways, structured around a coherent theme, either broadly occupational or non-occupational. Focus on a single theme nurtures multiple concepts of rigor. Moreover, the approach distributes responsibility for standards throughout the educational community, and it provides students with the benefits of curricular choice and several routes to graduation.

We recommend, then, that:

• Proponents of standards consider conceptions of rigor aside from the conventional test-based and course-based conceptions.

• The uneven application of standards be more seriously examined. High standards are already present in the best high schools, but many other schools, especially in urban areas, lack the capacity to meet high standards. The central problem is therefore one of inequality, whereas the movement for standards has largely neglected the issues of raising achievement for the lowest-performing students.

• Alternatives to the conventional academic program be more seriously considered, partly as ways of achieving more than one goal of the high school reform movement. In particular, fostering multiple pathwaythrough high school provides opportunities for developing multiple conceptions of standards as well as distributing the responsibilities for standards to a broader group of stakeholders.

If our society continues to focus only on standards defined in conventional academic ways, it seems destined to continue the cycle of “reforming again and again and again,” with incomplete reforms in one period leading to further critiques and still other reforms in the next—the pattern of the high school reform merry-go-round since the 1890s.