Real Accountability or an Illusion of Success?

A Call to Review Standardized Testing in Canada

OTTAWA, ON (February 16, 2013) – The Action Canada Task Force on Standardized Testing has just released a report analyzing the place of standardized testing as an accountability measure in Canadian K-12 education systems, using Ontario as a case study focus. “A review of standardized testing in this province and others is not only timely – it’s urgently needed,” says Sébastien Després, a 2012-2013 Action Canada Fellow and co-author of the report. Després explains that when standardized testing was established in Ontario two decades ago, the Royal Commission which recommended the creation of the province’s Education Quality and Assessment Office (EQAO) and the adoption of standardized testing in the province had also recommended that a five-year review be undertaken. Almost twenty years later, this review has yet to be done. Després concludes, “As things stand, the current testing system may or may not be facilitating the achievement of the education system’s range of objectives. A review of this accountability measure should be a top priority.”

Teaching is often said to be “the second most private act in which adults engage” (Dufour 1991) since it tends to take place behind closed doors, away from the view of many stakeholders. In its essence, however, teaching is a public and political act, and is fundamental to the continuing development of a citizenry that drives Canada’s global competitiveness and social and economic prosperity. Recognizing the importance of education, many jurisdictions have turned to standardized testing as a means of ensuring accountability for results. In some circles, this measure has become controversial, as stakeholders – and the public as a whole – are polarized as to whether standardized testing is an appropriate way of evaluating students and the overall effectiveness of education systems in light of their objectives and curricula.

Sébastien Després, a lecturer in Anthropology and Geography at Memorial University of Newfoundland, explains that standardized testing regimes are costly and time-consuming enterprises that can have an important impact on the classroom experience. “We know that not all students are motivated by marks and academic achievement. We also know that when these things are prioritized over others, instruction can become boring, and kids become disengaged.” The report also explores how standardized testing can impact teaching as a profession, and echoes earlier studies that show how an over-emphasis on test scores can diminish teachers’ role in determining the content and methods of instruction, casting teachers as efficiency experts who carry out instruction determined by someone else.

Standardized testing can also shift attention away from the presentation of the full breadth of a given province’s prescribed curriculum, to a narrowed focus on what they measure: literacy and numeracy. This is recognized by the EQAO, who in a recent report highlighted that “What gets measured gets attention.” Task Force member Marie-Josée Parent arranged for specially-commissioned artwork by Montreal artist Josée Pedneault and a short animated film featuring drawings from Winnipeg artist Ben Clarkson to accompany the report, a nod to the damaging effect that standardized testing regimes can have on the teaching of the arts, creativity, collaboration, critical thinking, and a list of other skills and competencies prescribed by provincial curricula. “Recognizing that the means by which we strive to make our education systems transparent necessarily have an impact on these systems is a good first step in a bold direction,” says Després, “and we are hopeful that this recognition will go a long way in occasioning a change in priorities from a focus on test scores to a focus on the ultimate purposes of education.”

To view the report in its entirety, visit: http://www.testingillusion.ca

Task Force Twitter feed: www.twitter.com/testingillusion

Task Force Facebook page: www.facebook.com/testingillusion

Media Contact:

Sébastien Després

Action Canada Fellow (2012/13)

Department of Anthropology, Memorial University of Newfoundland

(709) 334-1166

sebastien_despres@actioncanada.ca

Standardized Coercion

This was written by Sheila Stewart who is a former educator and parent from Ontario. This post first appeared here on her blog. She tweets here and blogs here.

by Sheila Stewart

I recently followed a discussion on Twitter regarding the inclusion of provincial standardized testing outcomes as part of the report card marks in Alberta. Joe Bower (@joe_bower) blogged about it here.

Ever since Ontario’s EQAO standardized testing began I recall assurances that the outcomes would not impact report card marks and classroom assessment. That seems to still hold true for Gr. 3 and 6 testing. However this is not the case for the Gr. 9 EQAO math testing. When my oldest child was in Grade 9 five years ago I was informed that the EQAO did allow for up to 5% of the test outcome to be factored into the course grade. I recall getting clarification on that at that time from the teacher and from an EQAO contact person. Now I am hearing that there has been a further change in this regard – it can now be counted up to 30% of the course mark. It seems to be at the discretion of the school and I have heard about ranges of 5-15% being decided upon and communicated to students and parents. When it was 5% I didn’t hear too much concern from other parents, but I have certainly heard more concern and questions now.

In looking closer at the EQAO website, I came across a research bulletin which confirmed the 0-30% range. It can be found here.

It states that student survey results indicated that students were more motivated to take the EQAO tests seriously knowing that the outcomes could be a part of their course mark:

“The questionnaire results show that students’ knowledge of the EQAO assessment counting has the potential to improve results. Also, approximately 70% of students indicated that this knowledge increased their motivation to take the assessment more seriously.”

Below is the actual question I found from the survey and the results.

Does counting the Grade 9 Assessment of Mathematics as part of your class mark motivate you to take the assessment more seriously?

Here are the responses from students in the Applied Courses:

Yes (10 183) 71%
No (1 629) 11%
Undecided (2 321) 16%
No response/ambiguous response (174) 1%

Here are the responses from the students in the Academic Courses:

Yes (39 082) 74%
No (6 316) 12%
Undecided (6 880) 13%
No response/ambiguous response ( 514) 1%

Complete results of the student and teacher questionnaires can be found here.

