EDUCATIONAL MEASUREMENTS: I AM SO SICK OF IT

This was in today's Times. It looks like the DOE is putting yet another quantitative spin on education.

I suppose the idea is: if you're going to test the students you might as well test the teachers.

But come on.

This makes me sick. How do you measure the art of teaching. How do you quantify a teacher's contribution to a student's life. Do you get points for being inspiring? For explaining things clearly? For being patient and illuminating? How about insight and encouragement?

How do you measure that stuff?

Sure, these tests will reveal something worth knowing. And it some cases they reveal inadequacies in a particular teacher's methods. But I am so sick on this reliance on tests, which is dehumanizing and gross.

It's also a waste of time and just one more bit of busy work that takes teachers and students away from what they should be doing: TEACHING and LEARNING.

New York City has embarked on an ambitious experiment, yet to be announced, in which some 2,500 teachers are being measured on how much their students improve on annual standardized tests.

The move is so contentious that principals in some of the 140 schools participating have not told their teachers that they are being scrutinized based on student performance and improvement.

While officials say it is too early to determine how they will use the data, which is already being collected, they say it could eventually be used to help make decisions on teacher tenure or as a significant element in performance evaluations and bonuses. And they hold out the possibility that the ratings for individual teachers could be made public.

“If the only thing we do is make this data available to every person in the city — every teacher, every parent, every principal, and say do with it what you will — that will have been a powerful step forward,” said Chris Cerf, the deputy schools chancellor who is overseeing the project. “If you know as a parent what’s the deal, I think that whole aspect will change behavior.”