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1) Next Argument
for Anti-Test Crowd: High Scores Are Bad.
The claims that standardized test scores are
overemphasized and that the tests are being misapplied are arguable, but at
least rational, responses to the latest emphasis on school accountability.
But faced with an American public that seems to be committed to extensive
use of standardized tests, opponents are introducing more radical arguments
that cross into the irrational. For some reason, in the last week a number
of columnists decided to take up the position that higher test scores are
not only crowding out a deeper and more meaningful education, but that they
are actually indicators of a decline in American education. The baldest
statement of this idea appeared in my local newspaper.
In a special column for
the Sacramento Bee, Anthony Ralston, professor emeritus of computer
science and mathematics at the State University of New York at Buffalo,
termed rising test scores the “next disaster in American education.” Ralston
claims that higher scores reflect “the learning of particular skills, often
unrelated to the further study of mathematics and often at the expense of a
broader curriculum that would really prepare students for the further study
of mathematics.” Worst of all, Ralston says, higher scores “give parents a
false sense that the learning of their children is improving when it is
not.”
Ralston even embraces
the internal logic of his own thesis: “Interestingly, just as rising test
scores are sure to mask deepening problems in American education, falling
test scores may be a good thing although few will recognize this.”
He’s got that right.
But among those few are the kids themselves, who will be sure to try out
Ralston’s theory when they get an “F” on their next math test. “Really, Mom,
it means I’m getting a broad curriculum that will really prepare me for the
further study of mathematics.” Mom will readily accept this reasoning and
enroll Junior in the DC Public Schools, whose abominably low test scores
must indicate a veritable Renaissance of true learning. As Junior considers
Harvard, he will attend weekend seminars to learn techniques of lowering his
SAT scores. One method will be to read 30 Days to a More Limited
Vocabulary (Publishers’ Weekly calls it “double-plus good!”).
Ralston’s Law (as it
will be later enshrined in college textbooks) will catch on in other aspects
of American life. The Postal Service will hire only those who can’t remember
zip codes on its standardized test. The FBI will hire only those who can’t
identify suspects on its standardized test. The state will instead certify
lawyers who fail the bar exam. Knowing the location of molars will
disqualify dentists. Contractors’ licenses will be given to those who think
“roof” is something a dog says.
The New American Order
will culminate in the endowment of the Ralston Chair for Applied Mathematics
at the State University of New York at Bizarro. Me so happy, me want to cry.
2) Massachusetts
Union to Consider Anti-War Resolution.
Whoever is behind the anti-war resolution making the rounds of teachers’
unions across the country (see last week’s EIA Communiqué), they
certainly have an obvious strategy in mind: Lobby the affiliates that are
most likely to see things your way, then present their participation to
middle-of-the-road affiliates as evidence of a mass movement on the issue.
Brought to life in the
Bay Area of California, the resolution received the imprimatur of the
California Federation of Teachers and is currently being voted on by
rank-and-file members of the Madison Teachers, Inc., an NEA local affiliate
in Wisconsin noted for being particularly left-of-center. Now the resolution
backers are going for big game: the Massachusetts Teachers Association. The
union’s board of directors will decide what action to take on the resolution
this weekend. The Massachusetts State College Association, which represents
faculty at the state’s public colleges, approved the resolution unanimously
last month.
3) Enjoy the Maple
Heights Strike? Now Pay for It.
Members of the Ohio Education Association endured a large dues increase to
close an equally large budget deficit.
Now the union’s representative assembly will reportedly consider an
additional annual assessment to create a “crisis fund” – shorthand for a
fund that would provide cash to underwrite the costs of local affiliate
strikes in the state.
4) Virginia
Children Suffer Because of Holes in Reporting System.
The headline in the Washington Post
read, “Schools, Clubs Unwittingly Hired Man in Abuse Case.” It appeared to
be an all-too-common story. A teacher whose license was revoked in one state
for improper conduct with a child is found teaching in another state, and
facing new charges involving sexual conduct with children.
No background checking
system is foolproof, and it is an unfortunate fact of life that dangerous
individuals will slip in under the radar. But what makes this case
especially chilling is that the teacher involved didn’t slip in; he was
featured in a number of newspaper stories over the past four years and on
the pages of the EIA Communiqué.
As the story read in
the EIA Communiqué of January 19, 1998: “In Sewickley, Pennsylvania,
sixth-grade teacher Joseph Doherty has been charged with indecent assault of
a 12-year-old boy in his classroom. Doherty and the boy were alone in the
classroom on a Saturday. The charges were filed by police who had seen a
videotape of the assault, taken from a hidden camera installed by school
officials. Police say the videotape shows Doherty and the boy wrestling on
the floor, with Doherty pulling down the victim’s pants several times,
grabbing his buttocks and genital area.”
