For the Kids
Another cheating scandal broke yesterday. Another Superintendent of public schools fired and this time indicted as well. Another example of the misguided policy that passes for education reform. This one could serve as a textbook example. (pun intended) This one featured the deliberate erasing of answers and changing wrong answers to correct ones. Imagine a principal calling in a select group of faculty, calling them the "chosen ones" and then secretly meeting to doctor up the test results. Bad enough right? But then, there is money involved too. Don't forget that the dunderheads that advocate this kind of high stakes testing also advocate merit pay for teachers who achieve high test scores and schools that improve dramatically. Some drama. In my view, the real tragedy is the testing itself. Testing is not teaching. If so much time and energy is spent trying to get students to regurgitate measurable bits of information,