What seemed to start out like a small incentive for students to write this test has seemed to become something more. Even though students answered that this is “motivating”, does this make it a sound assessment and evaluation practice? Should we question a little deeper why almost 30% of students in each of the course pathways did not answer yes to the motivation question? Is it a good idea to continue with such “external motivators” for performance in the name of improved results on standardized testing?

Ontario teacher opts child out of testing

Here is a comment left on a guest post titled Alberta Teacher Excuses Their Child From PAT:

I'm a teacher in Ontario, and my eldest daughter is in grade three next year. I've already made the decision that I'm going to opt her out of the grade three testing at the end of the year. I already know how well she's doing, as does her teacher. I already know what she reads and how well, what interests her, what she struggles with. Her teachers know this too. So the test isn't benefitting her or us directly. If it's only being used to pit schools and teachers against each other, to stress them out over a measure they cannot truly control, and to take away valuable exploratory learning in favour of lessons about how to take a multiple-choice test and how to at least try to answer every question, why would I subject my daughter to it?
I'm going to ask her teacher next year if it would be possible for her to spend test-prep periods in the library reading, since she won't be taking the test. Hopefully she'll get the opportunity to explore more books that way and actually learn something of value

Alfie Kohn and Noam Chomsky summarize #edchat

I was pleased to moderate #edchat for April 6. Our topic was:

From an educator's point of view, what should be cut from education budgets when times get tough?

I have a problem with the whole idea of cutting education. I also have a problem with even discussing it. The problem is we are making a rather gross assumption that we must accept the inevitability of budget cuts at all. Alfie Kohn would put it this way:

[We have a] cultural aversion to digging out hidden premises, pressing for justification, and opposing practices for which justification is lacking...

Too many of us, including some who work in the field of education, seem to have lost our capacity to be outraged by the outragous; when handed foolish destructive mandates, we respond by asking for guidance on how best to carry them out.

Even when we do regard something as objectionable, that doesn't mean we will object to it. Indeed, we're apt to see the situation as being like the weather - something you just learn to live with. We may not "accept" (that is, believe) everything we're told by public officials and professionals, but in the other sense of that word, we tend to accept (that is, put up with) what they do.

Indeed, there's no shortage of cynicism about authority figures and powerful institutions. But cynicism, unlike vibrant, reasoned skepticism, actually contributes to passivitiy. People who write off all politicians as "a bunch of liars" are unlikely to become politically active, just as those who say you can " prove anything with statistics" are unwilling to distinguish between better and worse research. For that matter, the statement "everything's bad for you these days" can be used to rationalize easting junk food. These are shrugs not positions. Whereas the skeptic thinks and doubts and in so doing affirms a vision of the way things ought to be, the cynic affirms nothing, takes no action, and ends up perpetuating arrangements that make our lives worse. (Those arrangements, in a neat self-fulfilling prophecy, then comfirms the cynical conclusion that no one can make a difference.)...

When we find ourselves unhappy with some practice or policy, we're encouraged to focus on incidental aspects of what's going on, to ask questions about the details of implementation - how something will get done, or by whom, or on what schedule - but not whether it should be done at all. The more we attend to secondary concerns, the more the primary issues - the overarching structures and underlying premises - are strengthened. We're led to avoid the radical questions. I use that adjective in its original sense: Radical comes from the Latin word for root. It's partly because we spend our time worrying about the tendrils that the weed continues to grow. Noam Chomsky put it this way:

"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical dissident views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate."

Education is a long term investment for the future that should never be cut, regardless of today's economic status. In fact, today's economic crisis should only reinforce how important education truly is. Cutting any investment in education sacrifices long term for short term gains - this is not acceptable.

However, to remain true to Kohn's definition of radical, I want to get radical. No cuts should ever be made to the root of our education system  - the teaching and the learning. However, if we needed to find a place to save money, let's look at the tendrils of our system - standardized testing.

It's time to lance the leeches that take pride in their data-mongering. It's time we expunged the parasites that suck the valuable resources out of teachers, students and parents.

And yet, while teachers talk about photo-copying less, or mailing letters home to only the oldest or only children to save on postage, Deleware is hiring 35 data coaches at a rate of $104,000 ($54/hour) per coach so that they can win Race to the Top money. In other words, we hack away at the tendrils, but the weed continues to grow.

So where do we go from here?

We are lost because we are driven by distractions. The Culture of Public Education has been poisoned. Ironically, teachers are partially to blame because we wait to be told what to do and blindly follow agendas that we don't believe in. Standardized testing and the tougher standards movement has crippled teachers. And until education reform can get these five principles right, we are doomed to waste both financial and human capital.

Finland and Alberta are beacons of hope. Alberta recently eliminated the entire Accountability and Reporting Division while also eliminating the grade 3 Provincial Achievement Test. Ontario has removed the fall report card from elementaries, and we could all learn a lot from the seemingly counter-intuitive paradoxes that make Finland's education system so damn good.

And then there's you. What are you doing to be the change that you wish to see in the world?