School officials had
installed the hidden camera in Doherty’s classroom after previous suspicious
activity had been reported. The use of the hidden camera prompted an
immediate response from the Pennsylvania State Education Association. A
union spokesman told the local media that the union had “every reason to
believe that this teacher is innocent and is being singled out because he’s
active in the union.” In later weeks, PSEA would backpedal from that
position, though Doherty’s local union did file a grievance on his behalf.
Criminal charges were
filed against Doherty, but a judge threw them out after viewing the
videotape, stating Doherty’s conduct did not meet the statutory definition
of indecent conduct. Doherty resigned his teaching position, claiming he was
satisfied he “did nothing illegal, immoral or wrong.” His Pennsylvania
teaching license was subsequently revoked.
Doherty’s story was
prominent only in western Pennsylvania newspapers for a few weeks, so it was
understandable that public school officials in Prince George’s County,
Maryland, knew nothing of the incident when they hired Doherty to teach
elementary school in 1999. He was removed from the classroom when a reporter
from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette informed the district of the story.
That phone call prompted Doherty to sue the Post-Gazette. The
Maryland incident, remarkably enough, was published in the May 6, 1999
Washington Post. When a similar case involving a different Prince
George’s employee arose this year, it reminded a Washington Times
reporter of the Doherty incident and the Times mentioned Doherty in a
February 28, 2002 story.
While this seemed to
put an end to Doherty’s public school teaching career, he had no difficulty
finding jobs that brought him into contact with young people. He was hired
by three private schools – one each in Maryland, Virginia and the District
of Columbia. He coached boys’ basketball teams for youth clubs in
Springfield and Braddock, Virginia, and started an Internet-based tutoring
service along with an overnight and weekend child-care service.
Last week, Doherty was
arrested on charges of aggravated sexual battery and indecent liberties
involving two boys, ages 12 and 15, in Fairfax, Virginia, where he held his
most recent coaching position.
The loopholes that
allowed Doherty to move from place to place and job to job are clear. He was
not convicted in the Pennsylvania incident so a criminal background check
turned up nothing. He resigned from his Pennsylvania job before he could be
fired. His license was revoked, but he never reported that fact on any of
his subsequent job applications. All along the trail, everyone can claim he
or she had no way of knowing that hiring Doherty to supervise children
required more than the usual precautions. Yet here was a man making banner
headlines because of his problems. Whatever else he is, Doherty is a
malfunction indicator for a background information-sharing system that isn’t
up to the job.
5) Florida Union
Defends School Choice for Member.
One of the long-standing arguments against most forms of school choice is
that public schools must take any child, while private schools are allowed
to make their own selections. The corollary is that public school admissions
are open and democratic, without the favoritism or arbitrariness that
plagues private schools and public schools of choice.
But as a number of
incidents from across the country have shown, there is a widespread, though
underreported, black market in school choice. Parents who seek to place
their children in better public schools are manipulating and circumventing
the enrollment system, sometimes with the complicity of the staunchest
defenders of that system.
In Pinellas County,
Florida, the school district rescinded an attendance waiver that had allowed
Laura Lindsey to enroll her son, Noah, in the same school where she works as
a teacher. Noah, who is white, is supposed to attend a school that has an
overabundance of minority students, according to a court-ordered ratio.
Twenty-five other district employees also lost attendance waivers. Lindsey
took her case to the Pinellas Classroom Teachers Association (PCTA), which
filed a grievance on her behalf, claiming Lindsey’s choice of school for
Noah is protected by the collective bargaining agreement. An arbitrator
disagreed.
Even more ironic, the
union accused the district of being fearful of civil rights lawsuits and
buckling under to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. “I think the school board
attorney took the path of least resistance when it came time to stand up for
school district employees against the Defense Fund,” PCTA Executive Director
Jade Moore told the St. Petersburg Times.
6) School News
Monitor Now Available by E-Mail.
The readers have spoken. There were a large number of requests to offer
School News Monitor, the top ten education stories of the week, via
e-mail and so it has been done. For those of you interested in being placed
on this new list, I ask that you send your request to
EducIntel@attbi.com in order to minimize confusion between the two
publications and e-mail lists. School News Monitor will still be
posted every Thursday on the EIA web site at
http://www.eiaonline.com/monitor.htm.
7)
Quote of the Week.
“The [Cleveland Teachers Union] had planned to publish the names of [Maple
Heights strike substitutes] in an ad in the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
However, first they offered it to the federal mediator. This move provided
leverage to help settle the strike. Now, the union has printed posters with
the scabs’ names for public display all over the Cleveland School District.
Remember, a scab is defined as a skin crust or plant disease. It is also
someone who fails to support a strike or takes the job of a striking worker.
The lesson is clear. There may be a few of these types of mercenaries, but
they cannot hide. What they did will not be forgotten for many years… if
ever.” – from the December 2 issue of The CEA Voice, the weekly
newsletter of the Columbus Education Association. |
